October Monthly Connection: Beowulf the unrelatable hero?

For my monthly connection, I will be exploring Beowulf as the hero in Beowulf.



In the passage, many people in the beginning have a bad outlook on Beowulf. He is not relatable and the reader knows nothing personal about him. He has all of these "superhuman" qualities, but that is as far as the hero goes. He has no moral dilemma, he's just a man protecting his people. Personally, I have no problem with Beowulf the man. Reading the poem, I did not expect to be able to relate to him. Beowulf is not a real person. Because he is the hero, there is no reason that the reader should have to relate to him. Beowulf is larger than life in his hero's stand point, I think this makes up for our lack of knowing about him personally, yet others say that we do indeed know a lot about Beowulf personally because of his actions in the poem.



One thing that I found interesting was Beowulf's childhood seen as an explanation for his ways as a man. Reading Beowulf, I didn't really see any connections to his childhood, but after reading the passage, I was like, "Oh yeah, I remember that," and, "That makes sense." Beowulf is constantly looking up to his father and uncle. Because of his father, Beowulf understands death better than most people perceive him to in the poem. We could even say that Beowulf is perhaps trying to live up to his father. This connection with his father makes him somewhat more relatable for the reader. From other subtle clues, the reader continues to learn about Beowulf's childhood. We learn that he once swam a monster infested sea on a dare, and that he also practiced fighting a lot. These connections make Beowulf all the more relatable.



Throughout the poem, Beowulf has these "unaccustomed dark thoughts". This clashes with the idea that Beowulf is basically cheerful. Near the end, he feels bad because he has not kept his people safe as a King. Even before this, he feels that he may be inadequate for the role of King. I do not really see how these are "dark thoughts" but the fact that Beowulf does indeed worry about them, makes him all the more human. Because of all of these facts, I do conclude that Beowulf is indeed a hero. It may be hard for some people to relate to him, but this does not take away anything from him.