Both Beowulf and The Wanderer share this tragic quality and sense of impending doom. In The Wanderer, this aura and feeling is spelled out throughout the whole text. One of the lines that show this is found in the very beginning, which is, “No one remains alive to whom I could utter the thoughts in my heart, tell him my sorrows.” This is followed up by another tragic line that goes, “One acquainted with pain understands how cruel a traveling companion sorrow is for someone with few friends at his side.” The narrator begins by expressing his sorrow and remembering fondly of his old companions, but he quickly recognizes that this is no longer reality. I believe this is effective, for it heightens the level of bleakness and desolation in the story while also hinting at, perhaps, the unavoidable fate that the Wanderer will endure, which …show more content…
The mere fact that he steps forth and accepts to take on the monster Grendel is enough for celebration only shows that greatness of Beowulf’s character. And Beowulf proves his detractors—well, his one detractor in Unferth—wrong and shows that he is a great warrior (and later a great king) when he beheads Grendel, and later killing his Mother and slaying the dragon. Each victory always seems greater than the last, and with this comes escalation, which allows only for a greater fall to take place. By the time he fights and gets bitten by the dragon, and by the time of his ultimate death, Beowulf is already an old man and has reigned supreme for 50 years, brining prosperity to Geatland. But when he dies, which seems unimaginable, is a wakeup call, the hit of reality, for the Geats that the Wanderer perhaps had and experienced when he realizes that he is, and will forever be, alone. Beowulf, the man whose character is the size of an entire town, is gone, never to return. And for the Wanderer, an entire town of characters suffers the same