Art as Falsehood, The Power of Stories, and The Pain of Isolation are all extremely prevalent in the story of Grendel. In the poem Beowulf, Grendel was introduced as an atrocious monster who spent copious amounts of time terrorizing the town of Herot. However, in the story of Grendel, author John Gardener gave readers an inside look of Grendel's life leading up to his death where he is killed by the hands of Beowulf. Told in the novel, the life of a monster is presumably a lonely one. Grendel does not have any sense of comfort or sociability other than his mother and even she will not respond to his whims. On rare occasions will she interact with her son, but in the grand scheme of things she ignores him, staring blankly off into space leaving Grendel alone with his own thoughts. However, Grendel does not wish to be alone; he longs for communication. No matter how hard he may try, being a grotesque monster means that no one wants to speak to him. “Talking, talking, spinning a spell (…) Not in a language anyone understands (…) Degenerate mutter of noises I send out.” (Gardener 15) …show more content…
Due to the fact that neither humans, his mother, or animals will speak to him. He resorts to speaking to the sky and air, but of course, neither answer him. The lack of communication drives the monster mad, causing him to grow angrier and want to cause more grief and suffering to those who do communicate with each other. The humans, specifically, are the cause of this pain. Grendel shares the same language yet they still refuse to speak to him out of fear, ultimately resorting to violence instead. “The king snatched an ax from the man (..) he hurled it at me.” (Gardener