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Summary: Grendel, an unusal book
Review: John Gardner's novel Grendel is different from any other book I have ever read. It tells the story of Beowulf from the perspective of the monster Grendel. Grendel is a lonely one of a kind misfit. He is a being with no conscience and a constantly violent and evil nature. In spite of all this the author makes you feel some pity and understanding for him. Grendel tries to talk to the first humans that he has contact with, but they are so terrified and repulsed that they try to kill him. Grendel talks to a dragon who explains to him that he is different and in his own way superior to man. Grendel comes to believe that only his own existence is important. As he matures he realizes that even his bond with his mother only exists because he is her offspring. Grendel has no relationships in his life except between a murderer and his victims. His feelings of isolation are reinforced by the philosophy of his contact with the dragon. The dragon can predict the future and explains to Grendel that in the grand scheme of time his exsistance means nothing. Grendel gives in to his vicious bloodthirsty side and begins a twelve year war with Hrothgar, King of the Danes, and his thanes. During those years Grendel carried out bloody raids on Hrothgar's meadhall. He killed and ate his victims in these raids. He was careful to never kill off all the Danes although he had the power to do so because his war with them became his only reason for existence. In John Gardner's story of Grendel one can see through the eyes of an insane tortured non-human. The reader can see many of mankinds conflicts and characteristics. I would recomend this book for the serious reader who is willing to try and think about complex things.
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Summary: The Anti-Hero Struggles Against the Nihilistic Void
Review: Marvelous. Written almost 30 years ago, Grendel by John Gardner has lost none of its nihilistic punch. Exposed to the novel half of those 30 years ago I had to experience it again after reading the critically lauded Seamus Heaney version of Beowulf. Greeting me once more were meditations on the dark existential void, religion, politics, and science by a creature, not too unlike us in our fears and hopes, who continued to strive to make sense of the universe and his place in it. Alternating between the sublime Orwellian double-talk of the minstrel Shaper and the cold, condescendingly bleak philosophy of the Dragon, Grendel struggles for meaning. Told that his life and energies exist only for man to define himself against, he finds small consolation. Still, Grendel throws himself on the mercy of the men in a Frankenstein's monster effort to be accepted... to no avail, deciding after that 'why should I not' destroy them . At times darkly humourous, and touching, the creature muses on the beauty of Hrothgar's placid, sacrificing wife before attempting to kill her, and plays with the fallen hero Unferth before Beowulf's arrival. As those familiar with the epic know, Beowulf in the original poem arrives from across the sea to save Hrothgar's hall by doing battle with Grendel, his mother, and eventually the Dragon. Grendel senses Beowulf's arrival and marvels at the concept of fear. Familiarity with the story makes the inevitability of the conflict all the more delicious when Grendel finally realizes his purpose and observes 'I cannot believe such monstrous energy of grief would lead to nothing' the reader is left to answer that it did not lead to nothing, it was a necessary component in an incredible story, told from the historical antagonist's point of view. Highly recommended to be read along with Beowulf.
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Summary: Grendel should have been cute
Review: This book made the wings of my nostrils flare like an angry priests.
Rating:
Summary: Facinating
Review: I was required to read Beowulf in school, but not Grendel; I found it in a bookstore and picked it because I was intrigued by an alternate Beowulf, especially since the villian is a monster with nothing but bloodlust and brute strength, and I wanted to see what Gardener would do.Grendel is interesting in many ways: the style, which is very modern and of course a great contrast with Beowulf's epic poetry; the way the characters are remade; and the way the theme and message of the book depends largely on your outlook while reading it (as you can tell from these reviews). And even though it does spring from that epic Anglo-Saxon poem which students have come to love and hate, you can love Grendel even if you're more in that "hate" area. I actually liked Beowulf while I was studying it, even though I was a little put off by the theme of heroism (in other words, fighting and killing) as the great aspiration. This just made me enjoy Grendel, with its nihilistic musings and criticism of the Dane's beliefs, a little more. I can't really describe all the different themes and nuances of this book, but the thing that impressed me most was that Grendel, despite being a monster who lives for the kill, is more human than anything else. His ultimate quest is to define himself, and a meaning to life, and this stays with him until the surreal scene in which he dies. His voice is also a very young one; like a teenager, as someone pointed out. He feels like the only thinking being in the universe, and that it it in fact revolves around him and is only an illusion created by his mind. Not new thoughts, but it's the context that makes this book interesting. The best review I can give is just: read it for yourself.
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Summary: Grendel: Apples and Pain
Review: Grendel has a sarcastic and cynical mind, which serves to entertain both him and the reader. Through his expositions of situations, we see humor where others would simply see violence, and irony where others only fact. These others are the humans, the Danes, unwitting neighbors of Grendel, forced to stand night after night of slaughter. What is a traumatic and terrifying experience for them, is simply a game to Grendel, and the reader. Grendel bursts in on the Danes, ready to kill, and they squeak. They are funny in their fear, laughable in their drunken fighting. The reader is focused on Grendel's perception of the Danes. The deaths go by easily, because of the humor involved. It does not cross the reader's mind that these are people Grendle is killing. The humor allows the reader to sympathize with Grendel's position, that of the predator. The prey is not meaningful, only nutritious and entertaining. It is a macabre humor, which accentuates how no death is noble, it is simply death. By making the Danes un-heroic and un-ideal, cowards and drunkards, the author is presenting the reality through the humor.
In contrast to the drunken lurching of the others, Unferth comes toward Grendel with speeches and bravery. He is a puffed up as a peacock, proud and ready to die for his king, his people, his ideal. Grendel simply states, "He was one of those." Grendel sees Unferth with a clear and unbiased mind. He is ridiculous. His exaggerated heroism, his words, even his first move, to scuttle sideways like a crab from thirty feet away, is laughable. Grendle does with him what he does with no other Dane in the story, he talks.
Unferth offers Grendle death, and Grendle sends back taunts. The reason this scene is funny is because the taunts are sharply accurate. The self-sacrificing hero is shown to be a spotlight loving fool, serving only his own reputation. Grendel continues talking to Unferth, making the poor wretch angrier by the moment. At one point, he compares Unferth to a harvest virgin. Unferth attempts to begin his own speeches, but is always cut off by Grendel, who has another barb to throw at him. Finally, Unferth screams and charges, his voice breaking.
This scene, of escalating argument, presents a different type of humor. While the first was a slapstick, exaggerated and dark humor, the argument is more sarcastic, intelligent and cutting. It exposes the cruel reality of the hero; he serves only himself and his fame when helping others.
When Unferth charges him, Grendel does the unthinkable. He throws an apple at him. Unferth is astonished, and even loses his heroic vocabulary. He continues charging, and Grendel continues the barrage of apples. This scene is pure humiliation for Unferth, pure delight for Grendel, and entertaining for the reader. Grendel, murderer and monster, is hitting the hero with simple red apples. By doing this, he is breaking any type of significance the battle could ever have. The bards cannot sing of how the monster threw apples. It is symbolically important that Grendel throws apples. Unferth symbolizes a virgin, pure in ideal and purpose. The apple brought down the first virgin, Eve, as these apples bring him down. They represent the truth, the knowledge that Grendle is pelting him with. The hero ends up on the floor crying, and Grendel remarks to him "Such is life...such is dignity." This remark holds no pity, only scorn, and is funny in its viciousness.
Most of the humor in the novel is followed by some of the most chilling and melancholic pieces of prose. This contrast of the humoristic with the somber makes the despair Grendel feels a more striking emotion. Before being completely exposed to nihilism and solitude by the Dragon, Grendel is compared to a bunny rabbit because he was startled. The monster that terrified the Danes is terrified by the Dragon, who continues poking fun at him and his fear. The reader is presented with the impotent figure of Grendel, trying desperately to react in some way to the dragon's laughter, and not knowing how. He gets angry, which immediately makes the dragon deadly serious. What follows is the dragon stating in turn his truths about life and snide side remarks on humanity. The humor allows the reader to connect slightly with Grendel's feelings as they transition from the comedy to the drama, sometimes in a jarring fashion.
This same transition occurs in the interaction of Grendel and Unferth. The Dane is a broken man, both physically and mentally. He cries. He has a broken nose. The humor is lost as the reader begins to feel pity for him. Once we feel connected to the being suffering, the humor evaporates, leaving behind the message, ideals are false. The humor sets up the atmosphere and the elements of the message, but it is only in the alternate tone that the message is truly established.
Grendel's humor is the truth in some aspects and a farce in others. It contrasts sharply with the Dane's views but it is a valid view. At the same time, the humor in Grendel hides a deep despair and the root messages. Grendel makes fun of Unferth, but is more like Unferth that he could possibly guess. Unferth represents the hero brought down by the monster, and the shattering of his own beliefs. Grendel is a monster who has no beliefs, and is brought down by an unnamed hero. The dragon spares Grendel, while Unferth is by Grendel. Unferth is a cast out among the men, and Grendle is a cast out to all human society. Unferth seeks desperately to die in the fight, and regain some type of honor. Grendel seeks the fight for some type of recognition from the Danes. In a way, when Grendel makes fun of Unferth, he is hurting that part of himself he dislikes. He, through Unferth, is hitting at the pretensions
Rating:
Summary: Interesting Idea - Disjointed book
Review: The idea of a book about the other side of Beowulf intrigued me. John Gardner depicts Grendel and not the epitome of evil, but a complicated creature that is both humanistic and animal with both internal and external struggles. He takes a simple creature from a classic piece of literature and adds depth and substance. What I didn't enjoy was Gardner's writing style. He uses perhaps the most annoying literary device ever conceived. In order to reflect a character's unfocused views, he writes in an unfocused haphazard manor. The exact same thing that made Ford Maddux Ford's, "A Good Soldier", and any James Joyce novel practically unreadable. This book is a short story about Grendel's interaction with man, observing all along, sometimes wanting to be included, sometimes disgusted with them. He is intrigued by their wars, violence, relationships, there Gods, their music, and many of the people. He switches from a primal beast to a philosophical man in a figurative sense. He interacts with his mother, human singers, human hunters, and even a dragon to counteract the lesser human comparative aspect. This helps shape his deep, yet somewhat different points of view. Unfortunately, if told in a straightforward story, this would be interesting, fun, and thought provoking. Instead, Gardner mixes normal first person narrative with incongruous poetry all sprinkled with random philosophical ramblings all with an non-fluid sentence structure, causing any reader to re-read many confusing pages. I would pass on this book. The idea is interesting, but this book is no page turner, as the execution is terrible.
Rating: 
Summary: The existentialist monster
Review: John Gardner's "Grendel" shines an odd spotlight on English literature's earliest antihero. When reading "Beowulf," who really ponders the character of the monster Grendel, who after all is not so much a literary character as an object for Beowulf to defeat as an exhibition of his heroism? Gardner sees the shaggy, anthropomorphous monster as a painfully self-conscious creature bellowing in rage at the forces of nature in agonistic protest against his miserable existence as a descendant of the cursed race of Cain. Grendel is sad, lonely, and bored. His only friend (besides his mother, who offers little conversational companionship) is a wise ancient dragon who sits on a massive treasure hoard and mentors the young beast in the significance of being a monster, that having the power to terrify and brutalize is just as much an affirmation of life as killing to eat. And killing is Grendel's forte: He repeatedly targets the thanes of Hrothgar, king of the Danes, who, as descendants of the blessed race of Abel, intrigue him; voyeuristically he spies on them in their meadhalls, sardonically observing their folly, believing that he provides for them a healthy challenge to their complacency. He particularly enjoys the ineffectual assaults of a warrior named Unferth who seeks hero status by trying to slay Grendel numerous times and whom Grendel always spares out of spite, to dishonor him and amplify his ineptitude. If Grendel were human, he'd be called a sociopath. He hates himself, men, and the world, but he turns his extreme negativity into a strange attitude of superiority -- he likes to show his enemies that he can always beat them, that they're defenseless against his aggression and foolish as well. Of course, he finally realizes his limits when one fateful day an unnamed Geat prince arrives on Hrothgar's shores, ready to claim his own superiority. A few weeks ago I read Jean Rhys's "Wide Sargasso Sea," which invents a background story for a mysteriously obscure but important character from "Jane Eyre." Gardner employs the same concept in "Grendel" and even uses a similar postmodern prose style, but he succeeds where Rhys failed because he gives Grendel a personality, a reason to exist as a character, and doesn't just make him a mute symbol of victimization. Grendel is a powerhouse and doesn't need anybody to feel sorry or make excuses for him.
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Summary: A Monster, His Mother, and The Meaning Of Life
Review: I found John Gardener's Grendel to be a very good read. It was the kind of book that you could just read, and leave it at that, or you could also go deep into it and discuss it in a book club kind of setting. In discussing the book you get the point that sometimes you have to look at things from the other person's perspective. The main character, a monster of unknown origin, is struggling as he explores the world around him and realizes life's harsh and brutish reality. The book really makes you think about your own view of life and humans. I recommend this book to anyone who has a love for good literature, internal conflict, with a bit of philosophy and a dash of blood.
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Summary: Grendel
Review: I'm going to be truthful in the fact that I did not enjoy the epic poem, Beowulf . Yet, I did enjoy the modern novel, Grendel. Grendel was a story less about egotistical men and more about a tormented creature trying to find the point of his isolated life. Due to the fact that I found the characters in Beowulf self-absorbed, I was humoured by Grendel mocking and torturing them. In addition, this tale was enlaced with nihilistic views that questioned existence. This agonized soul ponders the purpose of being: is there any point in living if everything is predestined? Not only did it question life, but also government, religion, ethics, and morals. I would recommend this novel due to the fact that it is intriguing with an underlying theme that is simple and direct.
Rating:
Summary: Grendel
Review: Spinning-off from human history's original epic, Grendel tells the story from the monster's perspective. Philosophical, humorous and very well thought out, Grendel raises captivating questions. Deceptively complex, Grendel depicts the life struggle of innocence and experience, structure and chaos, purpose and chance, throughout the ages of time and existence. Who knew Beowulf's monster was so deep?
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