Grendel's Mother Is Evil Essay

In Beowulf, Grendel’s mother is described as very monstrous however her actions are very humane. She has intentions to seek revenge against Beowulf for Grendel’s death. Grendel, like his mother seems to be guided by human emotions and impulses. He was outcasted from the Dane’s society and seeks his own revenge for this. He was never accepted into human society because he appears to be frightening, deformed and monstrous. When the Danes make a lot of noise in the Heorot Hall, enraged he comes to kill them for his exile and alienation. The fact that Grendel is able to have these human emotions of feeling hurt from him exile reveals that part of him may be more human than they think. Though his mother is not depicted as human or un-monstrous in any way, she still shares these human qualities with him. In fact she has much more human …show more content…
Though she is described as a sea-monster with evil intent, she has some human qualities that make her less of a monster and perhaps not a monster at all. What makes the Danes see her as monstrous is actually what make her humane as a mother. She comes to Herot with only the intentions of retrieving her son’s torn limb and getting revenge on the Danes because they took her sons life. The Danes see her as monstrous because she kills one of their most valued and respected men. However, unlike her son she does not relentlessly massacre forty men, she only seeks equal revenge; they shall lose one man because that is what they took from her. Rather than blindly murdering everyone in the town like her son may have, Grendel is much less monstrous because she has morals and self-control. She is not driven by blind-anger and resentment like her son was. She is driven by her pain and mourning for the death of her son—these are no monstrous qualities at all, in fact they are very humane