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And if the Babe is born a Boy
He's given to a Woman Old,
Who nails him down upon a rock,
Catches his shrieks in cups of gold.
-- William Blake  | |
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For Joel and Lucy | |
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The old ram stands looking over rockslides, stupidly triumphant. | |
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I touch the door with my fingertips and it bursts, for all its fire-forged bands--it jumps away like a terrified deer--and I plunge into the silent, hearth-lit hall with a laugh that I wouldn't much care to wake up to myself. The sun walks mindlessly overhead, the shadows lengthen and shorten as if by plan. And so begins the twelfth year of my idiotic war. The pain of it! The stupidity! I understood that the world was nothing: a mechanical chaos of casual, brute enmity on which we stupidly impose our hopes and fears. I understood that, finally and absolutely, I alone exist. All the rest, I saw, is merely what pushes me, or what I push against, blindly—as blindly as all that is not myself pushes back. What was he? The man had changed the world, had torn up the past by its thick, gnarled roots and had transmuted it, and they, who knew the truth, remembered it his way--and so did I. He closed his eyes, still smiling. "Pick an apocalypse, any apocalypse. A sea of black oil and dead things. No wind. No light. Nothing stirring, not even an ant, a spider. A silent universe. Such is the end of the flicker of time, the brief hot fuse of events and ideas set off, accidentally, and snuffed out, accidentally, by man. Not a real ending of course, nor even a beginning. Mere ripple in Time's stream." “You improve them, my boy! Can’t you see that yourself? You stimulate them! You make them think and scheme. You drive them to poetry, science, religion, all that makes them what they are for as long as they last. You are, so to speak, the brute existent by which they learn to define themselves. The exile, captivity, death they shirk from—the blunt facts of their mortality, their abandonment—that’s what you make them recognize, embrace! You are mankind, or man’s condition: inseparable as the mountain-climber and the mountain.”
"I've never seen a live hero before. I thought they were only in poetry. Ah, ah, it must be a terrible burden, though, being a hero--glory reaper, harvester of monsters! Everybody always watching you, weighing you, seeing if you're still heroic. You know how it is--he he! Sooner or later the harvest virgin will make her mistake in the haystack." I laughed. Something is coming, strange as spring. I am afraid. Tedium is the worst pain. | |
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▾Common Knowledge (short form) | Canonical title | Grendel | | Original publication date | 1971 | | People/Characters | Grendel, Hrothgar, Beowulf, The Dragon, The Blind Shaper, Grendel's Mother (show all 8), Unferth, Wealtheow | | Awards and honors | Mythopoeic Fantasy Award Nominee (1972), ALA Outstanding Books for the College Bound (1999.5|Fiction, 1999) | | Epigraph | And if the Babe is born a Boy
He's given to a Woman Old,
Who nails him down upon a rock,
Catches his shrieks in cups of gold.
-- William Blake | | Dedication | For Joel and Lucy | | First words | The old ram stands looking over rockslides, stupidly triumphant. | | Quotations | I touch the door with my fingertips and it bursts, for all its fire-forged bands--it jumps away like a terrified deer--and I plunge into the silent, hearth-lit hall with a laugh that I wouldn't much care to wake up to myself.... (show all) , The sun walks mindlessly overhead, the shadows lengthen and shorten as if by plan., And so begins the twelfth year of my idiotic war. The pain of it! The stupidity!, I understood that the world was nothing: a mechanical chaos of casual, brute enmity on which we stupidly impose our hopes and fears. I understood that, finally and absolutely, I alone exist. All the rest, I saw, is merely wha... (show all)t pushes me, or what I push against, blindly—as blindly as all that is not myself pushes back., What was he? The man had changed the world, had torn up the past by its thick, gnarled roots and had transmuted it, and they, who knew the truth, remembered it his way--and so did I., He closed his eyes, still smiling. "Pick an apocalypse, any apocalypse. A sea of black oil and dead things. No wind. No light. Nothing stirring, not even an ant, a spider. A silent universe. Such is the end of the flicker of ... (show all)time, the brief hot fuse of events and ideas set off, accidentally, and snuffed out, accidentally, by man. Not a real ending of course, nor even a beginning. Mere ripple in Time's stream.", “You improve them, my boy! Can’t you see that yourself? You stimulate them! You make them think and scheme. You drive them to poetry, science, religion, all that makes them what they are for as long as they last. You are,... (show all) so to speak, the brute existent by which they learn to define themselves. The exile, captivity, death they shirk from—the blunt facts of their mortality, their abandonment—that’s what you make them recognize, embrace! You are mankind, or man’s condition: inseparable as the mountain-climber and the mountain.”
, "I've never seen a live hero before. I thought they were only in poetry. Ah, ah, it must be a terrible burden, though, being a hero--glory reaper, harvester of monsters! Everybody always watching you, weighing you, seeing if ... (show all)you're still heroic. You know how it is--he he! Sooner or later the harvest virgin will make her mistake in the haystack." I laughed., Something is coming, strange as spring. I am afraid., Tedium is the worst pain. | | Last words | (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)'Poor Grendel's had an accident,' I whisper. 'So may you all.' | | Description | Grendel is a 1971 parallel novel by American author John Gardner. It is a retelling of the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf from the perspective of the antagonist, Grendel. The novel deals with finding meaning in the world, the ... (show all)power of literature and myth, and the nature of good and evil. |
▾LibraryThing members' description
| Book description |
Grendel is a 1971 parallel novel by American author John Gardner. It is a retelling of the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf from the perspective of the antagonist, Grendel. The novel deals with finding meaning in the world, the power of literature and myth, and the nature of good and evil. | |
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▾Book descriptions
Grendel is a beautiful and heartbreaking modern retelling of the Beowulf epic from the point of view of the monster, Grendel, the villain of the 8th-century Anglo-Saxon epic. This book benefits from both of Gardner's careers: in addition to his work as a novelist, Gardner was a noted professor of medieval literature and a scholar of ancient languages.
(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:57:57 -0400) ▾Open Shelves Classification The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details. |
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"I create the whole universe, blink by blink." Chapter 2, pg. 22
"I clamped my palms to my ears and stretched up my lips and shrieked again: a stab at truth, a snatch at apocalyptic glee." Chapter 3, pg. 45
"If you think I created that wall that cracked my head, you're a fucking lunatic." Chapter 12, pg. 171
"Poor Grendel's had an accident. So may you all." Chapter 12, pg. 174 (