It is New Year at Camelot and a mysterious green knight appears at King Arthur's court. In a challenge to the knights of the Round Table, he offers his splendid axe as a prize to whoever is brave enough to behead him with just one strike. The condition is that his challenger must seek him out in a year and a day to have the deed returned.

Sir Gawain accepts and decapitates the stranger, only to see the green knight pick up his head, walk out of the hall and ride away on his horse. Now Gawain must complete his part of the bargain, search for his foe and confront what seems to be his doom...

Michael Smith's translation of this magnificent Arthurian romance takes us back to the original poetic form of the manuscript and brings it alive for a modern audience, while revealing the poem's historic and literary context.

Illustrated with detailed recreations of the illuminated lettering in the original manuscript and with the author's own linocut prints, this exciting new edition will appeal to students of the Gawain-poet and the general reader alike.