BEOWULF

The poem begins with a brief genealogy and tribe of the Danes. Scyld Shefing was Danes'

first great king known for his talents. When Beowulf comes, Scyld is the great-grandfather of

Hrothgar, the king of Danes. Hrothgar is a good king like his ancestors. He builds a hall called

Heorot and wants to celebrate his reign. What happened was after this celebration. A monster

named Grendel attacks people and gives great destruction. After a while, this event spreads

and eventually News of Grendel's attack on Danish reaches to the tribe of Geats. Beowulf, a

brave and fearless young man in the tribe, wants to fight this monster.

One day while people are sleeping, Grendel comes and reaches Beowulf. A struggle

between Beowulf and Grendel begins. Beowulf keeps his arm and doesn't let go. Grendel

suffered because Beowulf caught him. Soon Grendel tears away, leaving his arm in Beowulf's

grasp. He slinks back to his lair and dies.

After a while, in the night Grendel's mother approaches the hall, wanting vengeance for

her son. The mother attacks the warrior and kills the king's friend Aeschere. Hrothgar tells

Beowulf where the creatures like Grendel live in a shadowy, fearful land within the moors.

And the story becomes more exciting when Beowulf searches for his mother.

As far as I know, Beowulf is a 3,000-line poem, one of the earliest, beautiful and important

examples of the old English, with the first epic poem of British literature and the oldest epic

of Europe -old old book, maybe the oldest book in the world- my respect is infinite. In my

opinion, Beowulf is shown in three different perspectives in poetry: a hero fighting for his

people, a hero fighting against vengeance and a hero ultimately reaching his untimely fate for

those he loves. Beowulf teaches us courage through these three different perspectives, it

shows us his own character and self-confident real characters like Beowulf, and at the same
time, it also shows us symbols that give an image of God and the hope that he brings to the

people that believe in his word.

I'm firmly believed that Beowulf's bravery and heroism can inspire every human being.

The thing that impresses me the most is Grendel, a kind of mysterious entity and normal

weapons will not work on it. So, surprisingly, Beowulf decides to fight her hand. And at the

end of the round, Beowulf wins. Another impressive point is Beowulf's struggle with the

dragon. In the final battle, the dragon causes a deadly wound at Beowulf, but before it dies, it

succeeds in killing the dragon with a knife that leads to a deadly thing. Wiglaf bravely battles

and survive the war, but both dragon and Beowulf die. I’d like to emphasize that the death of

Beowulf encourages people to die like a brave man, even though I'm very upset.

I’m not at all convinced that Beowulf is going to a lake to fight Grendel's mother and is

fighting his mother in the depths of the lake. Beowulf takes his favourite sword, but this just

won’t kill her, so once again he gives up his weapon and fights her in hand to hand combat

finally killing her with her own sword. Poetry is generally written like an epic, but most

things don’t seem to be in real life, but I think Beowulf might be another interesting place

instead of fight in the depths of the lake. Moreover, it didn’t convince me to fight underwater

without having a weapon.

Analyzing Grendel is difficult to analysis because he hasn’t told us much about him in the

poetry. I’m not absolutely sure that it seems to me that Grendel is killing to attract attention.

His behaviour is childish. Children do everything to attract their parents' attention; scream,

shout, shatter, fight and cry. Their reasoning and behaviour are sometimes illogical because

they don’t understand what is right or wrong and it is their parents' responsibility to teach

them what is good and bad. To me, Grendel is a child, with all these innocent, pure and naive

characters. He will kill people without any reason. When he gets hurt (by Beowulf) he returns
to his mother. Perhaps the problem isn’t with Grendel, but with his mother who didn’t teach

him manners. In my opinion, if a parent doesn't limit his child through punishments, that child

can grow and become a self-centered grown up who doesn't care for anyone but himself and is

driven by fulfilling his selfish pleasures. It seems like Grendel’s mother, as a parent, loved

Grendel so much that she couldn't limit his actions. I’m not sure that if Grendel would be like

a monster if his mother had a good parent.

Briefly, the courage and bravery of Beowulf gave me courage because it is a great honour

for him to fight for his people fearlessly, which is why I chose this poem. When I first read

this poem, I realized that it would involve something. After watching Beowulf's movie,

characters and events were imagined in my mind. In some places of poetry even though there

are questions marks in my head –like would Grendel be that monster if his mother punished

him whenever he did something wrong?- we have to accept that it is a great masterpiece.

References:

Beowulf, OLD ENGLISH POEM, written by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica