| Literary Analysis of Beowulf. Careful with this one. |
| The good, the bad and the Grendel; these are the matters I shall discuss in today�s literary analysis. The good is obviously Beowulf, who aside from being the title character, is the protagonist of the epic. The bad can be Unferth, who is the foil for Beowulf. The Grendel is of course Grendel. Beowulf is the stereotypical hero; outgoing, strong, courageous, proud, and full of himself or it. He loves battle and is quite good at it. He possesses great strength and skill in combat and in speaking. He travels overseas to help the Danes for several reasons; it is the right thing to do, for his own glory, and to help pay a blood-debt between his father and the Danish king, Hrothgar. So not only is he being a nice guy to people he has never met, but he�s also being honorable by paying the debt of his father by risking his life. This doesn�t mean that he�s perfect; far from it. At Herot he boasts and brags of his strength courage and feats; his pride makes him fight Grendel unarmed. During the night he let�s Grendel kill one of his friends just to keep the element of surprise. It would seem that tactical advantage was more important than a friend�s life. When Grendel�s mother steals away Hrothgar�s thane, Beowulf follows her and enters her lair, despite her having a certain advantage at the bottom of the lake. Finally, when his land is savaged by the fire dragon, Beowulf, who knows he will die if he fights, goes off to fight it. He knows that when he dies that he will leave the Geats leaderless and undefended, but his warrior side would rather die foolishly in battle and leave his people lost without a king than stay at home. His last wish is to have a great monument built for him, as a last act of brazen self-importance. Unferth, our luckless foil, is not a very good person. He is jealous of Beowulf for his strength and the attention Hrothgar gives to the young Geat. Unferth is also angry at his own impotence in defending Herot from Grendel�s attacks. He has surely lost many friends in the twelve years of Grendel's terror, and so is a bit peeved at the outsider. At the banquet, after a bit of drinking, Unferth tells what he thinks is a story to make Beowulf look bad. It backfires, however, and it is Beowulf who shames Unferth with a rebuke of his own. It seems Unferth killed is own brother, though the reason is unknown. The two warriors apparently reconcile their differences after the battle with Grendel, and Unferth even lends Beowulf his great sword, Hrunting. This is significant; a sword is a very personal item and is not to be loaned out lightly, especially one with as much sentimental value as Hrunting. Finally I get to the great antagonist himself, Grendel. Grendel is evil. That is all there is to it; he is evil. I do not know if he was beaten as a child, watched too many bad scops, was a product of a society that shunned him, or what. I do know that anyone who would kill for twelve years because he does not like music is not a nice guy. He is never accurately described, but I imagine him as being an ugly deformed freak, which cannot do much to help his temperament. Grendel was a coward; when faced with someone who fought back he was immediately terrified. He thought only of escape, to the point of ripping his arm off trying break free off Beowulf�s grasp. A bully is a better description of Grendel; he picked on people smaller and weaker than him, snuck around and struck when they slept. He never fought an open battle against the Danes even though they could not hurt him with weapons. He was an evil coward. So there is Beowulf, the flawed hero who risks his life and those of his friends and countrymen. There is also Unferth, the thane who is angry with himself and the world in general, but is not really that bad a guy. Then there is Grendel. Grendel is evil, plain and simple, but a coward. |