Arthurs Unrealism: Monty Python, Gawain and the Green Knight, and the Destruction of :: Essays Papers

Arthurs Unrealism Monty Python, Gawain and the Green Knight, and the Destruction ofIdealsIt may be that angels are necessary for humanity. Without idealized images, codes of behavior, even idealized objects, mankind would capture difficulty functioning. There would be a lack of context or criteria with which to judge objects that may be termed less than ideal. However, the problem with idealized images is that they screwing never be described fully, and certainly never attained. An example is the modern-day ideal of feminine beauty, which has led to countless problems such as notion and psychological dietary disorders among women who perceive themselves to be inadequate. The more cultur all in ally exclamatory an ideal is, the more ordinary people are made to whole step inadequate.This has led to a trend putting surface to all centuries, that of puncturing ideals by showing them to be less than what they are supposed to be. In art and literary productions we see manifestat ions of this mechanism. It is a protective mechanism in a sense, for it prevents center absorption in the ideal, forcing us to see it for what it is, a benchmark and not a realistic goal. Even in the works where men and women achieve the ideal, it is usually accomplished by supernatural means, for a concomitant of the ideal is that it cannot truly exist in the natural and hence imperfect world. Examples of such mechanisms range from the colloquialism out of this world to describe the superlative to the common mythological pattern of the religious leader being the son of a god.One of the most enduring myths in the Western world is that of Arthur and his Knights of the rhythm Table. Regardless of the origins of the tales, the fact is that by the time they had been filtered through a cut sensibility and re-exported to England, they were representations of not one but several ideals. Courtly acknowledge and chivalry and the various components thereof, such as martial prowess, chast ity, bravery, courtesy, and so on, were presented as the chief virtues to aspire to, and the knights as role models. Arthurs eventual fall is just now because of having failed at some level to fulfill these ideals in his life.The Arthurian unit of ammunition shows a sporadic awareness of the impossibility of mere humans fulfilling all the ideals that Arthur and his court represent. The story of Lancelot and Guenevere, Merlins imprisonment by Nimu, and numerous other instances profess to the recognition of this tension between the real and the unrealistic.