J’ola didn’t have time for that damn droid’s incompetence today. She’d left her crew aboard the ship after treating them to too much festivities the night before. Corso had never been one to hold his liquor all that gracefully, and his advances had been . . . . J’ola cringed. Despite her impatience with the kid, she hoped he didn’t remember half the things he’d said to her. Or that she’d laughed.
Risha had excused herself early to plot something. J’ola was sure the space princess would let her in on it whenever it was relevant, because prying the information out of the woman was damn near impossible. Guss had attempted to levitate the bottle of booze, before giving up and throwing it across the room, claiming he’d done so with his mind. J’ola had told him to levitate himself into the fresher to get a towel after that.
Bowdar and Akaavi had at least been interesting. Getting into an argument about their ancestor’s triumphs of old. When the two turned to J’ola for confirmation on who was the best killer, the lethan had pointed out that technically, this holiday originated on Kashyyyk, meaning Bowdar won by default simply because he was a Wookie. Akaavi had taken the defeat as she always did. By cleaning her weapon while glaring at her cabin mates. Afterward, Bowdar had regaled them all with his genealogy, right up until everyone
…show more content…
fell asleep. Taking a deep breath, J’ola waited at the top of the lift for C2 to return with the rest of the cargo.
She didn’t care that she’d just insulted a Jedi. A bunch of pompous, holier than thou people in her opinion. Not that J’ola particularly liked anyone. Well, maybe that wasn’t true. She’d grown rather fond of Guss. The worthless Mon Calamari kept life aboard the ship interesting, and he’d do absolutely anything J’ola asked, just to prove he could. He couldn’t, of course, but that was half the fun. It was like a game of roulette to see what would happen, and he was totally okay with the crew placing bets on the outcome of his
missions. The lift opened, and her C2-N2 droid toddled out with the remaining cargo. It had been Corso’s idea to paint the targets all over. It had been a month, and the blasted droid still hadn’t noticed, leaving J’ola feeling cheated. Maybe one day she’d test out those targets, see just how accurately they’d been placed. For now, she had a job to do. “We haven’t got all day, C2,” the Twi’lek grumbled, waving for him to load the hover sled so they could deliver the goods to the cantina. “I’ve got another delivery to make on the other side of the galaxy.” The droid chittered another apology and began steering the sled. When his back was turned, J’ola slipped another bottle of whiskey out and tucked it in her jacket. Just in case Corso remembered what he’d said last night.
In Beowulf, the protagonist Beowulf is shown as a hero with extrodinary strength. This is not what makes him a hero. By definition, a hero is a man of exceptional quality. However this term does not do Beowulf justice. His self-imposed purpose in life is to help others, and eventually sacrifices his own life in doing so. Beowulf’s battle with the dragon serves as a critique of the notion that Beowulf is a hero. The Dragon section displays many of Beowulf’s heoric characteristics. Beowulf establishes himself as a hero by fighting the dragon, exemplifing strength and courage when fighting the dragon, and sacrificing himself so that others can live.
O’brien, who fought in the Vietnam war, re visited the battle ground twenty years later. He didn’t go alone, he took his ten year old daughter Kathleen with him. They went on this trip as a gift to her from him (she had just turned ten). “I’d wanted to take my daughter to the places I’d seen as a soldier.”, he said. He also wanted her to see the world. A ten year old probably wouldn’t enjoy most of the trip. Although “she’d held up well”. Kathleen was getting restless saying stuff like, “I think this place stinks… it smells rotten”. She go back and forth to him and the jeep. She wasn’t necessarily
In Tolkien’s lecture, “Beowulf: The monsters and the Critics,” he argues that Beowulf has been over analyzed for its historical content, and it is not being studied as a piece of art as it should be. He discusses what he perceives the poet of Beowulf intended to do, and why he wrote the poem the way he did. Tolkien’s main proposition, “it was plainly only in the consideration of Beowulf as a poem, with an inherent poetic significance, that any view or conviction can be reached or steadily held” (Tolkien). He evaluates why the author centers the monsters throughout the entire poem, why the poem has a non-harmonic structure, why and how the author fusses together Christianity and Paganism, and how the author uses time to make his fictional poem seem real. He also discusses the overall theme of Beowulf and other assumptions of the text. To support his viewpoints, Tolkien uses quotations and examples from the poem, quotations from other critics, and compares Beowulf to other works of art. Tolkien discusses several statements in interpreting Beowulf as a poem.
It is common opinion that Beowulf was written by a Christian poet. This was probably true because at the time when it was written, most of the few people who knew how to read and write were in the clergy. There are various references within the poem to elements of the Christian religion. However, the story is about Pagan people and certain aspects of their culture are even glorified. The ambiguity of Beowulf’s religious content has caused confusion as to what significance religion had in inspiring the author and in what manner the author meant to inspire or influence his audience. I do not think that Beowulf is a Christian allegory because Beowulf had very little in common with the Biblical figure of Jesus Christ. I think that religion was not the primary thematic concern of the writer. Although there are discrepancies between the two styles of thinking, Beowulf seems to praise values which were considered moral and good among all humanity, both Christian and Pagan.
Beowulf begins with a history of the Danish kings. Hrothgar is the present king of the Danes. He builds a hall, called Heorot, to house his army. The Danish soldiers gather under its roof to celebrate and have fellowship with each other. Grendel, who lives at the bottom of a nearby swamp, is awakened and disgusted by the singing of Hrothgar's men. He comes to the hall late one night and kills thirty of the warriors in their sleep. For the next twelve years Grendel stalks the mead hall known as Heorot.
A writers mind is very intellectual, they tend to have an unparalleled vision within their sense of understanding. The differences of this vision, compared to the levels of understanding, shows itself transversely throughout the novel Grendel and the epic poem Beowulf. Both forms of literature are distinct in the plot and setting, but Gardner’s perceptiveness of Beowulf in his novel differs from the view of the unknown author’s relay of Beowulf in the poem. In the poem, Beowulf is portrayed as an epic hero, brave honorable, and dignified, with vast generosity and munificent loyalty. While in the novel, he is portrayed as an unsettling stranger that connives his way into everyone’s life by his dangerous nature and entrancing stories.
He killed three monsters and then he died. Not a very interesting fate, but it is none the less one that I find myself having to write about regardless of whether or not I want to. Thus it was, the mighty Beowulf of old England that went forth to slay the evils which plagued the lands of his own people as well as those of his neighboring tribes. The second battle was one that was brought about by Beowulf’s willingness to go and help an old friend, and thus he nearly lost his life once more. For those not acquainted with the story of Beowulf, he was said to be the strongest man ever to live, and given this he was fated according to their beliefs to accomplish certain things in his life. Some of these things being to be slaying of great monsters and winning of great wars. And thus that is what he did as he progressed through life. The epic is rather brief in terms of what an epic normally is, but, in this time he manages to travel to a distant land, and slay a monster that has taken over that land, and then after that feat he of course makes that monsters mother mad, you know you can do something to someone without making dear old mom mad. So, then Beowulf must kill the mother and then after they are both sent into hell, the land is free of tyranny and injustice Beowulf returns home a hero. After fifty winters of rule by Beowulf, a dragon attacks his people because of what was done by a thief, so Beowulf knowing in his old age that he would probably not survive this battle to slay the dragon, goes into battle anyway and slays the dragon and he himself is then slain, by injuries sustained by this fight. My focus is fate, and how no matter how Beowulf decided to do it he would eventually die for his people.
As the welcoming celebration for Beowulf goes on, Unferth begins to ridicule Beowulf about his swimming competition with Breca. Unferth is jealous and feels threatened by Beowulf " for he would not allow that any other man of middle-earth should ever achieve more glory under the heavens than himself." (Norton p. 33) Unferth is a very peculiar character. Although he has committed the horrific crime of killing his brother(s), he is privileged enough to sit at the feet of the king, a very respected position. His sin,an enormous violation of the comitatus, suggests that there is something wrong in Hrothgar's kingdom and perhaps helps to foreshadow its destruction. Ultimately, it will be destroyed, as the text says, by a fire after " sword-hate between son-in-law and father-in-law to awaken after murderous rage." (Norton p. 28).
There was a huge influence of both paganism and christianity that can be noticed in Old English Poetry. To better understand these two values, let us explain what paganism and christianity mean. Christianity is a monotheistic religion centered on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. As presented in New Thestament, Christians believe Jesus to be the Son of God and the Messiah prophesied in The Old Testament. Christianity began in the 1st century AD as a Jewish sect, and shares many religious texts with Judaism, specifically the Hebrew Bible, known to Christians as the Old Testament. The name Christian means belonging to Christ or partisan of Christ. As far as Paganism is concerned, the word comes from latin paganus and means a country dweller, rustic. It is a term which has come to connote a broad set of spiritual or cultic practises or beliefs of any folk religion a nd of historical and contemprorary polytheism religious in particular. (...) Characteristic of pagan traditions in the anscence of proselytisation and presence of a living mythology which explains religious practice. The term Pagan is a Christian adaptation of the goy of Judaism.
In “Beowulf” translated by Burton Raffel, the character Beowulf is portrayed as a brave, courageous, and very pious man. In the pagan tale the underlying motif of Good vs. Evil heightens these characteristics even to the point where Beowulf comes across as a symbol for God and Christianity. He battles “the demon” Grendel (ln. 16), Grendel’s mother, and a fierce dragon, all in order to save those who need aid, primarily the people of Herot. This too is very Christlike because he is serving those lower than himself for the sole purpose of doing the right thing. Although Beowulf is very brave all throughout, he becomes boastful and greedy from the time he first battles Grendel to when he takes on the dragon.
Beowulf is a very brave hero, he has fought and killed many creatures before, but this battle was different. He knew this battle was of great importance to everyone, and that made him that much more nervous. This creature was fierce and had been tormenting their village for as long as they could remember, so her death would be a huge victory for Beowulf and it would be an even bigger relief for the villagers. All of the people in the village were cheering for Beowulf as he walked away headed off to the greatest battle of his life.
Beowulf is an epic poem that, above all, gives the reader an idea of a time long past; a time when the most important values were courage and integrity. The only factors that could bestow shower fame upon a person were heroic deeds and family lineage. Beowulf, as the paradigm of pagan heroes, exhibited his desire to amass fame and fortune; the only way to do so was to avenge the death of others. This theme of retribution that is ever present throughout the poem seems to color the identities of its characters.
On the surface, the story of A Small, Good Thing is simple and universal. Thirty-three-year-old Ann Weiss orders a cake for her son's Scotty's eighth birthday and is a little put off by the baker's cold attitude - "(he) was not jolly. There were no pleasantries between them, just the minimum exchange of words, the necessary information." However, she soo...
In the epic poem Beowulf, the character Beowulf is seen to have three battles. The first battle is against Grendel, the second is against Grendel’s mum, and the final battle is against the dragon. In each of these battles Beowulf is portrayed as a great hero (well he should be since it’s a characteristic of an epic poem to glorify the hero) and is always seen to be brave and fearless.
“Oh honey,” I answered, sadly acknowledging my daughter’s hunger, “ I wish it was. Actually, I’m not quite sure what it is. Help me clean it off, will you?” Emily and I began scrubbing the dilapidated, seaweed covered object in the warm waves of the Atlantic. “Wow, That’s not at all I expected.” I answered as I rolled an old bottle in the water. “At least we can get some money for this at the recycling center. Not much, but if we collect enough bottles we could get some lunch!” I looked hopelessly at the bottle.