Monday, December 10, 2012

Finding Inner Grandel


This week my blog topic is all about Grendel, throughout the entire novel I have been curious to see how Grendel balances out the drgaon’s theories and his own desires. At the beginning of the novel Grendel was intrigued by becoming a part of man’s society. He was obsessed with the Shaper’s philosophies on how man was created and how humans interpret God. The human’s interpretation on God is also a major aspect on how Grendel fits but doesn’t fit in with humans. This book I think is written to completely show the negative side of Humans which is really similar to the way Beowulf is written to scrutinize monsters, and I was wondering is there a medium where monsters and humans can be equal? Is there also a way that the Dragon’s theories can be applied to the philosophies of humans?

So one of the main criticisms within the novel is that man lacks the ability to understand morals and is over all cruel, Grandel comments on how “not even wolves are that cruel to each other,” I find this a little ironic because Grandel kills humans for fun and is an offspring to God’s true creation of evil (Cain is evil because he killed his brother). Aren’t humans exhibiting evil qualities by going and raiding and pillaging each other’s clans and towns? I’m also interested in the fact that Grandel is the first creature in the story to establish an official belief system and man comes in and says he is wrong and that he is evil for being different. Before Grandel has his encounter with the dragon, he is superior to human, he has  an established language, he can think for himself, he knows the hierarchy of life, but once he talks with the dragon he loses all of those things and submits to being second to humans and the dragon. Grendel’s evolution cycle is backwards compared to men. Grendel starts out intellectual and moral but then progressively loses those morals as humans evolve into more moralistic creatures. I also found it interesting how humans establish the word of God and they are supposed to be divine creatures when they were created also out of evil.

What makes man fear Grendel the first time they see him? Where does the fear stem from in the beginning? I don’t like how Grendel is so willing to join their society and they fear him automatically because he is different. Is it because he is different and new that he is accepted? I was more attracted to agreeing with the dragons theories because they are completely true even when looking at society today, because of the corruption and the lack of morals today. I feel like we haven’t evolved that much in theory we still are scared of the uncertain but we have updated our beliefs on what is evil and what is not. I think today’s society is a great example of the balance between monsters and man because we all have a little bit of Grendel in us and we all stay close to our roots.

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