Beowulf is all of brave, courageous, and not greedy. He demonstrates his braveness by battling Grendel, his mother and the dragon. You can spectate that he is courageous because he protects his culture and defends it 'til his death. And he is not greedy because he doesn't keep the dragon's treasure to himself, but shares it with his people. By wanting to fight Grendel with his bare hands, Beowulf is exemplified as a hero.
Beowulf defeating Grendel can come off as a heroic situation like a Private, or soldier, completing an amazing feat like shooting down an AH-64 Apache plan with just a rifle. However, I seem to view Beowulf as an individual similar to Martin Luther King Jr. Beowulf sought to save the Gaets from a monster, Grendel, the giant, and Martin Luther King was trying to save the African Americans from a monster as well, racism. The outcomes of the situations ended up the same while they were trying to do the same thing, protect what they were passionate for. They also share the ability to unite people to work together for a common cause.
Modern day heroes, like Spiderman, or Superman, or even Martin Luther King, can all differ and compare to the epic hero, Beowulf. He demonstrates his characteristics of braveness, courage and is not greedy. His traits once, and still seem to be, admired by not only people of that time, but by modern day society that reads the Beowulf story.
Your thesis, while not very clear, seems to be, "He was seen as we see Superman or Batman today. Today, heroes can be completely different from the past." Your essay is short, clear, and concise. The only thing I would edit is focusing a little more on comparing Beowulf to one other person, or a specific group, and not jump from superheroes, to soldiers, to MLKJ. The characteristics you state and the examples you gave are really good though.
ReplyDeleteYou did a good job with characteristic comparisons, but maybe should have just focused on one. I really like how you incorporated the fictional superheroes, because many have used heroes from books including myself so it was like a breath of fresh air. You did a good job, but maybe your thesis could have been a little bit clearer.
ReplyDeleteYour thesis is "He carried traits that people once admired and he was seen as we see Superman or Batman today. Today, heroes can be completely different from the past. Yet, they can also be similar." It was a nice essay with solid examples from Beowulf, however, there was no need to list various examples of the modern hero if you're going to not elaborate or focus on them in any part of your essay. When you use something as an example, especially in your introduction paragraph, be sure that you elaborate on it throughout or at some point in your essay. Otherwise if you don't, there's no need to use them as examples at all, like in his case. Overall, it was nice essay. You clearly had a strong handle on the prompt, even if you didn't execute it clearly in a few parts of your essay. Nice job, Chyrstal!
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