Descriptive Technique In Sir Gawain And The Green Knight

“Descriptive Technique in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight” is a psychological criticism by Alain Renoir that focuses on the techniques that the poet implements throughout Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Renoir begins by expressing that there are many critics and scholars who have different stances on what makes this epic a “superior” poem. They all, however, agree on one central idea: “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight owes its compelling vividness equally to its author’s psychological insight into the nature of the experiences he describes and to his flair for significant details” (Renoir 87). In other words, the poet shows evident understanding of the nature of the experiences that he describes and implements significant details to captivate

He feels that it is necessary to notify the audience about the true reason behind the quality of this epic. Throughout the criticism, the tone is content because Renoir constantly approves of the poet’s “genius” techniques. “The very consistency with which that technique is used suggests in the Gawain poet an exceptionally fine sense of space distribution as well as an unmatched talent for transferring a visual experience into a poetic utterance” (Renoir 93). As portrayed in this quote, Renoir believes that the Gawain poet successfully utilizes his talent and fine senses to describe visual scenes in great detail to enthrall the readers. Renoir constantly expresses a pleased behavior towards the writing style of the poet by providing compliments to the technique used throughout the epic, which evidently shows that this criticism has a content tone. Renoir’s purpose of this criticism is to prove that the vividness of this epic comes from the poet’s use of a technique where “… the details selected for inclusion are set off in the most psychologically effective relation to the total picture presented to reader” (Renoir 87). As proved by the critic, Renoir simply wishes to prioritize the fact that the details set in psychologically effective way allows this epic to be a “masterpiece.” The purpose is to notify the audience about his claim in detail, and Renoir successfully does so, throughout this