Grendel

by John Champlin Gardner

This classic and much lauded retelling of Beowulf follows the monster Grendel as he learns about humans and fights the war at the center of the Anglo Saxon classic epic.

"An extraordinary achievement."—New York Times

The first and most terrifying monster in English literature, from the great early epic Beowulf, tells his own side of the story in this frequently banned book. This is the novel William Gass called "one of the finest of our contemporary fictions."

• ISBN10: 0679723110
• ISBN13: 9780679723110
• Publish Date: 14 May 1989 (first published 12 August 1971)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: Random House USA Inc
• Imprint: Vintage Books
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 192
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780679723110

Reviews

[Linda]

This is supposedly one of the great contemporary novels, in which the main character is the monster, Grendel, from the heroic medieval poem Beowulf. Most of the story is written in prose, in first person point of view and we see the world through Grendel's eyes.

While it certainly was interesting to see a completely different story, in which Beowulf only shows up in the very last pages, it seemed to be much more a story about the psychology of the 'monster' in romance, and Grendel acted almost human in many instances.