Grendel's Self-Image Changes In Beowulf

In the novel, the readers are allowed to see the progression of Grendel. As Grendel starts to grow up there are changes in his personality, more specifically his innocence. Grendel becomes conflicted, being the monster that he is and the choices that he makes. Grendel wants to know what his purpose in life is, or what is the purpose of life at all. While Grendel becomes evil there are signs him struggling against that way. Now I will talk about Grendel’s balance between good and evil.

Grendel discovers and begins to gain the understanding/knowledge of different concepts such as power, etc. In addition, he observes how humans interact with one another throughout the twelve years of war; Yet, his attempt to communicate with humans gives him the title horrific monster. This leads to his loneliness and isolation from everyone. Furthermore, Grendel is left without any companion. Grendel can be best described as a monster who has human qualities but can be both rational and irrational. In Chapter 1, Grendel has an outburst because of the ram that appears.. “I stamp. I hammer the ground with my fists. I hurl and skull-size stone at him. He will not budge. I shake my two hairy fists at the sky and let out a howl so unspeakable that the water at my feet turns sudden ice and even I myself am I left uneasy.” This demonstrates how Grendel is hostile and belligerent. His emotions get the best of him and blinds his consciousness and awareness of how harmful he can be towards

The Dragon wasn’t much help to Grendel either; he just pushed Grendel further to the idea of existentialism. He said that the stories the shaper told, who Grendel grew to like and believe, where pure illusion. The shaper only knew of the past and present, and the Dragon saw that nothing would come of it in the future. The only thing the Dragon did for Grendel was show him what he meant to men. The dragon tells Grendel that he stimulates the humans and inspires their poetry and art. He is telling Grendel that he is evil and they are “good”, but they are “good” because of you. Grendel’s evil motivates the fearful people to work, to strive, to think, and to overcome their problems. “You are mankind, or man’s condition: inseparable as the mountain climber to the mountain. If you withdraw, you’ll instantly be replaced.” The dragon is saying that even if Grendel decides to change his course in life and never kill

However it is true that the characters he meets and even just happens too notice do change the way he is as a Human/Monster. Beowulf, being the last most influential character in Grendel that ultimately affects Grendel overall as a character. In the very end Beowulf drives Grendel over to where Grendel becomes more of a Monster. At the very beginning it is easy to think of Grendel as a young minded baby and it's hard to imagine him as some sort of monster. But at the very ending we have a selfish self centered monster that blames his death on “Poor Grendel’s had an accident,” Clearly Grendel has no remorse on the world and has put himself at his

Grendel and the young boy both compare because of the alienation that occurs to them from society. Grendel is literally isolated from the people in the towns around him. He tended to sit back and watch them from afar. He did raid the mead hall of one particular king, Hrothgar. Grendel is not very fond of Hrothgar. So on some nights Grendel would sneak into the mead hall and attack Hrothgar’s men. He’d kill them and eat them. He’d ruin the beds they sleep on and break other things in the mead hall, but by the end of the attack he would always feel lonely. One night while he was raiding the mead hall Grendel ended up sinking to his knees, crying out, “Friend! Friend!”(Gardner, 52). Grendel was alienated from society and he just wanted to be friends with the people. Grendel all this time has been alone in the woods, wandering around observing from afar. He only wants to have companionship and not to feel alone. So when he attacks the mead hall and cries out “Friend!” he is only doing so, because he wants someone to help him feel less lonely in the world. Grendel does live in a cave with his mother, but she never really acknowledges him. She tends to just ignore him and even feel sorry for herself in having to be apart of him. While Grendel is dying at the end of the book he goes on to so yell, “‘Mama!’ I bellow. ‘Mama, Mama! I’m dying!’ But her love is history”(Gardner, 173). Grendel has his mom. He lives in a cave with her, but she does not love him. She does not care about

In grendel novel , the author used literary devices to create different stages in grendel's Character.John Gardner showed grendel by conveying his inner thoughts and observations; occasionally he narrates from the point of view of another character. Grendel attempts to maintain a mocking distance throughout the novel, but often finds himself slipping into an impassioned earnestness.throughout the novel Grendel struggles, within his own mind, to understand his place in a potentially meaningless world.In this significant work ,John Gardner used some recurring structures in the novel to maintain balance, to make the reader understand the novel ,and the stages of development that happens to grendel in the novel.

In the first chapter Grendel seems so rude and grumpy but he's more respectful than his mother. His characteristic in the first chapter so far is more animal like, however he does have some human characteristics by respecting what's around him unlike his mother. In the first chapter he states that “i fool myself with thoughts that i'm more noble” (Gardner 6). They also describe him as a pointless ridiculous monster crouched in a shadow. He stinks as dead men because he murders children and cows . He also states “i am neither proud nor ashamed , understand” (Gardner 6). He's not proud of what he does but he has to live the way his mother has adjusted it (tradition). Grendel is a sensitive monster in this book which he does care about

Along with this comes the authoritative voice, but also the ability to public speak. The point that Grendel focuses on is Beowulf’s eye contact or lack thereof. He pinpoints each aspect of Beowulf that does not fit the expectation and obsesses over it the same way one fixates on their own imperfections. These minuscule oddities are the only faults Grendel finds which serves to his discomfort because he is not able to understand Beowulf since he is so wholesome. The peculiarities Grendel preoccupies himself with are faults that in society are often not even counted as actual flaws. Grendel is so blinded with his misunderstanding of Beowulf that he cannot see his humanistic flaws or interior flaws, and since Grendel is the narrator the absence of these shows the tendency to look for any possible errors. Perfection is so sought after that even the closest attempts to it are ripped down by criticism.

In Beowulf, Grendel is described as “A fiend out of hell” (9) and a descendant of Cain's clan immediately giving the reader the vision of a beastly being, maybe even causing some to say monster. While in Grendel we are able to see this “monster” as having the same characteristics of emotions, conscience, and even see him observe and not fight. It seems as if Grendel is always fighting and plotting to kill the human race in Beowulf, but in Grendel we are able to see him observe and question the humans and him question why he is so different. The humans fear Grendel because of the fact that they have never seen anything like him before and immediately attack him and ostracize him. Grendel

Beowulf tells of Grendel’s spontaneous attacks on the meadhall where he would kill and devour sleeping thanes until his thirst for blood was quenched. This description of Grendel shows his nature as an animal simply responding to his jealousy over human fellowship. As an animal Grendel’s natural enemy is man, and mankind’s natural enemy is the animal, Grendel. This epic poem tells of a monster that goes on killing sprees to overcome his envy of mankind. However Grendel portrays a monster that is innocent by nature. At first, Grendel kills as a sport, for fun. Then as time passes and Grendel’s feelings toward mankind develop more fully he kills out of contempt. In the end, Grendel begins killing to protect himself from his own personal

It showed how terrified he was while Beowulf was killing him and his fear of dying. It even showed that he wasn’t very happy by gaining the ability to not be hurt by any weapon. You may not normally consider the feelings of a monster but the book Grendel will most likely make you feel bad for the monster. In the book Beowulf, it simply shows him as a bloodthirsty monster that kills for the fun of it.

Grendel is a character who, at first, is an innocent monster who is figuring out the way the world works. He is a character that we are supposed to sympathize with, in this story, because we are given his background, so we can see why he made the decisions that he made, and the reasoning behind them. Another interesting point in the book, is the argument of whether or not Grendel, in the end, was punished for his “evil deeds.” In Grendel, we are supposed to sympathize with him, the reader shouldn’t believe that he was truly vile, and the reader also shouldn’t think that he was truly punished for his evil deeds.

In the book Grendel, written by John Gardner, the story informs the readers about Grendel experiences throughout his life. John writes his story in the eyes of a monster, Grendel. He talks about what life means to him and how everything and everyone is meaningless. Some people he interact with is the humans, his mother and the dragon.

We all have both some Grendel and Beowulf inside us from the epic Beowulf. Beowulf was the hero and represented all the good things in the culture during that time. Grendel represented everything evil.

     Good and evil is one of the main conflicts in the poem Beowulf. How is Grendel affected by the concepts of good and evil? Grendel is an alienated individual who just wants to be a part of something. His desire to fit in causes him to do evil things. Grendel is fascinated by the Shaper’s poetry. He often