Gawain Questions Essays - Cephalophores, Cotton Library,

Gawain Questions To Be or Not To Be.... A knight To be or not to be... a Knight truly is the question presented through this story, which is a tale of Gawains trials and tribulations on his journey to the Green Chapel. First, before acknowledging Gawain as being or not being a knight, one must first know what a knight is. In reference to the Pentangle a knight or Gawain must be: "... first, he was faultless in his five senses, Nor found ever to fail in his five fingers, And all his fealty was fixed upon the five wounds That Christ got on the cross, as the creed tells; ... That all his force was founded on the five joys That the high Queen of heaven had in her child. ... The fifth of the five fives followed by the knight Were beneficence boundless and brotherly love And pure mind and manners, that none might impeach, And compassion most precious-these peerless five Were forged and made fast in him, foremost of men." (Ll. 640-655) This excerpt from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight demonstrates on what a knight should be when looked upon from the Pentangle mode of being a knight. What pertain to the Natural/Real Realm would be the five senses and five fingers. The five senses part is used to gain knowledge of the world and worldly wage. The five fingers are the deeds that are done. What pertain to the Religious, Spiritual, Christian Realm would be the faith in the five wounds of Christ would be Fealty and Force. Fealty is the faithfulness in the five wounds of Christ. Force or the force in battle is inspired by the five joys of Mary. What pertain to the Chivalric Realm are Beneficence, Brotherly Love & Truth, Pure Mind, Manners, and Pite. Beneficence pertains to the generosity that the knight bestows. Brotherly Love & Truth pertains to the fellowship and truth in which the knight bestows. Pure Mind pertains to the chastity that the knight shows through his encounters with women and their temptations. Manners pertains to the courtesy that the knight shows to the people that he comes upon. Pite, or piety, pertains to the compassion that the knight shows when he encounters different situations. (GP) The narrator defines Gawain as being: "... in good works, as gold unalloyed, devoid of all villainy, with virtues adorned in sight." (Ll. 633-635) This basically states that he was a model of a good guy. He kept himself out of trouble, we know this by reason of the narrator stating that Gawain was the "Devoid of all villainy." This statement says that Gawain is lacking in any sort of evil. It seems to be that the Green Knight symbolically represents a villainous being that crashes in on a party to play a medieval "Russian Roulette." In doing so causes an upheaval among the Knights of the Round Table. The Green Knight storms in and asks someone to chop his head off. At this part of the story it seems quite questionable as to his reasons for doing so. Gawain responds to the beheading game challenge in a humble, yet heroic sense. After the Green Knight barges into King Arthur's court and criticizes the Knights of the Round Table saying, "Where is now your arrogance and your awesome deeds... for all cower and quake..."(l. 87, 91) The Green Knight is now saying that the Knights of the Round Table are cowards. He is calling them out. The only one to accept the challenge is Arthur strictly to show that he is not a coward. Just as Arthur is about to decapitate the Green Knight Gawain speaks up and says, "I beseech, before all here, that this melee may be mine." (l. 115-116) Here Gawain is speaking up and telling Arthur that if anyone will do this that it will be him. Gawain shows a great deal of courage in accepting this challenge for the reason that no one else, aside from Arthur, would except the challenge. Gawain finds hospitality and shelter at the castle of Bercilak, unbeknownst to Gawain, the Green Knight. Bercilak made an agreement that "whatever I win in the woods I will give you at eve, and all you have earned you must offer me." (Ll. 1105-1107) This agreement that was made means that whatever Gawain gets in the castle he must give back to Bercilak. This agreement is complicated for the reason that Bercilak's wife is trying to seduce Gawain. With so some

Nathaniel Hawthorne (Literary Background)

Nathaniel Hawthorne (Literary Background) Free Online Research Papers Puritan heritage was a support and drawback for his work. His heritage gave him inspiration to write, but scine Puritan heritage saw fiction as vanity and an imitation of Gods creatures and creations, it also frowned upon his work. Hawthorne always tried to be mindful of imitating and analyzing human nature in his writings. He disected many human behaviors and reflected them in his writings. He wanted to expose human nature at its raw finest, and so he has done with his many works. Even though they are fictional, they are based on things he has witnessed Hawthorne read a great deal of romantic poetry and was influenced by all chief romantic poets, including, Williams Wordsmith, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Lord Bryan, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and John Keats. Of these writers, Hawthorne was most influenced by the work of Coleridge. Coleridge gave Hawthorne the most insight and inspiration. Hawthorne is best known today for his many short stories and his four major romances written between 1850 and 1860: The Scarlet Letter (1850), The House of Seven Gables (1851), The Blithedale Romance (1852), and The Marble Faun (1860). His work was and still his praised for it’s sentimentality and moral purity. More modern evaluation focuses on the dark psychological complexity or his writing. Research Papers on Nathaniel Hawthorne (Literary Background)Mind TravelCanaanite Influence on the Early Israelite ReligionAssess the importance of Nationalism 1815-1850 EuropeHonest Iagos Truth through DeceptionHarry Potter and the Deathly Hallows EssayThe Masque of the Red Death Room meaningsHip-Hop is ArtBook Review on The Autobiography of Malcolm XRelationship between Media Coverage and Social and19 Century Society: A Deeply Divided Era

Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 2

Case Study Example Given the massive size and scale of the corruption, do you feel that the punishment was acceptable? Considering the magnitude of the corruption witnesses in virtually all Siemens subsidiaries across the globe, I strongly feel that the US and the German governments grossly under-fined the German company especially considering that at the time, Siemens used to accrue over over70 billion Euros of sales annually. A miniature fine of only $ 1.6 billion did only encourage the company to perpetuate the already worse unethical behavior by bribing the US investigators. Had the regulating authorities impose a much heavier fine on Siemens, the company management and to an extension its employees, would have taken a second thought as far as massive corruption and bribery are concerned. If you were the new Chief Ethics Officer, how would you have handled the situation? As the new Chief Ethics Officer, I would have taken a slightly different course in that instead of summarily dismissing culpable employees, I would have engaged them in the reform process. Since there is no absolute ethical standard or person, the first step would have been to embark on massive employee training process, sensitizing, and enlightening the employees on the benefits of conducting themselves in accordance to acceptable ethical standards. By indulging all the concerned parties in extensive consultations, communications, and negotiations, I think I would have brought back the company to its original course much faster. This is because empowering and encouraging employees has the overall effect of transforming the employees’ culture and subsequently, the organization’s culture, for the better (Fernando, 2010). Was the corruption justified since bribery was legal in Germany until 1999? Before the German government put a ban on bribery and corporate corruption, most companies perceived this as an easy way of going about their business operations. Singled out was the electronics giant, Si emens, which took absolute advantage of the situation in order to gain undue competitive advantage. Several reports quote Siemens top executives insinuating that corruption and bribery gave the company the competitive edge that saw it stay ahead of the game for years. As some may want to believe that Siemens was compliant by engaging in corruption, it beats logic to deny that this act is unethical. By all standards of fairness, any acts of corruption and bribery amount to the breach of acceptable ethical codes of conduct (Twomey et al., 2011).   Ethics and moral justice should prevail in all corporate affairs and no company can justify corruption and bribery as a strategy for achieving company objectives. This is especially so if the acts of corruption and bribery infringe on the rights of other equally competitive companies like the right to fairly and transparently compete for tenders and contracts. Therefore, whatever reason Siemens referred to, there is not a single justificat ion for their unethical behavior (Twomey et al., 2011).   How does an organization make the shift to refine their ethical practices when there is such a radical change in policy? It is no doubt that ethical recovery is an agonizing experience for most companies especially if they were operating on a global platform. However, most organizations do manage to refine their ethical practices after a radical policy change. This, they achieve by following certain approaches that range from transforming the