September 14, 2011

Beowulf Journal 10


Unferth
Unferth was considered everything a warrior wasn’t; he couldn’t handle his beer, he was envious, lacked courage and hospitality, killed his kin (a major no-no whether you were a warrior or not), and wasn’t a good swordsman. He was perched at the king’s feet, almost like a jester while Beowulf expressed his want to kill Hrothgar’s monster. Unferth is almost like the village idiot. Unferth tried to make fun of Beowulf by saying that Beowulf lost his swimming competition against Breca. Beowulf puts Unferth in his place by telling the actual story of what happened during that ‘battle’ and told Unferth he was a drunken fool.

1 comment:

  1. Look up the meaning of Unferth's name and try and tie it in.

    ReplyDelete