The Knight on his Quest: Symbolic Patterns of Transition in 'Sir Gawain and the Green Knight'

Piotr Sadowski, The Knight on his Quest: Symbolic Patterns of Transition in `Sir Gawain and the Green Knight' (Newark: University of Delaware Press; London: Associated University Presses, 1996). 289 pp. ISBN 0-087413580-x. L29.50.

This book on the symbolic meanings of Gawain is an offshoot of two critical traditions: first, myth criticism, and, secondly, `historical criticism' (in D. W. Robertson's sense of 'historical') as exemplified by the work of Hans Schnyder, whom Piotr Sadowski quotes with approval. Sadowski also goes beyond these approaches by using `systems theory'. Not only literary works but also authors and readers can be regarded as interacting systems; and the reaction of systems (abbreviated as R) to a stimulus (S) depends on their ability to respond to stimuli, their 'reactivity' (r). Put in mathematical form: R = r x S. The first chapter, `Problems with methodology', explains the `farreaching consequences' of this theorem:

It means for example that a...