In the book Night by Ellie Wiesel a young boy describes his experiences as a Jew in the concentration camps during World War II. During this time, Wiesel witnessed many horrific acts. Two of these were executions. Though the processes of the executions were similar, the condemned and the Jew’s reactions to the executions differed tremendously. The first execution he describes in his book is one of many that occurred during his time in the camp.
The people in the story view Grendel as a monster, but why does Hrothgar-Grendel’s father-want Grendel to be killed? Is he full of shame? What would happen if the Geats knew about Hrothgar and Grendel’s Mother’s secret scandal? Grendel’s sadness and loneliness, the courage to protect himself from what is hurting is why he is despised. As a monster, Grendel was trying to protect himself.
A horrible tragedy of three ruined lives, a brutally murdered 14 year old, and life imprisonments of two teenage killers (Linder, 1). Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, two extremely intelligent young men with a crazed affection for each other, shocked many people by the gruesomeness and the nature of the murder of Bobby Franks. In Chicago, 1924, the radio was just making an entrance into social life, cultural norms were changing as the economy boomed, and traditional views on life began to change to be more contemporary (History.com Staff). Leopold and Loeb were fearless, living the fast life of robbing and conning, when they decided to commit the perfect, unsolvable, murder. They had no want or even reason to kill, but to experience the thrill of adrenaline flow through them (Linder, 2).
This is due to the fact that we, the audience, are reading the novel from the point of view of Grendel, so we see this new perspective of the characters. This means all the character roles are switched around since the story is told from a morally ambiguous character himself. So with that, we must decide what role this woman plays, “good” or “bad”, because she is the one who raised Grendel into what he is.
Equally important, the innocence Grendel had as a child provide an outline for his lack of baneful intentions. One act of innocence that has shown through Grendel’s entire life, from childhood until death, was a tendency to call for his mother when in danger of any kind. Putting this into perspective, shortly before the death of Grendel, on page one-hundred and seventy, he calls for his mother for the final time. “Mama!” he is heard bellowing.
It was all lies” (Gardner 54). It is obvious Grendel suffers the physical pain of being alone, and he gets addictive to hurting others due to his sadness. The more Grendel hears about people getting along he hates them and wants to fight them, because he can not have that. Grendel actions speak louder than his words when conveys his anger against the world. In the quote Grendel portrays this is what he does when he says, “It's all I have, my only weapon for smashing through these stiff coffin-walls of the world”
In John Gardner’s book, Grendel, Grendel who is the monster is shown as evil. He is evil because he murders and he knows what he is doing is wrong yet he doesn't stop himself and he continues to do wrong. We as the readers are not supposed to sympathize to with him because there really isn’t a relation and what Grendel does can’t be downplayed with excuses. Grendel is punished for his evil deeds and he definitely deserves it because what he is doing is not okay and he should be punished and he was in the right way.
After Grendel’s death, she channeled all that hatred and grief towards the people that harmed her child. Her love for her child lead her to commit these acts. Even though her actions are considered evil, it is natural to feel some sort of pity and sympathy for Grendel’s mother after her loss. Unlike Grendel, Grendel’s mother doesn't kill or destroy randomly. It is clear that she only wanted to take revenge for her son and targeted those that harmed him.
Grendel is destined to be a malicious character because he is a descendant from Cain’s clan. Cain committed a sin which the Creator, or God, did not forgive. He murdered his brother, Abel, out of jealousy and anger. In Beowulf it says, “the Almighty made him [Cain] anathema and out of the curse of his exile there sprang ogres and elves and evil phantoms” (9) which is what the Creator bestowed upon Cain as part of his punishment. This shows how Grendel is obliged to exist as an evil character, following Cain’s shadow of darkness and malign.
A historical figure that has had an influence on me is Ishmael Beah. His story of a child at war is truly inspiring. He ran to save his life at such a young age and he was captured and “brain-washed” into the war in Sierra Leone during the nineties. From his memoir, A Long Way Gone he enlightened me that there is no right side to war, both sides of the war are destructive, both sides recruited children to fight and both forced recruits to do drugs that altered their way of thinking. In the memoir, UNICEF saves him from the war by bartering for the children and they saved as much children as they could.
The first reason that Hansel should have stuck the bone out to the witch is that he had devised a smart plan. The bone was very skinny, even though his finger was probably fat. It was little enough to pretend to be his
He attempts to make peace, his actions are no different than those of others, and he is experiencing resentment. Although there is no excuse for murdering others, Grendel does not kill for the fun of it. His actions are just reactions to emotions he is experiencing. Furthermore, his willingness to make peace emphasizes the remorse he feels for the crimes he has committed. This also shows that he acted impulsively because of his strong feelings of resentment.
In the beginning of the novel, Gretel endures several things
It could be argued that he kills people who are at the hall because they are all having fun and socializing, but he isn’t able to do that so he punishes those who can. Readers see both sides of Grendel in his backstory because he is evil, but he is not evil for no reason, like
Her greed for food causes her to make egotistic decisions which may be the reason for her death later on in the tale. Hansel and Gretel are faced with temptation when they come across the witch’s house deep in the forest, “[t]he old woman had only pretended to be so kind… she was a wicked witch who waylaid children and had built her house out of bread to entice them” (145). It is their temptation that leads them into a precarious situation, which almost brings them to their death. The children find a particular temptation in not the foods that are the most filling, but those that are the sweetest, something to question when they claim to be so hungry: “‘I’ll take a piece of the roof. You Gretel, had better take some of the window; it’s sweet.’”
