Beowulf and the Tempest-Revenge

revenge.The characters in the book, they all have their own survival skills also have their own revenge plan .Beowulf fight for his people in the country;Grendel’s mother revenge for her son; Wiglaf fight for his King and loyalty; They all did really good revenge for their own people, for their family and for their loyalty.In the epic poem Beowulf, the idea of vengeance is exemplified through the actions of Beowulf, Grendel’s mother and Wiglaf.

The nucleus of the plot in Shakespeare's The Tempest revolves around Prospero enacting his revenge on various characters who have wronged him in different ways. Interestingly enough, he uses the spirit of Ariel to deliver the punishments while Prospero delegates the action. Prospero is such a character that can concoct methods of revenge but hesitates to have direct involvement with disillusioning his foes. In essence, Prospero sends Ariel to do his dirty work while hiding his involvement in shipwrecking his brother, Antonio, from his daughter, Miranda.

Beowulf faces the internal conflicts, self concern and betrayal, when he is much older and king. Even though he was much older he decided to battle a fire dragon because he was his people’s hero. Though Beowulf had helped so many people when he was young and strong, none of his comrades came to help him. Instead, they ran for their lives. “And only one of them remained, stood there, miserable, remembering as a good man must, what kinship should mean.” (Beowulf 43) Beowulf and his one comrade, Wiglaf, kill the dragon, but Beowulf is injured and soon dies. The last internal conflict Beowulf has before he dies is the betrayal of his people.

Revenge is presented both as an honest motive and a rhetorical tactic in Beowulf. For Beowulf himself, reprisal of

Vengeance is an important value that causes misfortune in the story of Beowulf. It brings not only Beowulf, but many others, fame and glory, plus, wealth as well. It is not a sustainable value for it brings everyone in the story only destruction. The tribes that have been bonded together by this value get destroyed but it. The value of courage is tied into the story since almost the entire story is based on vengeance.

Beowulf’s courage is called once again, and this is the final battle. In this battle, Beowulf has to defeat a fire breathing dragon, symbolizing Satan. First of all, Beowulf is very old at this point. Once he heard about his home being destroyed, he left to fight the beast right away. “Then Beowulf was given bad news,/ a hard truth: his own home,/ the best of buildings, had been burnt to a cinder”(2324-2326). This shows how couragous Beowulf really is. Beowulf is a very old man at this point and his courage is too big and he has to defeat this monster for himself for destroying his home. Secondly, Beowulf fights the dragon on his own. In the poem the dragon is to be symbolized as Satan and he is ready to fight. “The fabled warrior in his warshirt and helmet/ trusted his own strength entirely/and went under the crag” (2540-2545). Last of all, Beowulf is fighting the dragon and is nearly dead, Wiglaf had enough courage to come help. Beowulf and Wiglaf were able to defeat the dragon. “The noble son of Weohstan/ saw the king in danger at

Throughout the book Beowulf by Seamus Heaney there were many instances of revenge demonstrated by different characters. An example of when a character tries to get revenge is when Grendel’s mother comes to fight Beowulf. Grendel’s mother shows up to fight Beowulf since Beowulf had previously killer her son in battle. Another example of when a character exacts revenge is when Grendel comes to fight Hero and his people. Grendel wants revenge because he strongly dislikes Heorot and the cultural practices of the Danes. Next, at the end of the book the dragon attacks due to an accidental theft of a treasure that was the dragon’s. In the poem Beowulf, which was written, by Seamus Heaney, it is human nature to demonstrate the concept of revenge which was shown by Grendel, Grendel’s mother, the dragon, and Beowulf.

Revenge motivates many plots in the poem but the greatest one would be of Grendel’s mother. Her loyalty and love for her son helped her during her battle. I still feel like she did no wrong when it came to trying to kill Beowulf. The anger and pain he caused her was worth his death. If the tables were turned Beowulf would have tried to kill her for killing his significant other or

Anglo-Saxon culture consisted of receiving fame, glory, and wealth through acts of vengeance and courage. “Beowulf” portrays these parts in great detail and shows how destabilizing it can be. Through acts of vengeance, a never ending war occurs.

The last battle that Beowulf partook in was perhaps the most heroic of all. Although the battle ended his life, it proved that of all the men in the story, Beowulf was the only true Anglo-Saxon hero. All of his troops proved to be fickle. They abandoned him in a time when they were needed the most. Though his men lived, they lived as cowards, yielding to the dragon apprehended by all the Geats. Never the less, Beowulf’s strength of heart and mind gave him the will to fight the dragon, although none of his men were there to help him. In this part of the tale, Beowulf was older and his physical strength had dwindled. But despite this, his tremendous heroism remained. He fought the dragon to his death and died with a pride, gallantry and chivalry that no man at the time had

Beowulf’s wrath is swift and justified. He plays no games with his opponents. Beowulf even shows respect to his foe and honorably faces them with no undue advantage. A classic example of the honor usually associated with heroes lies in Beowulf’s decision to use neither sword nor armor when facing the monster Grendel in Heorot. Beowulf instead opted, in the name of fair play, to fight the monster on it’s own terms. Unsurprisingly Beowulf conquered his foe in true idolic form, tearing Grendel’s arm from his torso with only the strength of his grip and the power of his arms. This is what we cheer for in such stories, this is the satisfying victory over evil by the true embodiment of good: the hero.

The oldest of the great lengthy poems written in English and perhaps the lone survivor of a genre of Anglo-Saxon epics, Beowulf, was written by an unknown Christian author at a date that is only estimated.  Even so, it is a remarkable narrative story in which the poet reinvigorates the heroic language, style, and values of Germanic oral poetry.  He intertwines a number of themes including good and evil, youth and old age, paganism and Christianity and the heroic ideal code, into his principal narrative and numerous digressions and episodes; all of which were extremely important to his audience at the time.  Vengeance, part of the heroic code, was regarded differently by the two distinct religions.

Beowulf’s triumphs are short lived due to another attack on Herot. This time, Grendel’s mother comes to the great mead hall to avenge her son. The battle between Grendel’s mother and Beowulf differs greatly from the previous battle with the beast’s son. After another attack, Beowulf now must seek out his new enemy, and fight her on her own turf. As it stood, the scores were even between the monsters and the Danes, but Beowulf now looked for victory over the monsters, not revenge. Beowulf also had to regain his reputation. He had just won a trophy, when the bigger, badder bully came up to him and took it straight from his grasp. Now Beowulf traveled to the burning lake, which proved a test of its own. He then swam to the bottom of the lake where the monster resided. All of this just to get to the monster shows that this brave hero would do anything to set the scores right for his people and for the glory that came with it.

Though Beowulf was god-like and he was able to be successful when faced with decisions and adversity, he eventually succumbed to the destructive forces of nature and threw his nation into conflict. As aforementioned, Beowulf’s battle with the dragon depicts unpreventable death and destruction that afflicts everybody, his last battle also symbolizes that even the most seemingly perfect people are chained to hostile acts of nature and fate. Beowulf’s death is not a product of pride, it was a result of his altruistic nature to do good, however, his death forecasts war in his country as described by Wiglaf when ordering a messenger to tell the Geats of Beowulf’s death, “And this people can expect fighting, once/ The Franks, and the Frisians, have heard that our king/ Lies dead.” (Beowulf 2910-2913). Beowulf’s main purpose was to do good, and though killing the dragon was an act of goodness, he traded in his life for an act of good, however his death brought the large possibility of war to his

Although similarities between Hamlet and Beowulf exist, there are a greater number of differences that greatly sets the two characters apart. One of the biggest differences that need to be noted between the two was their motives. Starting with Beowulf, the first thing to note about him is his everlasting desire for glory in battle. Beowulf is characterized as a duty-oriented warrior, driven by nothing but being a dominant and revered hero for everyone to look up to. There is not a perceived sense of love and religion in Beowulf’s character, which leaves him to be a very straight-forward character. Overall, Beowulf’s motive for being a hero was just that: to be considered as a hero among the people.