"Enough! Who says I have to defend myself? I'm a machine, like you. Like all of you. Blood-lust and rage are my character. Why does the lion not wisely settle down and be a horse? In any case, I too am learning, ordeal by ordeal, my indignity. It's all I have, my only weapon for smashing through these stiff coffin-walls of the world. So I dance in the moonlight, make foul jokes, or labor to shake the foundations of night with my heaped-up howls of rage. Something is bound to come of all this. I cannot believe such monstrous energy of grief can lead to nothing!"Within the eighth chapter of John Gardner's Grendel, Grendel appears to be in the midst of a nervous breakdown. At this point, he seems to be conflicted between the Shaper and the dragon's arguments on living life.
As the dragon told him earlier, Grendel sought out his pile of gold and sat on it; he finds satisfaction out of grieving the Danes and continues to do so despite Hrothgar's misery. This shows his development from his previous belief that he no longer wanted to threaten the humans, that he wanted to "let them find some other 'brute existent'" (Gardner 73). During the war, Grendel initially seems angry with himself for his thirst of blood. He found it against his will, "mindless as wind," (Gardner 9) to feast upon the humans. His wish to become acquainted with the Danes is apparent when he storms the meadhall, crying out for mercy and peace, though the dragon argues that as long as Grendel exists, the humans will continue to unite against him.
Although he did so when he was younger, Grendel begins to acknowledge his large superiority over the animals and humans. When he was but a child, he called himself an "ugly god" (Gardner 22), saying that he created the universe with every blink he blinked. His boasts are more prevalent after the arrival of Wealtheow, and he states that Hrothgar is his own creation. He justifies his manipulation and torturing of the king by saying that he is his experiment. By this, he attempts to play God by putting himself above the Danes.
However, Grendel confesses that he is also a machine, mechanized by blind impulse and instinct just as the ram, the goat, and the humans. In addition with his language, Grendel also shares a methodical way of life with the Danes. Despite saying he was above all of instinctive behavior and has some sort of free will, he slowly begins to fall into that systematic habit of slaughter. What's interesting is that he backs this up by confessing his attacks were his only weapon for "smashing through these stiff coffin-walls of the world" (Gardner 123). By saying this, he is attempting to become his own Shaper in an effort to find a purpose in life. He rejects the purpose presented to him by the Shaper and tries to abide by his own idea which was brought upon him by the dragon, that the Danes' existence relies on his own.
Although he is trying to live by the dragon's advice, he refuses to acknowledge his idea that the world is meaningless, that "in a billion billion billion years, everything will have come and gone several times, in various forms" (Gardner 70). With the Shaper, even if it is false, Grendel is given a reason to live, whereas the dragon claims it's all for naught, that in time no one will even know he even existed.
As for me, I believe I try to live by the Shaper's words but end up being driven mad by those of the dragon. I've acknowledged that time is quickly passing by and I shouldn't waste time worrying about the inevitable end, but I can't shake the feeling that within a hundred years, nothing I've done will hold any significance. With seven billion individuals in the world, living and dying every second of every day, what difference can I really make? Even more, why does it matter that I make a difference? I feel as though so long as I enjoy the present, there's no need to squander my time fearing oblivion.
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