Similarities Between Grendel And Beowulf

In the epic of Beowulf, one of the warrior’s biggest adversaries is a creature from the swamp named Grendel. Although the character of Grendel is present for only a short portion in the story of Beowulf, Grendel signifies one of the important messages in the text about humanity. In Beowulf, Grendel is called a ‘monster’. However, if observed closely, analyzing the meaning behind the story, it is easy to see that Grendel is not a typical monster, in fact, it doesn’t seem like he is a monster at all. There is much evidence within the short period of the text where Grendel is present, which indicates he is

To honor the Beowulf’s heroic life and battles, I’ve been assigned as one of his closest warriors to exclaim his appellation and share the stories of his battles. One of the citizen came up to me and asked, “I heard that Beowulf was an amazing guy, but I never fully knew him. Could you tell me more about him?” I was extremely excited as this man was the first person to ever ask me about Beowulf. “Beowulf was a strong leader and a great friend. Although he might not have been a very humble man, he was nowhere near being a bully. He’s the type of man that would belittle anyone who hurts the weak and innocent. Beowulf was mettlesome and was never intimidated by any menace.” The man’s eyes were already widen. “He sounds like a guy I would wanna be protected by,” the citizen said, “Can you tell me about one of his battles?” I prepared myself as I was about to begin a long lecture of how strong Beowulf was.

Beowulf is about a warrior who fights a huge monster to show his loyalty to a king that was not even his. It was written in the Anglo-Saxon time period and this greatly affects the way the story is written. Grendel is written from the monster's point of view and this was written many years later.

deciphered. Beowulf being pure good, and Grendel being pure evil. One of the reasons of

One aspect of Grendel that is alike in both stories is the way he acts. In Grendel the monster kills many people. He does it very brutally too. "Enough of that! A night for tearing heads off, bathing in blood. Except, alas, h has killed his quota for the season. Care, take care of the gold-egg-laying goose! There is no limit to desire but desire's needs." This was Grendel's law. He does not take pity on any human. From his point of view, the humans deserved this and they were going to get it. These actions are the same in Beowulf

Beowulf is an old Anglo-Saxon story of a terrifying monster Grendel, Grendel travels to the Danes mead hall Heorot and while the danes expect it least he attacks killing countless men purely for the joys of doing so. Hrothgar king of the Danes calls for a warrior to fight this unruly beast. After 12 long years of grendel attacking Hrothgar's calls are answered and the great warrior Beowulf comes to kill Grendel. Beowulf travels to the land of the Danes from across the seas and in the first night he kills Grendel. Sadly for Beowulf Grendel has a mother that now seeks revenge for her son's death and Beowulf is asked to kill Grendel’s mother as well. Beowulf goes to where Grendel’s mother is staying and battled her to the death , Beowulf wins

The story of Beowulf is a heroic epic, chronicling the distinguished deeds of the great Geatish warrior, Beowulf, who travels across the seas to rid the Danes of the evil monster Grendel, who has been inflicting destruction and terrorizing the kingdom. Beowulf is glorified for his heroic deeds of ridding the land fiendish monsters and stopping the scourge of evil, while the monster, Grendel, is portrayed as a repugnant creature who deserves death for its evil actions. However, many have disagreed with such a simplistic and biased representation of Grendel and his role in the epic poem. John Gardner in his book, Grendel, sets out to change the reader’s perception of Grendel and his role in Beowulf by narrating the story through Grendel’s point of view. John Gardner transforms Grendel, once perceived as an evil fiend in Beowulf, into a lonely but intelligent outcast who is actually quite similar to humans, due to his intelligence capacity for rational thought and his real, and at times irrational emotions. Gardner portrays Grendel as a hurt individual and as a victim of oppression, ostracized from civilization. Although the two works revolve around the same basic plot,, the themes and characters in Beowulf and Grendel are often different and sometimes contradictory.

“Beowulf” and Grendel are two tales similar in many ways, yet different from each other. These stories are like a coin; you cannot have one side without the other. Just as the sides of a coin share the same coin, these stories share a similar plot, a setting, and tell of the same events. The sides of a coin also have differences as do “Beowulf” and Grendel. In the case of these two tales this difference is in their respective philosophical views.

There are many similarities and differences between the movie "Beowulf and Grendel", to the poem. Major differences between the movie and the poem would be Grendel himself. In the poem, he is described as an evil monster born from two demons. In the movie, Grendel is actually human, but known as a troll to the warriors and Danes. The poem doesn’t give the background of Grendel or show how the Danes killed his father and the possible reason of his revenge, like in the movie. If the witch, Selma, was not included in the storyline of the movie, the audience would not have known key information that she was used to show from more flashbacks. The witch gives more of an idea about Grendel’s past life that could have been the possibility to

In Seamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf, Grendel is nothing but an evil fiend that needs to be slain, “a fiend out of hell, began to work his evil in the world” (Heaney 9). Grendel is portrayed as an evil monster that has only been wreaking havoc and terrorizing a kingdom for an extended amount of time because it thrives on the pain of others. Seamus states, “Malignant by nature, he never showed remorse” (Heaney 10). Grendel is made out to appear as little more than a monster, “insensible to pain and human sorrow” (Heaney 11). He is portrayed to have little to no human qualities, to be the furthest thing from

Both the epic poem Beowulf and the novel Grendel depict the same storyline, but from different point of views. Grendel’s personality tends to be much more evil than he himself depicts in the novel. Since Grendel is the narrator of the novel, the audience only gets to know what the story is like from his point of view, which he stretches the truth on numerous occasions. But, in Beowulf, the poem has a narrator and is in the third person omniscient, this means the audience knows how all the characters and feeling, thinking, or saying. Also, the theme nature vs. nurture appears a lot in Grendel which means his viewpoints on certain things are either

Grendel, is thus seen as the descendant of an individual who epitomizes resentment and malice in Beowulf. The author states Grendel lives in exile and is seen as “mankind’s enemy”(Raffel, 22). Grendel is the representation of all that is evil and he is declared to be the “shepherd of evil and the “guardian of crime”(Raffel, 33) by the Danes in Beowulf. The author describes Grendel to be an evil, cruel, apathetic creature who’s pleasure lies in attacking and devouring Hrothgar’s men. The author describes Grendel’s malice by painting a gruesome picture of Grendel’s countless attacks on the mead hall in which he exhibits Grendel as a heartless, greedy, and violent being who mercilessly murders the men at the mead hall by tearing them apart, cutting their body into bits and drinking the blood from their veins. The author describes Grendel’s greed by stating Grendel’s thoughts were as “quick as his greed or his claws”(Raffel, 21). He describes Grendel’s as having eyes that “gleamed in the darkness and burned with a gruesome light”, swift hard claws and great sharp teeth which paints a picture of Grendel’s frightening appearance in the reader’s mind. In contrast to the traditional story of Beowulf, Grendel in John Gardner’s novel, Grendel is not depicted as a monster but as an intelligent creature capable of human thought, feelings and speech. John Gardner portrays Grendel as an outcast

Having multiple chapters of the poem dedicated to the monster Grendel, you would get the idea that he is of some importance in the epic poem. The poem storyline is majorly dedicated to monsters since the storyline is pretty much separated into three different story arcs. Grendel is described as a sin stained demon. “They have seen my strength for themselves. Have watched me rise from the darkness of war. Dripping with my enemies’ blood. I drove five great giants into chains, chased all of that race from earth, I swam in the blackness of night, hunting monsters out of the ocean, and killing them one by one; death was my errand and the fate they had earned. Now Grendel and I are called together, and I’ve come.” (Beowulf page 36). Grendel was the first monster to be introduced in the story and from the time he was introduced and the time he was defeated by Beowulf, Grendel was killing and terrorizing the Danes every day and night. When Beowulf got their he told the danes he was there to defeat the mighty beast Grendel. The King of Danes Hrothgar welcomed Beowulf and threw him a big party of sorts through the night. That was when Beowulf has the

In Grendel we see the monster as a more humane character. In this portrayal of the monster we see an almost human reaction and actions through the growth and change of the monster. In Beowulf the monster is truly seen as a beast; his character rampages and terrors the people and the humanity or intelligence of the character is close to none. In Grendel we see the monster growing and changing. Through the novel we see this character discover his closeness to humanity; through this portrayal we see him discover his emotions and we in turn discover the passion behind everyday life.

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.