This part of the epic is starting to describe the torment and badgering that Grendel receives from the Danes in Herot. *Grendel’s motive for killing a portion of the Danes is not what one would normally think. In addition, this is what is what Grendel hears everyday from Herot,“ As day after day the music rang / Loud in the hall, the harp’s rejoicing / Call and the poet’s clear songs, sung / Of the ancient beginnings of us all / … Conceived by a pair of those monsters born / Of Cain, murderous creatures banished / By God, punished forever by the crime / Of Abel’s death ” (Raffel 40). The songs of Herot in which they call him a felon, torments Grendel day after day, by calling him the most dangerous and disastrous monster there is. Grendel had never disrupted the Danes or done anything to make them hate him so much.
Gandalf’s heroism is shown when Tolkien states, “It was the wizard’s voice that had kept the trolls bickering and quarrelling, until the light came and made an end of them”(41). These examples show how heroism is apparent through external conflict. Through characterization, Tolkien does a fantastic job of showing heroism. First, at the beginning of the novel Gandalf has words of praise for Bilbo when the dwarves talk bad about Murray 2 him behind his back. Bilbo being a hobbit is not the ideal robber and the dwarves know this and express their frustration to Gandalf when he proclaims, “There is a lot more in him than you guess, and a deal more than he has any idea of himself”(19).
Is this "monster" truly the "wretched devil" (68) Victor believes him to be? Or is he actually a "fallen angel whom [Victor] drove from joy for no misdeed... [and that] misery made a fiend" (69)? The case for the creature being a "hideous monster" (102) is quite strong. He murders young William Frankenstein with his bare hands; afterwards, he frames Justine Moritz for the crime because he "is forever robbed of all that she could give [him, therefore] she shall atone" (103). Victor's best friend, Henry Clerval, is murdered by the creature as well.
It is ironic to note that in society’s desire to drive away the ‘wretch’ and monster, they themselves have become ‘monstrous.’ Victor in particular, with his ruthless neglect and lack of paternal feeling towards the Creature, epitomizes society’s merciless and brutal prejudice. With his unchecked ambition, fatal hubris and inability to empathize with the Creature, Victor is perhaps more the monster than the Creature is. He
Misunderstood Monster The story of Grendel is the story of a monster misunderstood by his human neighbors. While animalistic and brutish in appearance, his mental faculties are on par, or even exceed, those of the humans. However, due to his appearance he is alienated from a human society that he wants nothing more than to be a part of. It is this unfounded hatred that Grendel must endure from the Danes that ultimately pushes him to question whether there is any meaning or order to life. When Grendel first encounter the Danes he is feared and hated, and then attacked, due to his animalistic appearance.
He slowly climbs the ladder and later becomes Chief by convincing the boys that a “beast” exists on the island. He effectively manipulates the boys into thinking that there is a beast (even though he knows it probably does not exist) by using totalitarian methods so that they will join his tribe for protection. He demonstrates Lord Acton’s belief that “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” < http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Lord_Acton > The only boy to realize that the beast is not real, but rather a representation of the evil that is inherent in human nature, is Simon. This is fully exposed when he confronts the Lord of the Flies, when it said to him through hallucination, “Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill! You knew, didn’t you?
Brandon Dunning Mr. Robel English 2 November 5, 2010 Lord of the Flies Lord of the Flies, a novel by William Golding, reveals the inner evil in human society. It shows that human kind is hopeless when it comes to evil and that it can take over anybody. William Golding did a good job showing how evil can gradually take someone over. For these kids stuck on the island it was only a matter of time before they turned evil and became hopeless. When the boys were deciding who should be chief and who should be hunters, the group decided Ralph should be the chief and the choir boys should be the hunters.
From the earliest stages of the novel Frankenstein, I was pressed with one question – “Who is the real monster, Victor Frankenstein, or his horribly mutated creation?” Victor Frankenstein was driven by most selfish ambitions. He discovered the secrets of life and kept them all to himself, an act of greed. And upon finding these secrets, through a hermit lifestyle of isolation and the pursuit of knowledge, he creates what is only to be known as the monster. The monster is a hideous yet intelligent and caring creature whom self-taught himself the language around him, only in order to interact socially with people and to seek approval from his creator. Only after being treated so poorly and outcast by every human he comes in contact with is Frankenstein’s monster driven to rage and vengeance.
The Evil Created By Frankenstein In the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, Victor Frankenstein animates a being made of grotesque human body parts. The hideous appearance of his creation gave the creature no chance of fitting into society or ever being accepted. Throughout the story, the monster who has a “natural tendency to kind feelings” (Bloom 100) becomes violent and aggressive after being rejected and isolated. The creature is wronged many times by his irresponsible creator who abandons him within the first seconds of his life and then refuses to provide him with a friend. These mistakes of Victors, among others, are what cause the creature’s evil actions in the end.
In a tale of epic proportions, where gruesome monsters meet valiant heroes, it is a surprise that human nature is a topic that is expressed so excellently in Beowulf. The reader is introduced to multi-dimensional characters that possess god-like strengths, but also typical human-like mistakes. These mistakes are what make Beowulf so relevant and relatable to the common man and are what acknowledge the age old saying that nobody’s perfect. Even Beowulf, the superhuman man who could kill a monster with his bare hands is susceptible to these weaknesses. Human flaws are portrayed numerous times through characters in the poem, by both monster and by man.