I did my class project on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. At first, I picked it because there was pretty much nothing else to do it on. But now that I've read it, I must admit that I really enjoyed reading it. When at first I started reading, I thought, "Okay--so this game...where is this story going? What in the world is it about?" But once I got further into my reading, due to procrastination on my part, I liked the concepts behind Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
This story has a great emphasis on chivalry. And personally, chivalry is essentially respect, honor, and courtesy. It's pretty much about doing what's right and what's noble. And I think that this code of chivalry would work if this world was colored in black and white and there were lines to distinguish between doing what is right and doing what is wrong. But life isn't that easy. As human beings, we all make mistakes but what makes the difference between good and bad is if we learn from our mistakes. I feel that we should make mistakes, little ones and really, really big ones. How else would we learn? I for one, take into account advice given freely from others, but I never believe them until I have fallen into hard times and seen, firsthand, what a horrible choice I made. As humans, we tend to go through a phase in which temptation stares us in the face, and we fall. I find that that is the only natural way that we grow as a person.
I agree with all of this. We learn from our mistakes and we try to learn from other people's mistakes but we don't really learn from them until we do it ourselves. I love the idea of chivalry but I think that the world makes it so hard to do what's right. I know that just the smallest act of kindness helps a person and brightens their day. So chivalry can be simple, from just helping someone, to big.
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