Essay on Women in Ywain by Chrétien de Troyes

Ywain's selfishness in love surfaces in a different way, and ironically it comes about precisely when Gawain makes his erroneous observation concerning love. Ywain shows how self-centered he is when it comes to his love for Laudine by leaving her just after they are married. If he positively loved her, he would not have been convinced to leave her for the want of action and adventure. Ywain

     The chivalric ideal demanded many things of a knight. To the military ideals of prowess, loyalty, and honor it added the aristocratic ideal of largesse and, with the rise of the troubadour lyrics and romances, the ideal of courtly love. At times a knight could find these demands in conflict with one another. Such is the case with Chrétien de Troyes's romance The Knight with the Lion. In this story, the hero Yvain finds love while pursuing prowess; but, continuing to pursue prowess, he loses that love. In the adventures that follow, he seeks to regain his love. In so doing, he develops true prowess without aiming for it and learns to reconcile chivalry's demands of love and prowess,

In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Gawain was tempted by the lady several times. The first time she came into his room while he was sleeping and he told her that he is not the one she needs and that it was not the right thing to do. After this whole situation, she then gave him a kiss and left. Temptation became one of the main concepts of the story. Gawain was tempted by the lady several times through this journey to the Green Chapel. The second day she kissed him again, but she acted more aggressive. The third day she offered him a ring, which he did not take because he had no gifts to give her. Instead, he accepted the girdle, which broke the vow that he made with Bertilak. Not only was temptation a problem in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, it was also a problem in the stories of King Arthur. His wife, Guinevere betrayed him. She falls in love with Sir Launcelot and commits adultery. Because of this, King Arthur and Sir Launcelot started not to favor each other and their trust

To point out, women unlike men had a more submissive role in the Anglo-Saxon era. In the story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight shows a woman that is seductive toward a man, which is not her husband, but only because her husband orders her to. Thus validating that men had the authority over their women. In the poem this is proven to be when, “The lovely lady came laughing sweetly, / Fell over his fair face and fondly kissed him; / Sir Gawain welcomed her worthily and with pleasure; He found her so glorious, so attractively dressed, so faultless in every feature, her colors so fine” (Line 200-220). The Lady is trying to seduce Sir Gawain, but he rightfully declines her offer. The fact that The Lady is looking so pleased and she is kissing him, that does not seem to interfere with the way Sir Gawain feels about her at that moment. Sir Gawain encounters multiple uncomfortable situations with The Lady when: “For that priceless princess pressed us here so hard… And drove him so close to the line that she left him no choice... But to take the full pleasure she offered but refuses her. (Line 240) Sir Gawain did not want to sleep with The Lady because he did not want to violate the chivalric code. During that time period, men and women had to obey the chivalric code, which was a system of ideas and social codes governing the behavior of knights and gentlewomen. Chivalry brought about an idealized attitude toward women, but it did little to improve their actual position. The chivalric code brought a certain level of respect to the women of that time; even though it did not necessarily change their positions in

Far off places! Daring sword fights! Magic spells! A prince in disguise! Not only are these words lyrics to the song Belle in Beauty and the Beast. They also apply to medieval romance literature, such as described in the book Yvain: Or the Knight with the Lion, by Chretien de Troyes. Two of the main ideas of this medieval romance literature genre included chivalry and courtly love, and these ideas directly reflected the thoughts of the time period. “Sometime around the year 1000 A.D, the empire known as France became the first empire to employ the feudal system (Lecture),” and as a result, a lot of the writing was heavily influenced by what was happening in the world. Yvain was a premier example of this.

From the moment that he arrives at Sir Bertilak’s castle, Sir Gawain is constantly tempted by the flesh of a lady and the thought of survival as well as making decisions between what is right and wrong. During the day, while Sir Bertilak is gone hunting, Sir Gawain must tread a fine line between the virtues of courtly love, a nonsexual concept of love which involves putting women on a pedestal, and the chivalric responsibility of being respectful to his host and his wife. The lady is flirtatious toward Sir Gawain, surrendering herself to him and telling him that she will “contentedly attend to whatever task you set” (Gawain 1214). Sir Gawain plays along with the woman by also surrendering himself to her if only he can get dressed first. By using his wit, he is able to diffuse a dangerous situation full of sexual tension with not only respect for the lady, but also for his host by resisting his sexual urges. This display of chastity shows the willpower of the knight to maintain respect to his host, which is a part of the code of chivalry. On the second day of Sir Gawain’s stay, the lady enters his room in a moral test to “demonstrate the ability of his spirit to govern his flesh” (Blenkner 364-65). Sir Gawain “makes her feel welcome at once” (Gawain 216) in an act of respect. After a friendly kiss, the lady makes a reference to how knights

His characters showed they had freedom and didn't live in this defined world where they were powerless. His exploration definitely reminds readers of the mastery of men but also how quick that can be taken away when women gain supremacy. The wife begins to tell the story of a knight raping a girl as he “sawgh a maide walking him biforn/ by verray force he rafte hir maidenheed” (lines 892-894, p. 302). This therefore shows the forceful nature of men and the powerlessness of a women. But this idea is quickly transformed when the knight’s life in in the hands of the Queen and must beg mercy of her to spare him.

Sir Gawain learns that not everything is black and white and that sometimes one must choose the lesser of two evils. This fact does not make people bad, but rather that sometimes there is no right or good way to go about doing something. For the Knight, he realizes that his behavior and actions toward women are not acceptable and that those who do what is right and stick to their word are rewarded. His reward happened to be that the second woman he made a deal with became his wife, and a beautiful young one at that. Another parallel would be that the male protagonists each grew as a human being. Sir Gawain, for instance, was a naïve but skilled knight when he took the quest. He returned to Camelot a confused and shamed knight, newly aware of his imperfections. Sir Gawain’s quest was one that led him on the path of self-discovery, on the path to becoming a man. The Knight went from being a horrid rapist in the beginning of the tale to being a gentle and lovable husband in the end. His quest helped him

Arthurian legends may seem to only depict knights in shining armor saving damsels in distress or powerful kings with queens sitting idly by their sides, but upon closer inspection, those women were not as delicate as initially portrayed. In fact, there were many influential women who played critical roles in the men’s decisions. Significant ones included the Lady of the Lake, the moon goddess, Morgan Le Fay, the all powerful fairy, and Guinevere, the mere mortal that everybody envied because of her beauty. All three were beautiful enchantresses characterized by being shrouded in mystery, refusing to reveal the true intentions behind their deliberate actions. Yet behind each, there were complex backgrounds of where they came from and how they came to be.

On the contrary, Gawain, who places blame on women for his failures, should be thanking women for his success. More specifically, he should be thanking mother Mary. Mary was the leading lady who guided Gawain through not only his journey, but through the entirety of his life. Gawain’s entire existence revolves around him being a superb knight; this involves being chivalrous and courageous. Gawain’s courage during his journey originates in Mary, for he kept a picture of her in his shield so that he could “stare at Heaven’s / Queen and keep his courage high” (649-650). Mary is the woman who instilled bravery and true knighthood in him. Gawain is immensely reliant on the resilience that mother Mary provides for him and it is clear that Mary is a powerfully positive figure to Gawain. Hence, it is disturbing that Gawain has such misogynistic beliefs yet owes his most valuable qualities to a

The roles shift from honorable or respected to women becoming conniving, manipulative, subservient and greatly lustful towards men. Women in these later works no longer serve the role as just peace-weavers and honorable hostesses. The code of courtly love also becomes complicated throughout these stories as seen in the love affair of Launcelot and Guinevere and how it had serious implications on the kingdom, ultimately unraveling the Courtly Love Tradition. The depiction of women’s lust in the stories portrays them to have a sexual force or power over men which leads to downfalls or conflicts. “The Poisoned Apple,” depicts Queen Guinevere to be irrationally jealous and emotionally reactive as she banishes Lancelot from the court for not giving her the adequate attention after being away so long the quest for the Grail.

Priscila Alvarado Per.6 Women are idealized as objects In the Wife of Bath’s prologue the narrator explains how women are idealized as objects for starters the knight who serves King Arthur raped a woman the queen asked the knight a question and it was “ What is the thing that most women desire?”. The knight was off to his quest he asked every women in town but when he asked he got different responses, some women wanted rich husbands or want to be treated differently. Until he saw twenty naked ladies dancing in the forest a old lady uprounched the knight asking what his problem was.

Throughout the story, Gawain expresses a healthy amount of fear for his life and future. His actions sometimes exhibit this fear, a shown when he flinches and dodges away from the Green Knight’s first real blow. This rejects the idea of a “fearless” knight or hero. Gawain also displays a lack of courteous behavior in that he accepts some of the lady’s advances. He prioritizes the lady’s satisfaction over the proper, faithful behavior he owes to the lord of the castle.

At the end of Medieval literature a new literature was created. Women wanted stories where they could have a role. The women wanted to be treated like queens. This idea of courtly love-where a knight honored a married woman like he would “his liege lord” (Schwartz 1) can be found in Gardner’s translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Sir Gawain must honor such a lady. Because Sir Gawain honors a married woman, he struggles with being an honest and loyal knight.

Most of the women in Romance Literature are damsels in distress, but on the other hand, what if the roles were to reverse? The knight from “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” cries out desperately to the elderly women “Dear Mother, alack the day” (Wife of Bath l, 179); he is trying to seek refuge and trying to pay for one answer from the women by showing distress and hopelessness in his tone. O’Pry-Reynolds Believes that damsels in distress should be the one to make the hero heroic: “the chaste mind, good wife, and lady of the manor provides reason for