See the Desire for Peace from War

                                      See the desire for peace from war

     There is no need to talk more about the fact that Beowulf has a great description of wars. From Grendel, Grendel’s mother and the dragon, it is clear that Beowulf achieves great things and is a hero. However, through the whole work, this is not a simple story about wars between hero and monsters. Because of that it seems to see the narrator’s sorrow of the wars and the sadness of killing, which becomes a beautiful hope for a harmonious life in the end. In the meantime, one important thing here, the wars that in human’s general idea are not the wars between human and monsters, but the wars among humans. And in the time background of this work, this kind of wars can be related to clan wars. Although many people believe that Beowulf is a heroic legendary about three fantastic battles, I argue that this book shows the narrator’s negative attitude towards clan wars, based on these reasons: the narrator does not give much information about the clan wars; the negative words about the young Beowulf’s ability among all the praise for him; the short story about Hildeburch’s marriage and the reason of Beowulf’s death in the final battle.

     Beowulf as the obvious leading role of this book is responsible for conveying all the hopes and opinions of the author, which means the creation of this character must show the narrator’s ideas in some degree.

     If I were to ask the question: what is the first image of Beowulf appearing in people’s mind when they read the book? The answer probably is a warrior. It is definitely a right answer. However, author of this book may ignore the significant background of becoming a warrior. We cannot see too much description about Beowulf’s brave achievements before he becomes a hero to fight with Grendel. Even when he boosted his martial arts with “they saw themselves how I came from combat bloodied by enemies, where I crushed down five, killed a tribe of giants”(line 419-420), his great power is only a passing description here. That brings the question now, so why did we miss this part? If we consider the historical time period of Beowulf, wars and fights among clan families are expected to be normal in this society. There could be more examples of clan wars in order to prove his abilities. As a result, this missing part probably has a clue that the narrator is avoiding to mention the Beowulf’s participations in clan wars. Or, the author is reluctant to illustrate clan wars. That idea may give us an initial impression of the author’s opinion about human wars. Probably, the narrator holds a negative attitude towards wars.

     Another special detail about Beowulf is that this character may lead us to think about his personal principals of beginning or joining a war. In line 2185 to 2188, the narrator says “they thought him no good; he got little honor, no gifts on the mead-bench from the lords of the Weders. They all were convinced he was slow, or lazy, a coward of a noble.” It might be strange to see these sentences in this work since the poem is full of praise for Beowulf’s great power. However, relating to another part of description, there might be the reason: “by no means killed comrades in drink; had no savage mind”(line 2179-2180). This sentence enlightens me that Beowulf perhaps has his own principle for wars, which is that he possibly does not like killings for personal benefit. That is why he refused to take part in wars and was regarded as a coward when he was young. At this point, the narrator introduces one of the most important personalities of this character, which is that Beowulf is not in favor of establishing achievements by creating killings between people, and he is also opposed to joining this kind of fight. His belief shows that the building of fame should not be by killing human companions, and the fame should be built on the purpose of destroying the monsters to protect people. Perhaps, that is also what the author wants to say.

     We looked at this character independently, now it is time to start to analyze the three battles. People will raise the confusion about my argument that if the whole work is talking about battles, how this poem can be related to a wish for peace. As I mentioned before, the narrator’s sorrow is about the human wars. As for the battles with Grendel and his mother, the objects are demons or monsters. Therefore, no matter how much writing pages about the praise of these battles, it doesn’t conflict to my point.

     In addition, the motivation of Beowulf to kill Grendel is protecting people from danger. This purpose of fight is echoing Beowulf’s personal principle of wars that I noted previously.

     “that Grendel had fought long against Hrothgar, driven by hate, had committed crimes for many seasons, a relentless feud”(line 153-154). This part of description shows how demon Grendel is and tells the narrator’s attitude toward this battle. Grendel is an evil in this book does harm to people and brings a disaster to this nation. As for that situation, Beowulf starts the battle. The narrator support Beowulf to kill Grendel, because of that it is the true meaning of wars. This battle is fight for people’s safety and the stability of the country. It is different from clan wars. Here, we might see the author’s different sentiments between clan wars and the wars just for justice.