Discuss the Blurred role of the the knight in La Belle Damn Sans Merci.

The poem La Belle Damn Sans Merci, is an ambiguous poem, with the blurred lines between roles. Is the knight a Hero or a Villain even a victim. This essay will asses how Keats has portrayed the knight.
The knight is the first character Keats introduces in the ballad, he narrates the monologue ‘on the cold hill side’. On a 2 dimensional level he is a knight, synonymous with all things good, a hero, a gentleman etc. The knight is then set up to be a fallen hero. His is assumed to be dead as he is ‘pale’ with a ‘lily on thy brow’ the lily is a metaphor for death, as the flower is not only white like the colour of the dead knight but the flower is usually found at funerals.
The knight is also the narrator, which means he depicts how this story is told. Yet as the story progresses how reliable is he? For much of his narrative he tells us how the fairey responds to him, but as she speaks ‘in language strange’ he is unable to understand her. While he essentially says he can’t understand her, he goes on to tell us ‘what she said’ it’s oxymoronic.