Essay: Beowulf: Grendel - Online Essays.
Specifically between lines 438 to 476, a friend of Beowulf, Unferth, is skeptic of Beowulf’s heroic capabilities. In response to this Beowulf gives a speech of his achievements, criticizing Unferth for not assisting the king with the destruction Grendel ensues.
He is dying to be a martyr in both Grendel and Beowulf. The only difference between Grendel’s Unferth and Beowulf’s Unferth is the detail and depth to which his character is taken. John Gardner brought a relatively small character from Beowulf, and made him the second most defined character in Grendel.
Beowulf is an Old English epic poem created anywhere from 975 to 1025. In the poem, Beowulf, a warrior and commander, faces dangerous beasts and magical creatur.
Unferth, a warrior in the tribe of the Spear-Danes, challenges Beowulf's boasts and claims about himself. When Beowulf shows up ready to fight Grendel, Unferth tells a story he's heard about Beowulf's swimming contest with Breca, suggesting that Beowulf lost that competition.
Beowulf is the main character of the poem. He comes to help king Hrothgar, whose army was being terrorized by Grendel. Beowulf kills Grendel, and then kills Grendel’s mother—who came after Beowulf to avenge her son. He then becomes king of Geatland, but his reign as king was not peaceful; he gets attacked by a fire-breathing dragon.
Beowulf is a well-known epic poem written anonymously in Old English around the year AD. The mighty warrior prince, the title character, travels from his. Get everything you need to know about Unferth in Beowulf. Analysis, related quotes, timeline. In the Old English epic poem Beowulf, Unferth or Hunferth is a thegn (a retainer, servant) of the.
While Unferth demonstrates that he is an unlikable character, it is critical to realize that, like many of the other characters in the poem, he is more complex than he initially appears to be. Unferth does not want Beowulf to fail; instead, it appears that Unferth is so frightened and intimidated by Grendel that he does not believe that Beowulf will be successful.