Grendel Essay - Grade: A PDF

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Walker !1 Katherine Walker Ms. Jaquez English 12 AP - 3rd Hour 15 December 2014 Evil Misunderstood Stories are usually told from the hero’s point of view. How they saved humanity and defeated the monsters and everyone lived happily ever after. But what about the creature they just defeated? A fault in stories with epic heroes is that it glorifies one god-like person and flattens everything else to one color. It makes people confuse one story for all stories. But not anymore. Grendel by John Gardener is a mythological fantasy novel that follows the life of the antagonist from the famous epic poem Beowulf and gives readers the “other side of the story”. As the novel progresses, Grendel morphs into a character that isn’t just a typical destructor of human lives. Through Gardener’s presentation of the character Grendel, readers have reacted to him through sympathy, rather than disgust, due to the fact he is lonely, has a unchangeable fate, and is misunderstood. Grendel was always an outcast ever since he could remember. As a young creature he never had true meaningful interaction or companionship with anyone. “I used to play games when I was young…I lived those years, as do all young things…” (pg. 15-16). In addition to this, his mother lived her life in a cave, unable to interact with Grendel. “She was pitiful, foul…she whimpered one sound” (pg. 55-56). As for his father, he is unidentified within the book, but is suspected to be the main reason Grendel can speak english and is intelligent. This caused Grendel to be a born loner and it strengthened as he began to despise humans. “I scorned them,

Walker !2 sometimes hated them…I was as solitary as one live tree in a vast landscape of coal,” (pg. 76). Through this presentation of his lonely situation, readers pity Grendel as he never belonged, making him a bitter creature. One of the most significant moments within Grendel is when Grendel consults with the dragon. The dragon is a majestic creature who can see the past, present, and the future. He reflects the philosophical thoughts of Gardner and is a mentor to Grendel. He explains to Grendel that he is “the brute existent by which they [humans] learn to define themselves,” (pg. 73) giving Grendel’s life a purpose. That his destiny is to bring glory to humans, to give them a reason to define themselves as good, as heroes. This soon gives Grendel tendencies to act almost “mechanically” or “like a machine” to show that it is an impulsive behavior reflecting his purpose and he can’t control it. As this life was chosen for him, it makes the reader feel sorry for Grendel as he has been put into a situation without the choice to be evil, to never truly experience glory or true happiness due to the fact he is stepped on for human’s own eminence. As Grendel is a mixture of one part loneliness and one part stuck, it creates a full cup of his whole being a massive misunderstanding. It all started with the humans mistaking him for a “tree spirit or beast like fungus” (24-25) and trying to kill him. Thus, he misunderstood the ignorance of the humans causing everlasting hatred towards them. He won’t ever be accepted by anyone who isn’t a non-humanistic creature because humans are afraid and shun things they don’t understand. As they did multiple times with Grendel. He didn’t mean to be evil, he was just built that way. This ultimately causes readers to feel the upmost sympathy towards Grendel as he isn’t just an evil creature within Beowulf, he was just a product of an unfavorable environment that lead him into the deep chasms of darkness.

Walker !3 Grendel is a character that proves that there is always two sides to every story. Through his life situations of being feared by humans, inability for a real relationship, and his idle life Gardener creates the idea that being misunderstood does not necessarily translate to malicious ways. That there is always a reason behind immoral acts whether these reasons are evil or not. Some paintings are built from a thousand points of color, if one stands too close a sunset becomes just a series of red dots, but do not stare at a red dot and say the whole painting is just one color....