GRENDELBeowulf: Tone Analysis

Characterization

Demon“Grendel was the name of this grim demon”“He was the Lord’s outcast”“God-cursed brute”“A fiend of hell”“From Cain, there sprung misbegotten spirits,

among them, Grendel”It goes on…

Characterization

Feared“It was easy then to meet a man shifting

himself to a safer distance” Cruel

“Inflicting constant cruelties on the people”“Corpse-maker”“Insensible to pain and human sorrow”

Characterization

Basically, he’s evil and cursed by God“The captain of evil”“Malignant by nature, he never showed

remorse”“The bane of the race of men”“Prowler through the dark”“The God-cursed brute”

Imagery

Readers are shown that Grendel hates happiness“Then a powerful demon, a prowler-through

the dark, nursed a hard grievance. It harrowed him to hear the din of the loud banquet every day in the hall.”

Sound familiar?

Sounds like the Grinch! “Then the Whos, young and old, would sit down to

a feast. . .They would feast on Who-pudding, and rare Who-roast beast. Which was something the Grinch couldn't stand in the least!”

Imagery

Grendel uses his strength to cause pain“He grabbed thirty men from their resting

places and rushed to his lair, flushed up and inflamed from the raid, blundering back with the butchered corpses.”

Imagery

Grendel has a gruesome way of killing people“He grabbed and mauled a man on his

bench, bit into his bone-lappings, bolted down his blood and gorged him on lumps, leaving the body utterly lifeless, eaten up hand and foot.”

Imagery

And a dramatic ending. . .“With death upon him, he had dived deep

into his marsh-den, drowned out his life and his heathen soul: hell claimed him there.”

Symbolism

Represents evil/the AntigodCast out by GodDescribed as a demon (generally evil)Kills people (unholy)Called, “The captain of evil”

Symbolism

Overall, represents good overcoming evilBeowulf (strong and righteous) kills Grendel“The man who had lately landed among

them, proud and sure, had purged the hall”

Symbolism

Also could symbolize Christianity overcoming PaganismGrendel cast out by God as Pagans cast out

by ChristiansBeowulf (Christian) overcame Grendel as

Christianity overcame Paganism

Tone

Dark, negative, angryAlways described with dark words (ex: “The

shadow-stalker” ; “Corpse-maker”)People’s reactions and descriptions of him

are negativeHis actions display anger