Grendel was strong and powerful monster. (line 1) He was so strong that he could rip men apart. Most men in the kingdom feared him. He was the most evilest monster in land.(line21-24) Even though many of the men in the kingdom didn’t know about his mother.…
The choices made in the movie detract from my understanding of the poem. Throughout the poem, Hrothgar and Grendel’s mother are illustrated differently than from the film. In the poem I pictured Hrothgar as someone who, when Grendel was tormenting his people, felt “joyless in Herot…mourning the fate of his lost friends and companions.”(Beowulf 44) and instead he was shown as a heartless, inebriated king in the movie. In the poem, Grendel’s mother was described as a she-wolf, a monster (Beowulf 449) but, in the movie she is shown as a beautiful creature, with an attractive human-like body, and not a “wolf” like appearance. The course of events in the poem, such as the battle against Grendel’s mother and the truth behind Grendel’s identity,…
One of the most compelling and highly developed characters in the novel Grendel, written by John Gardner, and the poem Beowulf, written by an anonymous poet, is the monster, Grendel. Even though these pieces show two different sides to Grendel they are similar in many ways. Grendel evokes sympathy toward the hideous monster by making him seem like the victim, while Beowulf portrays him as being the most loathsome of enemies. The reasons behind Grendel’s being, his killing, and finally his death make him one of the most controversial and infamous monsters in literature. Grendel is the man-killing monster that Beowulf portrayed him as being, yet he is also the lonely victim of a judgmental world.…
The relationships as elaborated in John Gardner’s Grendel also open up a new perspective to how Grendel has “fallen” from humanity into the tragic anti-hero as Gardner takes original characters such as Grendel’s mother and the dragon and transforms them from the original text into life changing characters that have helped develop Grendel’s alienation and hatred towards the world. In the original “Beowulf” not much is given about Grendel’s relationship between his mother and himself, as poem only cites how “sad” and “angry” his mother was once Grendel had died. In giving no indication of the past relationship Grendel and his mother shared Gardner takes the opportunity to develop a complex and layered relationship as Grendel states “She [mother] loved me in some mysterious sense I understood without her speaking it (18).” Ultimately, Grendel throughout Gardner story suggests that although there was no physical nor verbal interaction between the mother and Grendel, they did develop a kinship where Grendel “pities” the lifeless “hag” that she has become (Gardner, 52). However, throughout Gardner’s tale, Grendel often does not reveal his love towards his mother but hides it through various insults and slurs directed as his mother. His false hatred towards his mother is partly because he does not comprehend her lack of human emotions and actions as she throughout the tale emits “strange…
Grendel mother is an ugly, smelly beast who Grendel resents and yet loves in a dependent, childish way. She cannot speak; she tries to communicate with his son by caressing and holding him. And at times she would go too far and suffocated him. She helpless at times she has to wait for him to bring her food, but when Grendel needs her, he cries like baby, and usually she saves him. She is also fierce and terrifying. Grendel sets himself apart from his mother according to him she does not think coherently. He believes he above her. He thinks of her as a fool. “Life-bloated, baffled, long-suffering, hag. Guilty, she imagines, of some unremembered, perhaps ancestral crime.”…
Beowulf seems to be living a similar life as the Anglo-Saxons because of the constant war, or battles, that he finds himself in. Grendel's mother is on a mission seeking revenge against Beowulf. "The warrior determined to take revenge for every gross act Grendel had committed for killing her son" (Beowulf 1577-1578). At this point it is shown that Grendel's mother is ready to fight and doesn't care what she has to do to get revenge. It is stated, "then suddenly the vehement mother avenged her son and wreaked destruction. Death had robbed her" (Beowulf 2117-2119). Grendel's mother was infuriated that Beowulf had taken her son’s life, and it was her turn to try and make him pay. Beowulf, who would be achieving lof decides to battle against her and wins. It was present that the Geats had appreciated the great work by Beowulf and gave him the fame and praise that he had deserved for once again being a hero and defeating a monster in Grendel's…
Overall, the value of Grendel’s mother is diminished as a result of the representation of patriarchy found in the book. Grendel’s mother was a great foe who proved to have a larger impact and cause the king the most grief. She almost kills Beowulf and causes him great injuries. Despite all this, she is seen as subordinate and Beowulf does not get the praise he deserves for defeating her, showing that even though a female character is strong, they will always be discredited for their feats because of this strong sense of male…
Grendel’s mother reminds me of a drug-addicted parent. She is unable to be there very much for her son, but she obviously still cares and comes running whenever he needs her most.…
Why do authors use the vehicle of theme to connect to readers? Throughout the book Grendel, John Gardner uses theme to emphasize a connection of the story to the reader. Theme is used because in a story like Grendel with “heroes” and “monsters” hope is used to further the interest of the reader. Themes can be viewed through different perspectives, but in Grendel the author uses the themes of fate and free will; also language to express human qualities to connect “monsters” to humans in modern life.…
All major characters have had some offense done to them and they kill in retaliation, the same action repeats four times, with four different motivations guiding them. The very plot of Beowulf draws these characters together so that details separate them. Grendel kills because his instincts tell him to with only emotions he cannot understand guiding him. His mother, however, is only shown to have killed in the pursuit to avenge her fallen son. Though she is cursed, she exhibits far more control and does not seem as if she would kill for the sake of killing, only for specific events. “Still, his mother, gloomy and greedy, intended to go on a sorry journey to avenge her son’s death” (35). This quote reinforces her reason: to repay the murder of her son, nothing more. The dragon is the only character to kill for anything less than the life of another’s. For wealth. Wealth it did not accumulate itself, didn’t earn nor conquer, the dragon flamed all nearby villages due to a pitiful slave stealing a golden drinking mug. Finally, Beowulf has always slain the enemies of man, however, after he decapitated Grendel’s mother, “-angry and determined-that blade was not useless to the warrior, for he wished to repay Grendel at once” (42). Beowulf then decapitated a clearly dead Grendel with rage and the determination to act upon…
My last words to him was “WHO DID THIS TO YOU ? WHO IS TAKING YOU AWAY FROM ME?!” I couldn’t stop replaying his response in my head “B-Beowulf... The Son Of Ecgtheow” I swear at that moment I’ve never cried so much, Grendel was my only child and he meant the world to me. I sat there in the cave holding Grendel he kept screaming and hollering, I hate hearing hollering, so I started plotting on the man called Beowulf. I thought of a million and one ways to kill him but I didn’t think anyone of them compared to what he had did to my son. When I got myself together I left my cave and…
his mother was very angry and killed a knight in king Hrothgar's court the same…
“All evils are equal when they are extreme.” This quote by Pierre Corneille explains the natural evil humans have. In the novel Grendel by John Gardner, a monster named Grendel, who was once depicted as a complete evil creature in the epic poem Beowulf, tells the monster's side of the story through it's own eyes. By reading the text in the novel Grendel a person can realize that the monster Grendel was seeking attention and acceptance from the Danes, who were the human civilization which Grendel encountered on a daily basis. The author Gardner used this portrayal of the monster Grendel in the third person as an allegory to show how humanity as a society is too judgmental and does not understand the battles a person, or in this case a creature, faces on a daily basis.…
The epic poem Beowulf does not portray Grendel in a fair manner. One of the main characters in the epic poem is called Grendel. Grendel is a monster who lives in a cave with his mother. He hates his mother and thinks that he is the most intelligent species and no one else’s life has meaning. Grendel in the epic poem is portrayed as a monster who only kills and cannot think for himself. John Gardner, an author of the book Grendel felt like the epic poem was one sided and Grendel did not get to share his side. In the book Grendel Gardner portrays a monster as someone who is a little different. Gardner is trying to make the point that if you are a little bit different, you are an outcast in society. Gardner ties parallels to today’s society and the society in the book about monsters being a little bit different causing them to be outcasts.…
Revenge is a big factor for several characters throughout the book, initially provoking Grendel and his mother. Grendel seeks revenge upon mankind for the heritage that he has. He enjoys raiding Heorot because it is the symbol of everything that he hates about men: their success, joy, glory, and favor in the eyes of God. Grendel's mother's revenge is more specific. She attacks Heorot because someone there killed her son. Although she is smaller and less powerful than Grendel, she is motivated by a mother's fury. When Beowulf goes after her in the mere, she has the advantage of fighting him in her own territory. As she drags him into her cave beneath the lake, her revenge peaks because this is the very man who killed her son. Only Beowulf's amazing abilities as a warrior and the involvement of God or magic can defeat her.…