Essay A Jungian Reading of Beowulf

Everybody is unique or special in one form or another and each personality has a theory. For many years psychologists have based theories upon individuals and I the writer will compare and contrast three well known psychologists Sigmund Freud, Alfred Alder, and Carl Jung. Sigmund Freud was one of the greatest psychologists in time he Alder and Jung’s theories were very similar but then again very different. Within these theories we will discuss characteristics with which I agree and disagree with, explore the stages of Freud’s theory explaining characteristics of personality using stage components

In the Epic Poems Beowulf, by an anonymous Anglo-Saxon poet, and Grendel written by John Gardner, Grendel, regardless of what he does, has been seen as unsafe to man. Grendel, perceived as treacherous, is just misunderstood and an outcast to society. The back story of Grendel is crucial to the reader’s understanding of Grendel becoming a monster. Grendel’s life experiences of his environment, men and meeting a dragon contribute to the drastic change.

The film Grosse Pointe Blank is an excellent example of the theory created by Joseph Campbell called The Hero’s Journey. This journey is said to be found in all types of movies, stories and myths no matter where you look. In order to have a complete journey you must go through the several basic stages, which is called the monomyth. The structure has been helpful to many film directors and creators for example “George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars, claims that Campbell’s monomyth was the inspiration for his groundbreaking films.” The film Grosse Pointe Blank taps into these basic elements of the journey which are the ordinary world, the call to adventure, Refusal of the quest, accepting of the call, entering the unknown, supernatural aid, test or supreme ordeal and the reward.

Set in an era long before the customs of contemporary western civilization, Heaney’s translation of Beowulf follows the courageous hero through an epic journey that solidifies his figurative immortality. Much like the Greek’s great Odysseus or the Roman’s devout Aeneus, Beowulf serves as an impressive and almost godlike warrior for the Anglo-Saxons, providing insight into the constituents of greatness for that society. Confident in his abilities and committed to his task, Beowulf voluntarily embarks on a mission to defeat Grendel, the treacherous enemy of the Danish kingdom. Beowulf solidifies his classification as an epic hero as he satisfies his quest for glory, saves a kingdom from destruction, and reveals the values of an era.

“No better king had ever lived, no prince so mild, no man so open to his people, so deserving of praise.” This is an ultimate description of the heroic events of Beowulf, an old Anglo-Saxon poem about a warrior who battles and destroys three horrifying monsters. Although written long ago, the emotions expressed within this work, emotions of bravery, valor, and ethics still speak to us centuries later. The anonymous author of the poem convinces us through the masterful use of various literary elements that emphasize its meaning and message. Conflict, imagery and setting are three literary elements that contribute to the effectiveness of the poem.

Beowulf and Grendel are two different stories, and characters, who look at the same situation in polarized ways. Each character has their own story that is written from different time periods: the Anglo-Saxon time period and America in the 1970’s. Both of these time periods have different attributes that make them special; the Anglo-Saxon time period consists of the literary movement of the epic poem and America in the 1970’s consists of the literary movement known as postmodernism. Beowulf is shaped by the Anglo-Saxon time period through its use of the heroic code and religious influences and Grendel is shaped by the American 1970’s time period through its use of metafiction and an unreliable narrator.

John Gardner offers an alternate interpretation of the old english epic “Beowulf” by narrating the experiences of the monster Grendel, after whom the book is named. Grendel conveys himself as a homicidal, ravenous beast, only capable of destruction and chaos. Therefore, one can conclude that Grendel is indeed evil, and that he well deserves the cessation of his existence. However, depending on the philosophical ideologies and the relative perspective one finds self in, they may conclude differently. Nevertheless, the reader may likely to find one’s self both sympathizing with, and scorning Grendel, because, as the 10th century old english monster says, “balance is everything”.

Jung’s idea of experiences of synchronicity included the presence of archetypes. An archetype is an ideal example or model person that others copy or base their actions upon. Jung had archetypes such as the animus, the anima, and the shadow. The animus is expressed as a masculine inner personality in females, while the anima is expressed as a feminine inner personality in males. The shadow archetype consists of repressed shortcomings, weaknesses, and instincts. These archetypes are of the collective unconscious, and not based on people in their daily lives.

An example of the innate need to question and change the way that psychologists think about a particular subject is when Austrian psychiatrist Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) first defined the unconscious as a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and memories, many psychologists agreed with Freud’s thinking; however, Carl Jung (1875-1961), believed that the unconscious was more than what Freud described. Jung believed that the unconscious has two layers: a collective unconscious- containing the shared memories of the common human past, which he named archetypes- and the

Beowulf, an Old English epic poem, consists of an enormous amount of themes, archetypes, and symbols. The purpose behind an archetype is to give characters in the poem a purpose and a framework. In Beowulf, the archetypes of the quest, the battle between good and evil, and the hero are all prevalent throughout the poem. The quest plot displays Beowulf’s purpose in going to the Danish kingdom to embark on a journey to become glorious by ridding the city of a fiendish creature named Grendel. By doing this task Beowulf opens the door to his eventual battle between good and evil with the creatures of nightmare, Grendel and her mother. Beowulf finally takes initiative and displays heroism near the end of the poem when he decided to fight the dragon

An aspect of Jung’s theory that applies to Mary is the Persona which is “an element of the personality which

Jung began to assert the importance of myth, including findings that myths from around the world seemed to have certain common elements although completely isolated and uninfluenced by one another. Seeing that these similarities were in large number Jung began to apply them to his theories. The more popular of the theories include the concept of the archetype, the anima and the animus. The theory that best suits the style of Hawthorne’s Gothic is that of conflict, both internal and external. Jung’s approach to conflict involved the many internal conflicts between the conscious and unconscious parts of the mind. Jung saw these similarities often led to similarities in the psychologies of the different cultures. The conflict between the conscious and the unconscious is a basic premise of this realm of thought. Jung supposed that the unconscious was always "yearning" to become a part of the conscious mind. Assuming this is true, repressed memories, thoughts or tendencies are always trying to surface into the conscious mind. This is what Jung proposed was the main element in the conflict between the conscious and the unconscious. With this it is possible to ask questions about Minister Hooper’s intent. Assuming that repression is the driving force behind his actions, it is safe to presume he is hiding something. The "something" in this case is not the most important part, until conclusion takes place, of this particular part of the analysis. Was Mr. Hooper hiding this

Carl Gustav Jung is a Swiss psychiatrist and the successor of psychoanalysis with important intellectual movements of the twentieth century. In his early career, Jung was influenced by the theory of Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis (Breger 2000, p. 217). However, they came into disagreement in notions which then broke their relationship. It was because Freud’s view of myth was based on reality, which there was no religion involved, whereas Jung though that myth was based on both reality and religion. Consequently, Jung’s notions were commonly accepted by society because of the wider context. Then, through his research and clinical findings, he developed some concepts like archetypes, collective unconscious, shadow, extrovert and introvert and persona (Carter 2011 p. 442). These concepts help Jung to deepen the explanation about myth. For Jung, myth is a projection of archetypes and collective unconscious. Their form are universal and identical with every society back into history. Myth can be identical because the original form, the archetypes, is configured to be the same among human's unconscious globally where people's psychic realm encounters certain motifs and typical figures that built into the structure of man’s unconsciousness (Jung Myth Ex. 3-4). According to Edward Tylor and James Frazer, myth and science were contradict where science was factual and myth was not (Segal 2003, p. 48). Therefore, myth has an important role in human nature and modern

The epic tale of Beowulf was written sometime after his death. In other words, a long time ago during the Anglo-Saxon period. Today, directors in Hollywood did not keep from creating their own rendition of this epic poem As a result, plenty of modern interpretations of Beowulf, such as Sturla Gunnarsson’s Beowulf and Grendel, have been released. Naturally, the cultural values that might be reflected in modern Beowulf renditions will demonstrate a clash with those of the original fifth century Beowulf literature. One reason for this is that in the modern age we value characters with profound characteristics, characters that change due to the challenges they experience; characters that we as the audience can attach to. Flat characters like those of the original Beowulf text are difficult to empathize with since they are not realistic enough for our standards. Due to these differences in culture and values, the Beowulf and Grendel from the original Beowulf text possess definite contrasts when compared with their Beowulf and Grendel counterparts.

Within are experiment we will be assessing whether or not opposite sexes, can hold opposing personality traits, therefore a Jung(1968), supports this notion as he developed the idea of ‘archetypes’ when referencing to gender roles within the subconscious, he believed that within males there is a feminine part of their psych inherited by the mother. The Females have an Animus, this is a masculine part within their psyche inherited by their father. However, Jung could have been leading the audiences to the conclusion of these archetypes and no other expectation for different personalities, furthermore this is an old reference , which could potentially be out dated (Jung C 1968 Vol.9, Part1)