<p>Preserved on a single surviving manuscript dating from around 1400, composed by an anonymous master, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight was rediscovered only two hundred years ago, and published for the first time in 1839. One of the earliest great stories of English literature after Beowulf, the poem narrates in crystalline verse the strange tale of a green knight on a green horse, who rudely interrupts the Round Table festivities one Yuletide, casting a pall of unease over the company and challenging one of their number to a wager. The virtuous Gawain accepts and decapitates the intruder with his own axe. Gushing blood, the knight reclaims his head, orders Gawain to seek him out a year hence, and departs. Next Yuletide Gawain dutifully sets forth … His quest for the Green Knight involves a winter journey, a seduction scene in a dream-like castle, a dire challenge answered — and a drama of enigmatic reward disguised as psychic undoing.Simon Armitage’s new version is meticulously responsive to the tact and sophistication of the original — but equally succeeds in its powerfully persuasive ambition to be read as an original new poem. It is as if, six hundred years apart, two northern poets set out on a journey through the same mesmeric landscapes — acoustic, physical and metaphorical — in the course of which the Gawain poet has finally found his true and long-awaited translator.</p>

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (English Poets Series: No. 13)

Literature & Fiction

Gollancz, Israel

Poetry

Developmental Biology (ll)-w/access

Barresi

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the Oxf publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Oxf

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the Oxf publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (English Poets Series: No. 13)

Developmental Biology (ll)-w/access