Whosoever cuts off my head may keep my axe, but then must come to me a year later and allow me to cut off his head. So goes the story of Sir Gwain, a knight beyond reproach, and the Green Knight.
Sir Gwain does the deed and to his horror the Green Knight, bleeding profusely, picks up his severed head by the hair and rides off.
A year later Sir Gwain rides out to meet the Green Knight and stays with a man and his wife while waiting.
The man tells Sir Gwain he will go out hunting every day and bring Sir Gwain whatever he kills, but Sir Gwain must give him whatever he gets in the man's home.
Sir Gwain is tempted by the man's wife daily and thanks to his virtues fends her off with only a kiss that he shares with her husband until the last night when the wife offers him a green girdle that will protect him from being killed.
At last Sir Gwain is so tempted that he capitulates and this time does not share the girdle with the husband.
He is saved, but the shame marks him for life. Arthur makes him king, but his kingdom crumbles, his son dies in battle and he never gets the woman of his dreams.
We cannot escape our shame.
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