Grendel Chapter Prompts 1
Student Name Period
Instructions: You will have one journal prompt for each chapter. The prompts may focus on the plot, the character, authorial style, genre, philosophy, language, or DIDLS. You are to write a reader response to the prompt that is between 250-300 words. It must have at least two pieces of textural evidence from Grendel to support your argument.
Use the word counter on the homepage to determine how many words you are using. If you type in Word, go to tools and use the spelling and grammar tool and the word count tool.
Date ________________________
Chapter 1
Why would John Gardner choose to retell Beowulf from the monster's point of view?
What is to be gained from such a shift?
Date ________________________
Chapter 2
How does Grendel's telling of his own story affect your response to him? How is this response different from the way you thought of him in Beowulf?
Date ________________________
Chapter 3
Try to imagine this novel written from the third person point of view - though still from
Grendel's perspective. What does the first person narraction add to Gardner's story?
Date ________________________
Chapter 4
Imagine that the author of the original Beowulf epic has just read Gardner's book,
Grendel. What would the original author think? What would he like about the novel?
What would he dislike about the novel? What would confuse or upset him?
E3-BL-Unit:Grendel April 10, 2020