Sir Gawain As A Perfect Hero

In today's society, people love and praise stories about a hero saving the day and always doing good and what is right. Attributes of these so called heroes can be seen in specific stories such as Sir Gawain and Beowulf. In the tales of Sir Gawain, he is a knight of the famous King Arthur and is taking up the task to defend the king and go on wild and deadly adventures (Bulfinch). He ends up failing his king by trying to save his own life and is forgiven by Arthur. Beowulf is the manly man that we all think of. In his story, a monster named Grendel is attacking and killing his people. When he finds out this information, he takes up the task of defending the people he cares about and goes to fight Grendel and killing him. Though Sir Gawain seems to be a perfect hero and knight, Beowulf is more of a true hero because he dedicates his life to others and sacrifices his life for the people around him and for what is truly moral and right, while Sir Gawain just follows the rules for his own benefit. When Beowulf discovers and hears that people are being slaughtered every night by this mysterious creature, he devotes everything he is doing to solve and even defeat Grendel. He sees that Grendel is an unmerciful monster who is killing for fun and knows that he must be stopped …show more content…
Beowulf is a great example of a what a hero should look like regardless of what time he is from. Even today Beowulf is seen as a great hero and that if he was around today, he most definitely would be seen as a significant and impactful hero. Sir Gawain cannot compare to all the good and pure hearted desires of Beowulf. Gawain is selfish, and only in it for himself and his own desires. Beowulf is a true and selfless hero due to his true passion to save and defend those that are weak and does what needs to be done even without the needed materials to do