Compare And Contrast The Battle Of The Beast And Beowulf

Battle of the Beast

Beowulf is an interesting tale of heroism, where the strong-willed and heroic Beowulf single handedly slays an evil beast named Grendel to save all the innocent people that he has been feasting on. Although these characters are from two completely different sides of the spectrum, they do show both similarities and differences throughout the story. Beowulf is one of the most well known people in all of the land, While Grendel is an outcast, that lives in the wild, as far away from civilization as possible, and hates nothing more than than the hum of a joyous celebration going on near him, Beowulf is loyal, compassionate, heroic brave and affectionate to his fellow human beings. He fights for what is right and destroys

the wrongdoings he comes across. Both of these characters demonstrate tremendous amounts of courage, drive for what they desire, and they both show what great fighters they are in their battle.
Beowulf shows prodigious bravery, and a bit of insanity, in traveling to a land that he knows nothing of, to slay a monster in order to protect and defend the people of Herot.

He was the hero of all heros, People knew of him everywhere and knew how great and brave he was. Everybody wanted to be him, or wanted to know him. Beowulf was scared of absolutely nothing. “Telling stories of their dead king and his greatness, his glory, passing him for heroic deeds”(831-833). Once he makes a vow he always stands by his word, no matter what. He signifies the true heroic character because he is willing to risk his life for other people. In his youth, Beowulf was a tremendous warrior, characterized predominantly by his feats of strengths and courage. While he is young, he proves he is a brave hero by defeating not only Grendel but Grendel's mom also, who are both descended from the evil cain. Beowulf is a strong responsible leader. He once stated “I feel no shame with shield and sword and armor against this monster” (673-674). He was not scared at all while fighting grendel, he knew he would come out a winner like always. He felt the same way with grendel's mom and as always, he came out a winner. From the time he was young until he got older he was always strong and always put all his effort into everything he did. Beowulf matures as he grows up, gaining more heroic qualities. Everybody around him watched him as he grew, watched him gain knowledge. Beowulf says “They have seen my

strengths for themselves, have watched me rise from darkness of war dripping from my enemies blood”(151-153). As he gets older, he remains loyal and respectful to all of those around him. He was the most brave person that any of them knew. He killed very many beast and proved that by saving, “lucky or not, nine was the number of sea huge monsters I killed” (307-308). He did anything and everything to prove his loyalty to his people. He protected all the ones he loved and even the ones he didnt love. Close to the end of his life, he fights a dragon off because, being a king, you had to keep your country safe.What he did not know was that he would not win the encounter with the dragon. the dragon won and that was the end of beowulf life. As Beowulf died, he left his country without a king, open to any kind of danger. Nobody was left to protect them, and to remain loyal to them. As Beowulf was a loyal person and a brave warrior, he died after a long successful life.
While Beowulf was the hero, Grendel was the was the exact opposite.

He was half-fiend and half-human, and very unappealing on top of that. He was enormous and was a very powerful, grueling creature, which made him nearly invincible to any of the normal Herots that tried to rid of him. He lived deep in the wilderness close to Herot. Grendel was a ferocious fighter, much like Beowulf, but he fought for all the wrong reasons. Grendel fought to kill innocent people, and feast on their flesh. He was a very cruel person, not caring about anything or anybody. He would take people in the night while they were sleeping in beds, just to make a meal of them.“He slipped through the doors and there in silence snatched up 30 men, smashed them unknowing in their bed and ran out with their bodies”(36-38). He showed no remorse for the people he was feasting upon. And even showed a bit of delight in the acts he was committing “The blood dripping behind him, back to his lair, delighted with his night's slaughter”(39-40). He loved the taste of blood of those who never liked him. Grendel felt alone, as if nobody liked him or wanted to be around him. Sadly that was somewhat true. When seeing a evil monster like grendel people would make fun of him, laughing at him, trying to kill him. “So mankind's enemy continued his crimes, killing as often as he could, coming alone, bloodthirsty and horrible”(79-81). Although Grendel looked and acted as if he was evil, he felt like he was a human deep down,

and had human emotions just like everybody else. People were so cruel to him and that's what caused him to be cruel back. Grendel loved and cared for his mom a lot as did she towards him.That is why his mom tried to kill Beowulf after Beowulf killed Grendel. Sadly, Grendel had no choice but to live the life that was chosen for him. Grendel was descended from Cain, just like his mother, so he killed people, ate them, and showed no remorse for them. He had an ugly appearance that made him a huge outcast so he would stay far away from humans by sleeping and living in the forest, only coming towards their towns at night, and only to feast upon them. Everybody hated grendel, and they never reakky even knew him.
Grendel was an evil, ruthless killer. and beowulf was a very strong heroic warrior. and no matter how strong grendel may have been, Beowulf was much stronger. After Grendel killed almost all of the Herot warriors in the hall, he proceeded to mutilate their already lifeless bodies and drink their blood. But this would no longer be the case when he tried to attack Beowulf. Beowulf shows a great deal of strength and courage by not only standing up to a monster so cruel and evil as Grendel but standing up to him with no armor, in fact he was naked,”He came to, ripped him apart, cut/ His body to bits with powerful jaws, Drank the blood from his veins and bolted/ Him down, hands and feet; death And Grendel's great teeth came together, Snapping life shut. Then he stepped to another Still body, clutched at Beowulf with his claws, Grasped at a strong-hearted wakeful sleeper — And was instantly seized himself, claws Bent back as Beowulf leaned up on one arm”(422-431). Beowulf and Grendel exemplify different strengths of courage. Beowulf is much more courageous than Grendel and this is shown when the story says,”His mind was flooded with fear — but nothing Could take his talons and himself from that tight, Hard grip. Grendel’s one thought was to run From Beowulf, flee back to his marsh and hide there” (435-438). Both characters demonstrate small similarities, but none of them are just outstanding. They both have a drive to accomplish whatever they are trying to do. They are both ruthless, but for completely different reasons. They both remain loyal to the things they feel they should be loyal to, and they're both very strong.
They share differences and similarities alike. However there are many more differences. First, Beowulf is a hero, while Grendel is on the complete opposite side of the hero-villain spectrum. Beowulf shows great loyalty and courage, while Grendel is a coward and feeds on people only weaker than him and when finally Grendel was faced by a worthy opponent that would put up a fight, the first thought that crossed his mind was running back to his homeland where he could hide in the safety of the place he knew best. Beowulf defended his people, while Grendel had no people to defend because of how evil he was. They showed similarities in the aspect of drive to accomplish their goals, They were both ruthless fighters, though Beowulf was a fighter for the good, and Grendel fought to be evil.