King Arthur: legend, history, and cultural significance

King Arthur Mordred and the Conflict at Camelot
Arthur is at the center of the Arthurian world of legends; he is the king of Camelot and is married to Guinevere. Arthur has numerous difficulties with his Knights of the Round Table, however—including with Lancelot and Mordred. Lancelot has an affair with Arthur’s wife; and Mordred betrays Arthur’s trust in seeking his own ascension. Why should so many people who were close to Arthur betray? That is a question that remains. Arthur is a good and noble king—but things fall apart for him following the affair between his wife and his best and most loyal friend; and then his own son (Mordred) plots to overthrow his father’s seat. They end up attacking one another on the battlefield, and the father slays the son and the son mortally wounds the father. This is perhaps the saddest of all endings to a story that one could imagine. Arthur changes from a good and noble king to a desperate one attempting to hold onto his power and lashing out at all those who betrayed him—including his own son and his own best friend and wife. It is a kind of fall from grace that is barely comprehensible.
Lancelot is one who is most loyal to Arthur and serves as his best friend and best knight on the Round Table. Yet Lancelot becomes enamored of Arthur’s wife Guinevere and they share a kind of sympathy between themselves that should have been resisted, but it was given nourishment. This crossed a line, and Lancelot should not have crossed it as it was a betrayal of his own king and his own friend. It is understandable why it was crossed—that kind of love/lust is overwhelming and once it is given a moment’s indulgence it is like a snare that one cannot get out of. Thus, Lancelot gives in to a weakness and it sets off a chain of events that destroys Camelot.
Guinevere is also not without her faults. She is Arthur’s beautiful queen. She is loving, loyal and fair—but she indulges this fancy for Lancelot and it serves as a fall from grace for her as well. This illicit love between the knight and the queen is so disastrous—and yet so understandable…after all, Mordred is the illegitimate son of Arthur. That means Arthur himself had his own illicit loves—so why should it be so out of the question that his wife and best friend should have the same failings and weaknesses?
Gawain is a knight who actually rises up and moves away from weakness to strength by coming to better understand his own weakness. He is an arrogant and powerful knight in the legend of the Green Knight, and he cuts off the head of the Green Knight—only to see the Green Knight pick up his own head and walk off. Gawain has given the first stroke and now must accept a stroke in return. Gawain keeps his word and offers his neck to the Green Knight but the Green Knight gives him mercy and explains to him that Gawain’s weakness has been his inability to be indifferent to romantic love. He has kept the memento of the lady of the castle of the Green Knight—and so the Green Knight tells him he must wear it as a sign of his own weakness henceforth. Gawain does and it is an outward sign to one and all that he is a man with weaknesses, and it actually makes him stronger in the sense that he is aware of the danger within himself and it makes him more mindful. However, Gawain sees Lancelot as a traitor and convinces Arthur that Gawain is a traitor and this sets up the final conflict. It seems as though the Green Knight is the only capable of mercy—but Gawain repents himself in the end, which shows he could be weak but tended towards nobility when all was said and done.
Mordred is simply an out and out villain. He is Arthur’s illegitimate son and represents something of Arthur’s own inherent sinfulness. He plots to pry Arthur out of his seat of power and is killed for it by Arthur but also delivers his father a mortal blow as well. It really is a terrible way for both to go, but for Mordred it seems as though his own covetousness for power is what brings him down. His cruelty is blatant—and yet in a way it, too, is understandable: he wants to be the man in charge; he wants to be the legitimate authority, and this desire likely stems from the sense that he has been illegitimate from conception.
I see myself mostly in the character of Gawain: just having this sense of I-can-do-it-all and yet being exposed in the end as someone who cannot do it all, who often makes mistakes, and who has his own weaknesses and sins to repent of. And yet in the end he is willing to admit all this, and I think that I am as well. I don’t often like to think of it, but if I am being honest, I can see that I have my flaws and problems and that everyone sees them except for me at times.
So if I had to select someone with whom I most identified it would be Gawain. He acts foolishly and rashly at times, but at others he shows signs of courage and commitment. I think at heart he has a good character. I am not saying I have that kind of noble character myself—but of the choices, I would hate to think of myself as being like Mordred or even Lancelot. I don’t really see any of Guinevere or Arthur in myself—they are just too different in terms of character and status. I think that there is something working class in Gawain that I find makes him unique. He is loyal yet not without his own pettiness, arrogance, and flaws. So he is the most relatable of all the characters discussed in this paper.