Grendal
Throughout the novel Grendel by John Gardner, the main character Grendel is searching for answers about life, most importantly the meaning of life. He is confused with how he wants to view life and searches for some reason to why he exists. He turned too many for these answers; his mother, man, and the dragon, but no one could provide Grendel the answer he so desperately sought, all just pushed him to the idea of existentialism.
Grendel’s first impression was to ask his mother about the meaning of life and what was his part in it. After Grendel’s first encounter with man, he immediately told his mother what had happened. “I tried to tell her all that happened, all that I had come to understand: the meaningless objectiveness of the world…She only stared troubled at my noise”. However, she had lost her ability to speak years ago and only responded with gibberish, not once giving him an answer. Instead when he said, “the world is all pointless accident…I exist nothing else”, she hurried over and seized him pulling him close to her. Realizing that his mother probably doesn’t understand, Grendel was forced to turn to some one else for the answers he needed, so he turned to man.
Grendel became fascinated with man at an early age. He watched as their population grew, he watched the wars they waged, and the celebrations they had at night. He watched their senseless killing, their wastefulness, and he learned some new words from them. He seemed to look at man as his teacher and deep down it appeared that he wanted to become a man himself for they had found some kind of meaning. He did make a couple of futile attempts to befriend man. Often he approached the exiled, but in the end he “had to eat them for they wer...
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...nt of life is. He tries to seek out answers from various people, all of which leave him with no definite answer. His mother seems incapable of comprehending such a question and avoids it altogether, man tries to kill him, and the dragon using what he deems to be comprehensible logic only confuses Grendel. Towards the end of the book Grendel returns to his original idea of existentialism, which he stated in the beginning of the novel. “I alone exist, All the rest, I saw, is merely what pushes me, or what I push against, blindly – as blindly as all that pushes back.” Thus, Grendel continues believing in his concept of existentialism and goes on with his killing until he becomes the prey of Beowulf and is killed. He never comes to understand that it is sometimes better to accept life and live it, rather than spending your entire life trying to analyze the meaning of it.
The climax of the story is when Miles is shot by the Bonewoman. The reader comes to realize that Miles’ choice to live life on the safe side was a mistake:
"'Pointless accident,' not pattern, governs the world, says Grendel, who, as a consequence, adopts an existentialistic stance," explains Frank Magill in Critical Review of Short Fiction. This point has been expressed in numerous critical papers by various essayists. One may wonder, however, whether this is the only way to interpret an incredibly ambiguous story in which no question is ever clearly answered nor clearly formulated. One may wonder, actually, whether the author meant for his work to be analyzed in this way at all. The author, John Gardner, spins a tale of a monster held viscously to his destiny of an unnatural death. No matter what Grendel does, his death is predetermined. Though he tries to disprove fate to himself by believing in existentialism, the belief that actions create the future, he never validates that point of view. John Gardner's purpose in writing Grendel was to express that the future is completely unavoidable.
This ‘beast’, the protagonist of the story, fights an internal struggle, of which is a part of the Hero’s Journey. Grendel is unable to decide what to make of himself and of the world surrounding him. He has only ever known the world as wild and mechanical, yet he is charmed by the artistic brilliance of the Shaper’s words. Grendel ultimately meets a brutal yet peaceful demise. Standing on the face of the same cliff he found himself in the beginning of the novel, surrounded by mindless eyes, he states, “Poor Grendel’s had an accident. So may you all.” (Grendel, John Gardner, pg.174) Previous to this, he questions if what he is feeling is joy. The reader is lead to believe that Grendel must feel nothing but peace. This, is the concluding moment of his
Throughout John Gardner’s Grendel, the audience bears witness to a creature who has been ostracized by the world around him. Throughout his journey, the stories protagonist tries to live out his own life the way he wants to, despite being labeled as evil by those around him. Due to this constant criticism by his peers, he develops an inferiority complex that he desperately tries to make up for as the story progresses. Throughout his development, Grendel very rapidly moves past his existentialist beginning, through a brief phase of forced skepticism, and into a severely nihilistic point of view.
He derives a satisfaction from his interactions with the Danes that he cannot get from interactions with any other creature. violent outbursts and antagonistic relationship with humans can be seen as the result of a lonely creature’s misunderstood attempts to reach out and communicate with someone else. Grendel was amused by the humans, observing of their violence that (ch 3) He was sickened by the waste of their wars, all the animals killed but not eaten. Ashamed of his monstrousness, what better that to be like the thing you envy the most.
Many of the characters in Grendel have direction and purpose in their lives. Wealtheow is self- sacrificing, and Hrothgar is out for personal glory. Unferth and Beowulf spend their lives trying to become great heroes so that their names may outlast their flesh. The dragon believed in nihilism, and the Shaper used his imagination to create something to believe in. Some of the characters’ philosophies may not have been commendable, but Grendel could not find any direction or purpose for his life whatsoever. Grendel looked for the intervention of a power higher than himself to lay the truths of the world upon him, an experience that the Romantics would characterize as an experience of the sublime. John Gardner portrays Grendel as someone who wants to find a philosophy, whether his own or someone else’s, that fits him and gives him an identity or a reason to live. By looking at the text from this perspective we can see how Gardner believes people should pursue, or rather, embrace a power greater than themselves.
Grendel, as a character, has a much more complex identity than just a monster and a human. Some, such as Ruud, classify him as a mixture of three different characteristics, but alone, they tend to conflict with each other. By making the connection that Grendel represents immorality, the previous idea makes more sense, while simultaneously incorporating more aspects of the character into the analysis. In either case, Grendel represents much more than meets the eye, and provides a fascinating insight into
Grendel as a character is very intelligent, he is capable of rational thought at all times. Because of this, at sometimes during the story I would forget Grendel is a monster, the way he acts in his thoughts and actions I would mistake him for a human; at times I was even feeling bad for Grendel because he is a very lonely person who tries to understand all of the meaningless of the world around him. Grendel can never get to close to
In the story Grendel, one learns that this monster that seems atrocious and insensitive holds a dark outlook on the world. He often ponders the meaning of life, which seems to plague him. This stems from his painful childhood: “I understood that the world was nothing: a mechanical
He seeked guidance from “The Dragon” however, it can be argued that The Dragon was never real, yet a figment of Grendel’s imagination. Many people would rather hear a comforting lie than a painful truth; thus, that is what Grendel was seeking. At first The Dragon tells Grendel his purpose is to be a monster. He tells him, “you are the brute existence by which they learn to define themselves” (73). This supports process philosophy because it states how everything in life is connected. Grendel must fulfill his role as the monster to give the humans their purpose. He continues to compare Grendel and mankind to a “mountain climber and the mountain” (73). Thus arguing a mountain climber would be nothing without a mountain just as mankind would be nothing without Grendel. Therefore, everything in life is connected and everything has a purpose. However, although The Dragon seems to be in support of process philosophy, he utters words of nihilism. When Grendel asks The Dragon, “but why” (72) he responds “Why? Why? Ridiculous question! Why anything?” (72) therefore there is no real purpose to life, there is no reason why. Grendel only hears what he wants to hear, which is the nihilistic aspect of The Dragon’s lesson. After this, he commits the ultimate act of nihilism and becomes a true monster. A goat is “climbing, mindless, mechanical, because it is the business of goats to climb” (139).
After having thoroughly read the book, there is no doubt that Grendel shows proof of support in existentialism. The novel follows the life of a character who is gradually "disillusioned," turning from a teary romantic into a cold nihilist. Indeed, as the main character describes his childhood/adolescence in the beginning of the novel, his naiveté and innocence clearly stand out. “And so I discovered the sunken door, and so I came up, for the first time, to moon light”, recalls Grendel, remembering his first days out on earth as he analyzed and discovered various creatures and his surroundings with blatant ignorance. With the story of his first encounter with men, after getting his foot stuck in a crac...
John Gardner’s Grendel portrays a monster searching for his purpose in life. The characters know the meaning of their lives, but Grendel tries to discover his role and what life has to offer him. Grendel discovers his identity through other characters’ actions and beliefs. In Grendel, John Gardner illustrates the contrasting views of each character to show their view of society and the influence they have on Grendel.
In Chapter 8, Grendel exclaims, “I’m a machine. Like all of you. Blood-lust and rage are my character,” (Gardner 123). This profound statement establishes a connection between Grendel and the ambiguous “you,” the reader. The monster, though he confesses to his wrongdoing, asserts that readers are no better than he. Countless bible verses reiterate this concept: “For all have sinned,” (Romans 3:23) “[Humans] are all. .impure with sin,” (Isaiah 64:6). Gardner’s reminder to readers of mankind’s predisposition to sin earns pity for the monster. He expands on these sympathies by describing the nature of Grendel’s lonely existence. “But there was one thing worse,” Grendel states after discovering the dragon’s charm, “no weapon could cut me,” (Gardner 75). In this moment, nihilism overcomes Grendel; if fighting poses no danger, it has no purpose, and neither does he. Any reader who has had an experience which challenged his or her values cannot help but feel empathetic towards the purposeless creature. Perhaps more piteous, however, is the suggestion that Grendel has no choice in being “the dark side. . the terrible race God cursed,” (Gardner 51). The dragon condemns Grendel as “the brute existent by which [humans] learn to define themselves,” telling him that it is worthless to better his character (Gardner 72). It is not until after
At the end of the novel Grendel gets the chance to try to change his life. Grendel takes action and does something useful to make his life more important and memorable. Grendel felt as though his world and life was fading into darkness, he wouldn’t accept the truth and reality of the facts around him. ”Something is coming, strange as spring. I am afraid. Standing on an open hill, I imagine muffled footsteps overhead” (Gardner 126). Through Grendel’s agony and pain of his slow death he still resents the fact that he was defeated and says to himself that it was an accident. Gardner is successful in revealing the difference of reality and fantasy with the reference of Unferth, the dragon and himself and in which Grendel faces throughout his life in the
Grendel is alone; he can not know God’s love and be comforted. He is an outcast, and the sins of his forefather have fallen upon him. Evil can not stand God being glorified just as the praising of God by the Danes angered Grendel.