Grendel

John Gardner's novel Grendel is presented as the story of Beowulf from the monster's point of view, but that's a really reductionist view of the story. In fact, if that had been Gardner's goal, this would be a terrible book, since it's incredibly anachronistic (Grendel talks of toruses, the Dragon quotes Bertrand Russel, and so on).

Instead, Gardner is looking at various approaches to putting a meaning into life -- the Dragon's approach, in which everything is a product of chance, and in which life is ultimately pointless; or the bard's view, in which we struggle toward an ideal, even though that ideal is based on a fantasy of life as we'd like it to be, not life as it is.

But I think that Gardner is ambivalent about the two approaches, even though he seems to lean toward the poetic. On the one hand, the shaper's poetry is set up in opposition to the Dragon -- the Dragon believes that everything is chance, but the bard says that people can give meaning to their lives through the inspiration of art. On the other hand, Gardner undercuts that message by showing us that the bard is really self-interested, taking money for his services. Also, Beowulf isn't really presented as a role model either -- he's a thug, his eyes are cold, he's sarcastic, and so on.

Ultimately, both points of view are problematic -- is Gardner hinting at some third way?