John Gardner: Literary Outlaw

Saari, Jon; Silesky, Barry

doi:10.2307/4614711

Cited by 2 publications

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“…The inspiration for Grendel came when I realized the Beowulf monster might stand in for Jean-Paul Sartre; all of the things Grendel says can be found in various works by Sartre." (Silesky, 2004) Grendel looks for, like an existentialist philosopher, understanding the nature of his being and to bring his nature to completion. He comprehends the idea that the "world was nothing" (Gardner, Grendel, 1971) and that people are responsible for find meaning to their life.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beowulf Revisited: A Study of John Gardener’s Novel Grendel

Madhi

2023

J. Tikrit U Hum.

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This study presents a critical and textual analysis of John Gardener’s novel, Grendel. Relying heavily upon aspects of post structuralism, the study examines the two texts, Beowulf, an anonymous medieval epic, and John Gardener’s Grendel in terms of their contexts and discourses. The study argues that Grendel is a hypertext that relates to Beowulf by means of transtextualty so as to tackle crucial perspectives of western philosophy, civilizational heritage and thus elucidates its existential discourse. The study concludes that Gardener’s novel is a revisionist narrative that aims at elaborating on the concept of heroic Self as opposed to the antiheroic ‘Other’. Further, the study concludes that Gardener’s, by means of adaptation, presents a new discourse that does not reduce Grendel, the monster in the original epic, to the demonic stereotype of the ‘wronged villain’. The significance of the study springs from the need to liberate literature from the anxiety of aimless imitation and thus enhancing Derrida’s poststructuralist notion which confirms that meaning has no definite closure. The study significantly examines the texts with reference to Gerard Genette’s structural narratology, John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction, and other critics who theorized the main key concepts in intertextuality, appropriation, and adaptation.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beowulf Revisited: A Study of John Gardener’s Novel Grendel

Madhi

2023

J. Tikrit U Hum.

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The Redemptive Sacrifice in J. Gardner’s Novel Grendel: An Analysis of the Novel’s Poetics in Light of Ritual-Mythological Criticism

Kalashnikov

2021

LoA

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The paper presents an analysis of the novel Grendel (1971) by American writer J. Gardner (1933–1982) in light of M. Eliade’s, R. Girard’s and V. Toporov’s concepts of myth and ritual studies. Literary studies concerning the ritual-mythological aspect of the novel are reviewed in the article. The research hypothesis suggests that the key features of Gardner’s poetics can be systematically analyzed in the context of myth and ritual. Meanwhile, the bulk of previous research covering the issue tended to rely primarily on other analytical frameworks, like P. Bourdieu's sociology of literature (B. Ekelund) or the theory of intertextuality (H. Ellis, W. Ober), the myth and ritual theory playing a supplementary role. While placing myth and ritual theory at the core of the methodology, the present study highlights its two key categories singled out in line with B. Malinowski’s “functionalist” view of myth and ritual as two complementary aspects of the archaic culture — the “theoretical” one (myth) and the “practical” one (ritual). Here they are presented as the etyological nature of myth (i.e. its ability to view all phenomena as dependent on the primordial origin of the universe) and the redemptive sacrificial ritual. Accordingly, the etyologization of Grendel’s narrative and the presentation of the protagonist as an “emissary victim” (in Girard’s terms) are the specific features of Gardner’s poetics which the paper primarily addresses.

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John Gardner: Literary Outlaw

Cited by 2 publications

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Beowulf Revisited: A Study of John Gardener’s Novel Grendel

Beowulf Revisited: A Study of John Gardener’s Novel Grendel

The Redemptive Sacrifice in J. Gardner’s Novel Grendel: An Analysis of the Novel’s Poetics in Light of Ritual-Mythological Criticism

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