»Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

This riveting new translation, presented in a side-by-side text with the original on the left-hand side and the modern English on the right, brought new joy to this stirring tale.

The translator's preface brought to my attention many of the poetic conventions, devices, and methods that the author, known as The Pearl Poet, brings to this epic: alliteration, especially, is a delightful and strong element of the poetry. In reading this translation, I found myself reading aloud: The New York Times review by Edward Hirsch brought to my attention many of the basic elements of this poem that escaped me twenty years ago, when I first read Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (for a high-school English class, perhaps?).

In reading Simon Armitage's excellent new translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, I enjoyed the work in a way that I have not enjoyed an epic in English since Robert Fagles's translation of The Odyssey.

A full text, with notes by J R R Tolkien and E V Gordon, appears at the University of Michigan's web site.