Grendel: Direct and Indirect Characterization Beowulf, an epic poem written by an anonymous Anglo-Saxon poet, is a story about an epic hero named Beowulf who comes to the Danes to fight many monsters and save the people of the Danes. The first enemy Beowulf fights is a creature named Grendel. Grendel is described as a large non-human creature with large claws. That’s mostly all that is directly given about Grendel’s appearance, leaving the reader to picture Grendel as they like. Besides physical appearance the author does indirectly describe Grendel’s family and his personality.…
Since the arrivals of the characters are pretty spread out between negative and positive, Grendel has his ups and downs. At the very beginning of the story, Grendel seems to be a decent character, and it does not seem like he is really out to get anyone. This is especially true when he is a child; he discusses the games he used to play when he was young. One of those games led to Grendel getting caught in the tree (Gardner 18). Then Hrothgar comes in, and the monster’s character somewhat devolves, because he begins to hate the king.…
Grendel, since he is a descendent of Cain, is one that is cursed by God himself, forced to wage “his lonely war, inflicting constant cruelties” on people (116: line:164-165). I would say that he is evil because of the hatred of his neighbors have made him bitter, but he is also evil because he is a demon. They call him a “fiend out of hell”, one that loves to work evil in the world (114: line 100). Even though he may be bitter because of the resentment, the fact that he is a demon that came out of hell makes him a monster, something that is evil from the roots of his origin. He is linked to the man Cain who was cursed by God himself for killing his own brother, an event that would conjure up significant resentment of the human race, part of…
Beowulf and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight both feature antagonists that could be considered monsters. These two characters are the primary entities that challenge their heroes in their following stories. A monster by normal standards is an ugly and ferocious creature that strike fear into others, but the definition of monster can be loosely taken and adapted into anything. Specifically a source that summons a great amount of anxiety for other people. Grendel and the Green Knight are our horrendous beings that fit the term monster but one creature in mind truly depicts the word monster, Grendel.…
Grendel’s self image all depends on His opinions of himself, comparisons, and opinions of other people. Three characters that change his opinion of himself are The Dragon Unferth, And His Mother. Grendel’s mother impacts Grendel’s personality because he wants to be different from her. Grendel’s mother cannot talk and is not free willed like grendel is and that seperates grendels personality apart from his mother’s. “I understood that the world was nothing: a mechanical chaos of casual, brute enmity on which we stupidly impose our hopes and fears.…
Grendel from Beowulf differs in character from Grendel from the novel Grendel because in Beowulf, Grendel is confident, predictable, and a static character, while in Grendel, he is an outsider, confused, and a dynamic character. In the epic poem, Beowulf, Grendel is characterized from the third person point of view. The third person point of view creates distance, and it limits the depiction to only the beliefs of those who are not Grendel. Grendel is viewed as a monster who is full of confidence.…
Grendel is misunderstood he, only wants to know why he was put on this earth when everybody hates him. He lets his inner demons of that question get the best of him and that’s why he kills people. When Grendel…
In his attempts to discover his purpose, Grendel observes and rejects the key human values of civilization and religion. Grendel’s struggle to find meaning of his existence and…
Whom the creator outlawed and condemned as outcasts” (104-107). Fueled with anger, Grendel was blinded by rage and “... he grabbed thirty men from their resting places and rushed to his lair…..blundering…
Grendel is evil, heavily due to the Danes making him this way. If Grendel is evil, the Danes are just as much so. They eliminate their neighbors in order to gain wealth and power, as well as destroying anything that opposes them. At first, Grendel attempted communication and decided to not interfere, but, by the end of the novel, he had no intent on this and wished for their death and despair (as proven above). In chapter five, the text states, “From now on I’d stay clear of them.…
All of these events cause Grendel to question his role in this life and if he should be that good or bad role. “I had become something, as if born again. I had hung between possibilities before, between the cold truths I knew and the heart-sucking conjuring tricks of the Shaper; now that was passed: I was Grendel, Ruiner of Meadhalls, Wrecker of Kings! But also, as never before, I was alone.” (Gardner 80) Grendel had realized that he had a choice in how he would react, and he chose to attack the humans.…
This scene is an excellent representation of Grendel’s true personality. He is not evil, he is solely led to carry out his evil doings due to his environment. Grendel is merely cursed with this unfortunate…
Being considered a creature from hell, Grendel could not co-exist with man. Forced to…
Grendel’s anger builds up towards the world for being so confusing and this causes Grendel to kill. He acts as if his actions don’t correlate to any moral implications, however it does have meaning. Therefore it is a misguided attempt to deny the meaningless of life by destroying it. He attempts in different ways to show his denial of meaning. He devours the priest, reducing religion to something that “sits in the stomach like duck eggs.”…
Grendel is an innately evil demonic beast and his birthright is to be scorned by man as Cain’s evil offspring. As a result of this ostracism, he takes out his fury on the men in Heorot, killing whomever he can as his own form of warped vengeance stemming from a feeling of isolation as a born outcast. Despite Grendel’s misfortunes, which may garner sympathy from some, his actions are not justified by the situation he is in and, even in a violent, revenge-based society, Grendel is still the heartless beast the Danes see him as and his fate was well deserved. When Grendel is first introduced, he is actually described in a slightly sympathetic light.…