<P> The boar - hunting scene is, in contrast, laden with detail . Boars were (and are) much more difficult to hunt than deer; approaching one with only a sword was akin to challenging a knight to single combat . In the hunting sequence, the boar flees but is cornered before a ravine . He turns to face Bertilak with his back to the ravine, prepared to fight . Bertilak dismounts and in the ensuing fight kills the boar . He removes its head and displays it on a pike . In the seduction scene, Bertilak's wife, like the boar, is more forward, insisting that Gawain has a romantic reputation and that he must not disappoint her . Gawain, however, is successful in parrying her attacks, saying that surely she knows more than he about love . Both the boar hunt and the seduction scene can be seen as depictions of a moral victory: both Gawain and Bertilak face struggles alone and emerge triumphant . Masculinity has also been associated with hunting . The theme of masculinity is present throughout . In an article by Vern L. Bullough, "Being a Male in the Middle Ages," he discusses Sir Gawain and how normally, masculinity is often viewed in terms of being sexually active . He notes that Sir Gawain is not part of this normalcy . </P> <P> Some argue that nature represents a chaotic, lawless order which is in direct confrontation with the civilisation of Camelot throughout Sir Gawain and the Green Knight . The green horse and rider that first invade Arthur's peaceful halls are iconic representations of nature's disturbance . Nature is presented throughout the poem as rough and indifferent, constantly threatening the order of men and courtly life . Nature invades and disrupts order in the major events of the narrative, both symbolically and through the inner nature of humanity . This element appears first with the disruption caused by the Green Knight, later when Gawain must fight off his natural lust for Bertilak's wife, and again when Gawain breaks his vow to Bertilak by choosing to keep the green girdle, valuing survival over virtue . Represented by the sin - stained girdle, nature is an underlying force, forever within man and keeping him imperfect (in a chivalric sense). In this view, Gawain is part of a wider conflict between nature and chivalry, an examination of the ability of man's order to overcome the chaos of nature . </P> <P> Several critics have made exactly the opposite interpretation, reading the poem as a comic critique of the Christianity of the time, particularly as embodied in the Christian chivalry of Arthur's court . In its zeal to extirpate all traces of paganism, Christianity had cut itself off from the sources of life in nature and the female . The green girdle represents all the pentangle lacks . The Arthurian enterprise is doomed unless it can acknowledge the unattainability of the ideals of the Round Table, and, for the sake of realism and wholeness, recognize and incorporate the pagan values represented by the Green Knight . </P> <P> The word gomen (game) is found 18 times in Gawain . Its similarity to the word gome (man), which appears 21 times, has led some scholars to see men and games as centrally linked . Games at this time were seen as tests of worthiness, as when the Green Knight challenges the court's right to its good name in a "Christmas game". The "game" of exchanging gifts was common in Germanic cultures . If a man received a gift, he was obliged to provide the giver with a better gift or risk losing his honour, almost like an exchange of blows in a fight (or in a "beheading game"). The poem revolves around two games: an exchange of beheading and an exchange of winnings . These appear at first to be unconnected . However, a victory in the first game will lead to a victory in the second . Elements of both games appear in other stories; however, the linkage of outcomes is unique to Gawain . </P>

Introduction to sir gawain and the green knight