Descriptive Language In Beowulf

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The Honorable Hero
The epic poem Beowulf describes a famous hero of the Anglo-Saxon period. The hero Beowulf, is a …show more content…
Beowulf boasts about his superhuman strength at the beginning of the poem when he comes to the aid Hrothgar to defeat Grendel. The battle is vividly described, demonstrating Beowulf’s physical strength: ‘He twisted in pain, and the bleeding sinews deep in his shoulder snapped, muscle and bone split and broke.’ The images of the battle are horrific, but helps describe what happens. Beowulf has ripped off his enemy’s arm and ending the battle, something the average man cannot do. Also a number of swords are described in detail throughout the poem. One of the first descriptions of a sword is Hrunting, the sword Beowulf brings into battle with Grendel’s mother. Though it is a excellent sword, it does not help when he is battling the greedy she-wolf: “He tossed his sword aside, angry; the steel-edged blade lay where he had dropped it.” In this line, the author describes the sword is tossed aside and does not serve its purpose. The final use of imagery in the epic is Beowulf’s followers mourning his death: followers rhode, mourning their beloved leader, crying that no better king had ever
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