Beowulf Meeting The Shadow Essay, Research Paper
The heroic poem verse form, Beowulf, depicts the conflicts and triumphs of the Anglo-Saxon warrior Beowulf, over man-eating monsters. The baronial guardian, Beowulf, invariably fought monsters and animals to free the land of immorality. The most important of these monsters, Grendel, represents Beowulf & # 8217 ; s shadow, the Jungian original explored in the essay aggregation, Meeting the Shadow. The character Grendel portrays the fallen ego, which will asseverate itself violently if neglected, and must be overcome throughout life.
The monster Grendel mirrors the portion of our fallen province. Grendel & # 8217 ; s ancestry leads to the scriptural figure Cain, to which all immoralities can be attributed. Grendel represents the concealed immorality of Beowulf. Rollo May depict this in his metaphor & # 8220 ; the firedrake or the Sphinx in me will frequently be clamouring and will sometimes be expressed & # 8221 ; ( 174 ) . Grendel represents Beowulf & # 8217 ; s Sphinx, that lashes out on others. The name Grendel can be approximately translated to intend & # 8220 ; bomber, & # 8221 ; and & # 8220 ; storm & # 8221 ; ( Raffel Burton 152 ) . These footings come to life when he invades the Mead Hall. Grendel & # 8220 ; Rushed angrily across the inlaid floor, snaping and fierce: his eyes gleamed in the darkness, burned with a ghastly visible radiation. Then he stopped, seeing the hall crowded with kiping warriors, stuffed with rows of immature soldiers resting together. And his bosom laughed, he relished the sight, intended to rupture the life from those organic structures by forenoon & # 8221 ; ( 46 ) . Grendel and the other monsters that represent Beowulf shadow & # 8220 ; project their ain immorality onto the universe & # 8221 ; ( Peck 178 ) . Grendel the & # 8220 ; Shepherd of immorality, defender of offense & # 8221 ; represents the built-in immorality that the shadow embodies ( Burton 46 ) .
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Beowulf fought off Grendel like we must contend our shadow. We can non free ourselves from our evil potency ; the shadow represents a womb-to-tomb enterprise. Beowulf ne’er finished contending his devils. He defeated animals in the sea, Grendel, Grendel & # 8217 ; s female parent, battled with the Swedes, and eventually fought the firedrake until his decease. To get the better of evil we must cast the clasp that it has over us. Grendel & # 8217 ; s & # 8220 ; hatred rose higher, but his power had gone. He twisted in hurting, and the hemorrhage sinews deep in his shoulder snapped, musculus and bone split and broke & # 8221 ; ( Burton 48 ) . Beowulf disempowered Grendel by rending of his arm. To free ourselves from evil we must loosen its clasp over us by extinguishing its power.
Grendel represents Beowulf & # 8217 ; s shadow. The suppressed shadow will come up to rest
ore the instability in personality, like Grendel frequently surfaced from the swamp. Grendel is a symbol of the suppressed and unloved shadow, and he reeks panic on Herot to do his presence known. He represents the hidden neglected portion of us. “Every portion of our personality that we do non love will go hostile to us” ( Bly 8 ) . By ramping into the Mead hall and rupturing the soldiers up before devouring them he represents this suppressed personality come uping. Grendel is motivated by green-eyed monster and choler. He is really covetous and resentful towards the guiltless people of the land. He vents, and undertakings his choler onto society to reconstruct a balance to Beowulf’s personality.
Grendel represents Beowulf & # 8217 ; s shadow. He is driven and motivated by the same things as Jung & # 8217 ; s description of the shadow. First of wholly, he represents the reaction of our shadow when it is neglected or suppressed. Second, he is an illustration of pure immorality, a direct descendant from the beginning. Last he represents the built-in immorality that is inside all of us. The possible for immorality is ever seeking to demo itself, and a uninterrupted conflict must be fought in order to free ourselves from it. May writes, & # 8220 ; If evil weren & # 8217 ; t their as a potency, the good would non be either & # 8221 ; ( 175 ) . Life will ever be full of enticements that must be fought off day-to-day. Grendel is an illustration of
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the shadow contending against subjugation. When a peculiar emotion or idea is suppressed it is sometimes projected onto others. Anger at oneself can be transformed into choler towards others
and the denial of 1s evil. The ignored shadow if non projected in another & # 8217 ; s way, will come up in oneself to reconstruct the instability personality. Evil nowadayss us with a day-to-day battle between enticements and justness. Like Beowulf, we must conflict the immoralities of our shadow until it has been recognized and defeated.
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Plants Sited
Bly, Robert. & # 8220 ; The Long Bag We Drag Behind Us. & # 8221 ; Meeting the Shadow.
Ed Connie Zwieg and Jeremiah Abrams. Los Angeles: Jeremy Teacher, Inc. 1991.
May, Rollo. & # 8220 ; The Dangers of Innocence. & # 8221 ; Meeting the Shadow.
Ed Connie Zwieg and Jeremiah Abrams. Los Angeles: Jeremy Teacher, Inc. 1991.
Peck, Scott, M. & # 8220 ; Healing Human Evil. & # 8221 ; Meeting the Shadow.
Ed Connie Zwieg and Jeremiah Abrams. Los Angeles: Jeremy Teacher, Inc. 1991.
Raffel, Burton, trns. Beowulf. New York: Penguin, 1963
