literature. The true power lies with God. The Christian philosopher. Heroism and arrogance are to be admired as long as the hero does not strive too close to the gods and the heavens. His heroism begins with humility but also with robust promises: "I mean to be a match for Grendel. So, Beowulf concludes, Breca may have won a simple swimming contest, but he never fought and triumphed over heinous demons of the deep. Once again there is a contrast between the pagan and Christian cultures, as the same "giants" are referred to with honor and contempt in succeeding paragraphs. Finding a huge sword in the monsters cache, he manages finally, with rage in his heart, to slay the creature.
In the act ual battle with Grendel, Beowulf s heroism is unarguable. To clinch his argument. Beowulf s Androgynous Heroism 487.
It is Augustine's ideas that we see in Beowulf, tempering the heroic arrogance of the great warrior. Even before the encounter with Grendel we have heroes in chain mail, emptying mugs of beer, and trading stories of violent victories against formidable enemies. But instead of taunting Unferth, Beowulf praises the sword: ".in his words he found no fault at all with the sword's edge; he was a thoughtful man" (11.3). The concept of the tragic flaw of which Hrothgar warns Beowulf was first expounded by the Greek philosopher Aristotle, with Sophocles' Oedipus Rex as the ultimate example in Greek literature. Honor after Death, the strongest link between Beowulf's flawed heroism and that of a prideful Greek warrior comes after the Scandinavian wanderer's death. Beowulf's fight with the dragon at the epic's climax might be regarded as Anglo-Saxon heroism meeting Greek nemesis: the beast scalds the warrior's armor othello on Lagos Two Actions into molten lead and inflicts poisonous wounds so deadly that Beowulf succumbs to death.