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Original Title:	Grendel
ISBN:	0679723110 (ISBN13: 9780679723110)
Edition Language:	English
Characters:	Beowulf, Grendel
Literary Awards:	Mythopoeic Fantasy Award Nominee (1972)

Grendel Paperback | Pages: 174 pages

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Title	:	Grendel
Author	:	John Gardner
Book Format	:	Paperback
Book Edition	:	Anniversary Edition
Pages	:	Pages: 174 pages
Published	:	June 2nd 2010 by Random House Vintage Books (first published August 12th 1971)
Categories	:	Fiction. Fantasy. Classics. Academic. School. Literature. Mythology

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this review may or may not contain spoilers. i assume that most bookish people are familiar with the basic plot elements of beowulf, either through high school required reading or that video-game-looking movie, or cocktails at the heaney's. if not - this could ruin everything! but it won't. ah, existentialism... when i was a young lass with my fontanelle as yet unfused; when i still liked the doors and books about manson, i dabbled briefly and emotionally in existentialism. "l'enfer c'est les autres"...it just sounds so good, doesn't it? and not just because it is french and therefore inherently sexified.but it sounds so romantically world-weary and byronesque. and when you work retail, the surface of that statement rings true every single day. but at its core, it is of course infantile and selfish. and this book was where i first realized this.what i love about this book, beyond just the gorgeous simplicity of gardner's prose (and, for some reason, the font) are its hidden depths. it isn't just a retelling, it isn't an apology or explanation - it does smooth out the rough warrior edges of beowulf (the work, not the character) and gives great powers of articulation to grendel with his almost genteel existential worldview, but there are subterranean caverns of philosophy tucked away in here. and i am not someone who digs on philosophy, but i do love the way it is explored here. there was some interview with gardner - must have been in the seventies, and someone was asking him about this book and "what it meeeeeeans", and gardner just sighed and said "there are twelve chapters. there are twelve zodiac signs. you figure it out". which is douchey, yes, but it makes me laugh. and, yes, of course there are the zodiac elements, and the nihilism of the dragon and so many other things happening in this tiny little book. but what stays with me, besides grendel's whole "i alone exist, i create the universe blink by blink" speech, is of course poor existential grendel losing his comfortable childish worldview and "growing up" as he is beaten with his own arm (why are you hitting yourself??) and being shouted at. "sing of walls, bitches!!" there are of course other stages of development at work here, but the one that affected me most powerfully at 17 was this renunciation of existentialism. i think it marked my entrance into womanhood, and it had nothing to do with menarche or penetration or tax forms. for me, the adult world became mine when i set aside childish things unexpectedly (and incompletely) in the wake of a monster's arm. grendel's had an accident. so may you all. come to my blog!

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Ratings: 3.69 From 31290 Users | 1950 Reviews

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An existential crisis told from the monster's point of view. Grendel tells of everything before Beowulf, a prequel. This was far more abstract and philosophical than I expected incorporating Grendel's arc from fumbling child learning his environment to elder bored with existence. "I understood the world was nothing: a mechanical chaos of casual, brute enmity on which we stupidly impose our hopes and fears.""Then the wars began, and the war songs, and the weapon making. If the songs were true,

Grendel is John Gardners endeavor to squeeze as many schools of thought (nihilism, existentialism, solipsism, you name it) into 174 short pages. The result is an intense and quirky philosophical treatise on beauty, evil, culture, love, and humanitys search for meaning (or meaninglessness) that raises several uncomfortable questions why do I feel compassion and empathy for a bloodthirsty monster? Why are some people good and others evil? What makes an action or character moral or immoral? What

Beowulf is a an 11c heroic epic poem, written in England, in old English, by newly Christianised monks, but set in Scandinavia. If one cant handle the Nowell Codex, the film does a pretty good raconteur job.Grendel (1971), of course, precedes both the film and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974) which subsequently utilises similar techniques: interweaving highly theoretical discourse with quotidian and utilitarian undertakings.Effectively, Gardner takes up Beowulf a millennium

I feel a little ambivalent about this book. It was definitely intellectually appealing, and the conversation that Grendel had with the dragon was very well done. But Grendel didn't really do what I expect novels to do: it didn't make me care about anything. Part of that may be because it's only a meager 174 pages - probably technically a novella - but I think even in 174 pages Gardner could have engaged the reader more.While I was able to scrape away a few enjoyable bits from this book out of

"Grendel" is a retelling of the epic poem "Beowulf" from the point of view of the monster, Grendel. The poem was written in Old English sometime between the 8th and 11th Century. The monster had been attacking the Scyldings in the mead hall of Hrothgar, the king of the Danes. The hero Beowulf, a Geat, destroyed Grendel. Although the poem "Beowulf" also tells of further adventures of the hero, the retelling ends with the death of Grendel.In "Grandel" the narrator-monster has been living in a cave

This smallish book, published in 1972, is an interesting exercise in examining a well-known story from an unexpected viewpoint in this case it's Beowulf retold by the monster Grendel. It could have been a bit naff, like one of those awful reinventions that certain novelists seem to knock off every couple of months, like Hamlet narrated by Ophelia. And actually I didn't really like it at first, for exactly the reason that it seemed a bit gimmicky. But by the end (and it's not a long book), it

This book was one of great self discovery. John Gardner takes us through the highs and lows of a beings life that has been forsaken by society. Taking philosophical ideas as a guideline, Grendel struggles with the thought of existence and meaning in his life. With two different kinds of influences pulling at him from both directions, Grendel must find the side where he belongs the most. I think the book could relate to peoples own struggles with meaning and that even though the book was written