Such a fun read!! This is certainly an underrated work in my opinion. I love Sir Gawain and the Green Knight as much as the first time I read it years ago in the Norton Anthology translation by Marie Borrof. I found this current translation by Simon Armitage easier to read and it does flow very smoothly. However, it doesn't have notes on the botom of the page, so I still used the notes on my Norton Anthology version whenever I needed it. This is a great Middle English long poem written probably around 1400 A.D. by an unknown poet. Fun Fact: According to the introduction by Simon Armitage in his translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the original manuscript is so small it "would fit comfortably into an average-size hand [...]" (9).

This poem tells the story of Sir Gawain, a Knight of the Round Table and King Arthur's nephew. It takes place during Christmas. The knights and King Arthur have a joyous feast when they are interrupted by a Green knight with a Green horse. The Green knight presents them with a challenge to prove their bravery and skill. Sir Gawain accepts the challenge on behalf of King Arthur. According to the challenge, he must strike the Green knight once with the ax and after a year he must go find the Green Knight so he can now accept a strike by the Green knight. Sir Gawain strikes the Green knight with the intent to kill him and beheads him. To everyone's surprise, the Green knight picks up his head, gets back on his horse, reminds Sir Gawain his promise to find him after a year, and gallops away. A year passes and it's time for Sir Gawain to keep his word. As he says in the poem: "[...] I would rather drop dead than default from duty." You must read the rest to find out what happened to Sir Gawain and the Green Knight... Some important values/themes are: Courage, bravery loyalty, friendship, honesty, honor, keeping your word/promises, pride, humility.