Knights, Dwarfs, and Carts - Oh My!

Okay, first thing I noticed about this story: Chretien de Troyes really likes including dwarfs. I'm not sure what's up with that, but there was a dwarf in Erec and Enide, and now there's one here, and they're both equally nasty and gross. Dwarfs are "ill-born and ill-bred" (pg 174) - I wonder if this has anything to do with re-purposing old Germanic/Celtic pagan legends, but that's something of a long shot. It also doesn't help that whenever I think of these dwarves, I think of the Keebler elves.

I didn't choose the the thug life, the thug life chose me.

 I was a little confused as to why a cart would be a bad thing, because a cart, in my head, was just the same thing as a wagon, even though the text explains it, kind of? It is not a wagon? There seems to be some weird hierarchy of wooden transportation devices, which is confusing? Was it because carts were associated with poop and criminals and shame? 

I would appreciate it if Chretien de Troyes would use more proper names - between "the knight", "the knight", "the knight", and "the other knight", I have no idea who anyone is, unless you are "of the cart" or "Sir Gawain". The entire exchange between the knight of the cart and the knight of the ford (?) reminded me a lot of the thumb-biting exchange in the beginning of Romeo and Juliet, which was hilarious. 

I can tell that the knight of the cart is in love with someone, but who? He's distracted for seemingly no reason and just kind of... mopes... while trying to rescue the queen, who is one of the many young ladies Chretien references??? I admit, this story is rather difficult for me to follow because Chretien likes to jump around a lot and reference people indirectly. I'm still not 100% sure what's going on.