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Abstract

The late medieval romance poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight has long been a text of interest for medieval ecocritics. Scholarship on the subject frequently rehearses a framework of difference, most locatable in the poem’s narrativization of conflict between the cultural world of Arthur’s court and the natural world of the Green Knight. Though these are interesting considerations of the poem’s ecology, they also reproduce anthropocentric perspectives that pit a cultural “inside” against a natural “outside,” which makes nature an inevitably threatening space. Adapting the scientific premise of ecotones to a literary framework, this thesis argues for the importance of transitional ecologies in SGGK. My approach is in keeping with the principles of fourth wave and material ecocriticism, which increasingly looks at the interconnectedness of human affairs and the natural environment. Using Jacques le Goff’s nature/culture framework, Eleanor Johnson’s writing on wastelands, and Robert Pogue Harrison’s account of medieval forests, this thesis examines the natural landscapes of SGGK and how they intersect, overlap, or stand in for cultural spaces. I argue that the borders between nature and culture are ecotonal, meaning that they are permeable and unfixed. Next, I extend this reading to argue that the animals, humans, and creatures in SGGK also display similarly ecotonal characteristics by reflecting, embodying, or infringing upon one another. I conclude that SGGK presents a complex medieval perspective on the environment, with a particular interest in the subversive possibilities of ecological transition. This thesis proposes that alternative sites of focus for literary ecocritics can generate fuller understandings of medieval relationships with the environment.