Innumerable Stars

Summary: King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table are gathered for a Christmas feast when a strange guest arrives. A massive green man carrying an ax rides his horse out of the bitter winter knight and challenges those gathered to a game. The idea is simple: He will bare his neck and allow one person a single stroke with his ax with the understanding that, in one year's time, he is permitted to return the favor.

Arthur's young nephew Gawain rises to the challenge. He strikes the head from the green man … who then rises, resets his head on his shoulders, and rides off—after reminding Gawain of their date a year hence.

The tale follows Gawain through his adventure to find the Green Knight, where he will be challenged by the forbidding winter, tempted by love, and of course desperate to find a way to win the game and save his own life.

Why Should I Check Out This Canon? Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is one of the masterpieces of Middle English literature. For the literary-minded among you, the poem retains some of the vestiges of early English language, meter, and style during a historical period where English language and literature were increasingly influenced by French such that the poem is like a portal into a lost world. For the rest of you, the poem includes adventure, sex, and at least one beheading with a giant green ax.

Where Can I Get This? Tolkien translated Sir Gawain and the Green Knight from Middle English and it is available in the slim volume Sir Gawain and the Green Knight alongside his translations of the Middle English poems Pearl and Sir Orfeo. The poem contains 101 stanzas and is not a long read. What Fanworks Already Exist? As of this writing, there are 136 fanworks on AO3 tagged with Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. The #gawain and the green knight tag on Tumblr contains fanworks as well. Be aware that they are not necessarily based on Tolkien's translation; there are many translations available and a recent feature-length film based on the poem.