Well, OK. I know about the chivalric code, etc. For that matter, I’ve published an article about the poem, though not about the beheading game. I was interested in the exchanges that take place in the 4th part of the poem. But that fact that Gawain was bound by a code of honor which simply didn’t exist in the West isn’t what interests me. If it interests you, read the O’Neill article I link to in the OP. That’s what he discusses and his discussion is a very interesting one.
What interests me is that any reasonable adult who hears that challenge, no matter which version, would know instantly and intuitively that something funny was going on. I wanted to see whether or not ChatGPT understood that. Which means that for my purpose, the old West version is actually better because, with respect to the point that interests me, the chivalric code is distracting noise. I don’t what ChatGPT to answer as though it were under some ethical obligation to accept all challenges.
So, thanks for helping me think that through.
The audience for the poem certainly knew the code and knew it well. But by the time the poem was written the age chivalry was dying out. The poem is deeply ironic. The poem is, and I’m reluctant to use this much over-used word, the poem is a deconstruction of chivalry. That code both demands that Gawain peruses Bertilak’s wife when she approaches him in the third part of the poem, and that he expose her to her husband in the exchange bargain he’s made with Bertilak. There’s no way out.
Well, OK. I know about the chivalric code, etc. For that matter, I’ve published an article about the poem, though not about the beheading game. I was interested in the exchanges that take place in the 4th part of the poem. But that fact that Gawain was bound by a code of honor which simply didn’t exist in the West isn’t what interests me. If it interests you, read the O’Neill article I link to in the OP. That’s what he discusses and his discussion is a very interesting one.
What interests me is that any reasonable adult who hears that challenge, no matter which version, would know instantly and intuitively that something funny was going on. I wanted to see whether or not ChatGPT understood that. Which means that for my purpose, the old West version is actually better because, with respect to the point that interests me, the chivalric code is distracting noise. I don’t what ChatGPT to answer as though it were under some ethical obligation to accept all challenges.
So, thanks for helping me think that through.
The audience for the poem certainly knew the code and knew it well. But by the time the poem was written the age chivalry was dying out. The poem is deeply ironic. The poem is, and I’m reluctant to use this much over-used word, the poem is a deconstruction of chivalry. That code both demands that Gawain peruses Bertilak’s wife when she approaches him in the third part of the poem, and that he expose her to her husband in the exchange bargain he’s made with Bertilak. There’s no way out.