Cultural Differences In 'Grendel And Beowulf'

In today’s society, most of our life can be defined by what is occurring in the media. What trends we are following, what we find entertaining, and even the values that we hold close to our heart. As you examine the movie, Beowulf and Grendel (Gunnarsson, 2005), and compare it to the original work that it is modelled after, Beowulf (Heaney, 2000), you can see that there is a significant difference in the cultural values of the time period that Beowulf and Grendel was written compared to Beowulf. There is a multitude of differences in the values people hold close to their heart in our world today compared to Beowulf. With Beowulf representing the Anglo-Saxon time period and Beowulf and Grendel representing the early 2000s era, the differences

in our cultural values are vividly seen and well displayed in the two works. The different levels of realism within the two works, the complexity of the character of Grendel, and the addition of extra characters into the movie--such as the witch and the son of Grendel--visualize the vast distinctions of our different cultures’ views on the complexities of good and evil.
Our society, having a vast amount of resources at our disposal to investigate and research everything that is humanly possible, place a great deal on our entertainment having a certain amount of realism. The Danes however, did not have access to such technologies. This caused for them to believe just about anything they heard such as Beowulf’s boast, “... A naked, hard-proofed blade for protection Against the whale-beasts. But Breca could never move out farther or faster from me than I could manage to move from him. Shoulder to shoulder, we struggled on for five nights, until the long flow, and pitch of the waves, the perishing cold, night falling and winds from the North Drove us apart… (pg. 37)”. The lack of realism is also seen with, “So times were pleasant for the people there until finally one, a fiend out of hell, began to work his evil in the world. Grendel was the name of this grim demon haunting the marches, marauding round the heath and the desolate fens; he had dwelt for a time in misery among the banished monsters, Cain's clan, whom the creator had outlawed and condemned as outcasts. (pg. 9)”. Because the Danes had limited ways of validating stories like Beowulf’s, they often believed and found entertainment within them.
Like I previously stated, our society, having the ability to research and validate whether or not anything we view in the media is true, or even humanly possible in Beowulf’s case, we expect our entertainment to have a certain level of realism within the characters.

With our culture, we find certain kinds of inaccuracies, such as the exaggeration Beowulf’s boast, to be unstimulating. As a society, we now have the knowledge and common sense to not believe everything we hear without validation. Because of this, our culture places more value on entertainment that is more realistic within the actions of the characters, but more complex within the plot itself and how the characters interact with each

other.
It is a prevailing characteristic in our culture to see horrible acts of crime on the news. When this occurs everyone’s first question is always, “Why?”. The explanation as to why Grendel chose to terrorize people in the book was not given to the reader due to fatalism. This gives a preview into the Anglo-Saxon time period’s cultural values of not finding that much importance into the explanation as to why some people do horrific acts, such as Grendel. Throughout the poem, the Danes were completely satisfied with assuming that Grendel committed such acts just because he desired a companion. While Grendel is wreaking havoc, his actions are never fully explained; for example, “Then his rage boiled over, he ripped open the mouth of the building, maddening for blood, pacing the length of the patterned floor with his loathsome tread, while a baleful light, flame more than light, flared from his eyes. He saw many men in the mansion, sleeping, a ranked company of kinsmen and warriors quartered together. And his glee was demonic, picturing the mayhem: before morning he would rip life from limb and devour them, feed on their flesh. (pg. 49)” This reflects on their culture of having a lack of wanting to understand of how the brain actually works and accepting the notion that villains are not made, they are born into who they are, having no choice about what they will become.
With today’s entertainment culture, the producers of the movie were not content with making the Grendel’s character as simple as it was in the poem. With more people in today’s culture being aware of mental illness and having an understanding of the effects it can have on someone, the people of the twenty first century would not have been satisfied with a movie that does not explain why a character does something as terrible as what Grendel’s character did. Our culture has the desire to understand the antagonist’s actions and even sometimes feel compassion for them. Our culture also has the urge to root for the underdog, and with the way that Grendel was ostracized for being different he became one that our culture would like to sympathize.
Within the poem, the only characters that are included are ones that pertain to the main plot line. To add even more simplicity into the work, it is found within almost all of the minor characters, they all have some sort of kin relationship with a main character--such as, Beowulf, King Hrothgar, and Grendel. This is due to the Anglo-Saxons not finding a need for extra drama like, Grendel having a baby or the actual reasons as to why Grendel does what he does. Their culture obviously did not have multitudes of entertainment at their disposal, causing them to find enough entertainment value in the main plot line. Whereas our culture, always being entertained, need the extra oomph to send it over the top.
The desire for our culture to better understand Grendel’s character is also seen through the addition extra characters in the movie. Without the addition of the witch, we gave Grendel someone to understand and sympathize with him. Which, again, is something that our society has a fascination with. The witch also gave way into the possibility of Grendel having a son, which only caused for the viewer to have even more compassion for Grendel’s character. When an antagonist, such as Grendel, has a child we see the child as a continuation of Grendel himself. The child of Grendel, having done nothing wrong in this situation, we, of course, feel sorry for him, therefore, feel sorry for Grendel.
The complexity of Grendel’s character and the addition of new characters also reflects our society’s increasing need for drama in anything and everything we view for entertainment. The extra characters brought that extra drama in for the movie to have an upper hand on the book. The addition of the witch and the son of Grendel, the movie was able to have a different kind of drama that our current society craves. The type of drama that our society finds entertaining includes events like, the sexual assault of the witch by Grendel. This would have never been featured in the epic considering the taboos of sex in the Anglo-Saxon period and their culture would have not had sympathy for the witch because of their views of women and lack of respect for women’s privacy.
Because that Beowulf and Beowulf and Grendel come from completely different cultures, the values of said cultures are The values of our different cultures are displayed through, the different levels of realism within the two works, the complexity of the character of Grendel, and the addition of extra characters into the movie--such as the witch and the son of Grendel.

Even though, the values of Beowulf and Grendel are similar to the ones that I and my entire generation have grown up learning, both of the epic and movie have qualities that make me unable to come to a conclusion as to which of the works recounts the story of Beowulf and Grendel in a more exceptional way. Therefore, I give the forthcoming generations the responsibility of making that

agreement.