Let's Talk About Gaiman
Recently, a friend of mine posted on Facebook about Neil Gaiman's script for the film Beowulf . Personally, I avoided the film as soon as I heard about the changes, specifically that Grendel was Hrothgar's bastard child with Grendel's mother and the dragon was the same for Beowulf. Furthermore, Beowulf is portrayed as a lying, boasting fraud. I'm just not okay with that. This friend (to return to my opening point) said: " Didn't have to read more than a few pages into Neil Gaiman's script of Beowulf to conclude it's a rotter - but then it completely violates the very thing Tolkien believed made Beowulf powerful. Bad form, dude. Bad form." I had to agree with her, but then, I also felt I needed to read Tolkien's essay on Beowulf , which I had been interested in since I first read the long poem in high school (yes, I was one of those freaks who liked it in high school). Inevitably, the conversation (through another of her friends) led to wh...