Re:Grendel
a candy colored clown (mws4c@faraday.clas.virginia.edu)
Tue, 01 Jul 1997 21:52:24 -0400 (EDT)
On Mon, 30 Jun 1997, randy royal wrote:
> i don't know of a stire written from grendel's mother's veiwpoint,
> but a few months ago i bought a book called Grendel that was written
> by his perspective. don't know if this is the same thing.
i've never heard of a story from grendel's mother's viewpoint, but
considering she makes no appearance in beowulf (or did she?) and it's only
in Grendel that we see his interaction with his mother, i don't see how
the body of work (although very wonderful) could inspire yet a third
degree of literary separation from the original bard's tale. so, what did
you think of grendel's POV? it's one of my all-time favorites, and his
conversation with the dragon ("Feed the hungry. Give to the poor. Be
kind to idiots! What a challenge!") is phenomenal and dearest to me at
least.
John Gardner is really a great writer - if you like grendel he had
written some other novels and stories in the midieval setting (he taught
that genre of literature at SUNY, i think) and some contemporary stuff.
his writing style is addictive in the way salinger's is.
one frail, foolish flicker-flash in the long dull fall of eternity,
-myron