The End

I think that final remark about his "accident" also plays upon his supposed invincibleness. He had reached a mind set where he figured he could brandish his power without facing any of the consequences which existed before the dragon, but was greatly augmented by the dragon's speech. The word "accident" suggests that it is not supposed to happen, whether that mean not supposed to happen in Grendel's eyes or the dragon's or the narrator's or anyone else's. This one simple word also suggests that the Grendel, even while being "invincible" and all powerful, is prone to the world's cruel tricks that will always be more powerful. While reading the end I was a little bit frustrated with the seemingly sudden entrance of these all powerful "men" from across the sea who caused Grendel's "accident" but I figure that's the way accidents happen; no one ever really has foresight about the bad things that may be coming their way but when they start coming forwards, they come inconceivably fast.

Speaking of Slaughterhouse-Five, [SPOILER---for Slaughterhouse-Five and Grendel] I think Gardner not only adopted Vonnegut's "so it goes" but also the idea of Tralfamadorians. His novel, Grendel appears to be one elaborate response to Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-five.

For example, The dragon appears to have the Tralfamadorian mindset when he tells Grendel "'We see from the mountaintop: all time, all space. We see in one instant the passionate vision and the blowout. Not that we cause things to fail, you understand...Dragons don't mess with your piddling free will'" (Gardner 54).

This quote matches up with Vonnegut's novel, in which he writes "'...I am a Tralfamadorian, seeing all time as you might see a stretch of the Rocky Mountains. All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warnings or explanations. It simply is. Take it moment by moment, and you will find that we are all, as I've said before, bugs in amber....If I hadn't spent so much time studying Earthlings,...I wouldn't have any idea what was meant by 'freewill''"(Vonnegut 85-86).

Looking back into my journal responses to Slaughterhouse-five from last year’s summer homework has proven to be not-so-helpful—I interpreted the Tralfamadorian mindset and “and so on”s and “so it goes”s as a representation of dehumanization in war and PTSD, an interpretation that Gardner does not appear to share. What Gardner appears to do is take a creature that enjoys pushing boundaries---Grendel---and say “what would happen if I give him a boundary he cannot break?” Grendel’s response, as pointed out by Patrick, is to get angrier at the world and is forced down by the boundary of “accident” established by the dragon.

Focusing back on the end of the novel, however, an immediate and somewhat cliched answer comes to mind—that despite all actions, good or bad, all living things meet the same fate: death. Gardner seems to express the opinion that  because memories can be twisted---the Shaper can make the bad appear to be good, events can be forgotten, and history books are our only remnants of the past---the only thing that matters is perception. For example, on the last page, Grendel, claims he has had an "accident" while also stating "my voluntary tumble into death" (Gardner 152). Grendel's paradox is not one of confusion but rather one of preserving the perception of free will. Although the dragon appears to be correct, Grendel's "voluntary tumble" and use of "may" instead of "will" in his final sentence is a expression of individual free will, a defiant declaration that he still refuses to play by the rules of fate. 

Back to the discussion of what exactly Grendel meant when he referred to his death as an "accident," some were suggesting that it was a final shout out to one of the novel's main themes: the cruel randomness and lack of meaning in life. Yet I perceived it more as an illumination of a last spark of Grendel's stymied desire to believe in a life that has meaning. 

I gather this logic mainly from a quotation a few paragraphs before the last line. As Grendel begins to realize his death looming near, Gardner writes (in the perspective of Grendel), "'It was an accident,' I bellow back. I will cling to what is true. 'Blind, mindless, mechanical. Mere logic of chance'" (152). Suddenly, it seems as if Grendel longs to believe in the "Mere logic of chance" (which is a total paradox, I must point out). And while it may have seemed like Grendel had believed in this sense of randomness and chance all along, let us not forget the dragon's insistence that living beings have no control over their own lives, that everything that will happen in the universe has been pre-planned--a being's fate is inevitable and unchangeable. Hence, when Grendel refers to his death as an "accident" it seems as though he wishes to believe that his true destiny would have stretched much farther into the future, and that his death represented a glitch in the eternal plan. In a "blind, mindless, mechanical" world, it does not seem that chance or accidents could exist; rather, like a factory machine, each being is produced and sent in a specific route towards its fate in the hands of the all-powerful universe. In these last moments of Grendel's life, I believe he realizes the paradox between how he viewed his own fate and the fates of other beings. While he readily killed others because their deaths were inevitable anyhow in the scheme of things, in the back of his mind I don't think he ever doubted that he was invincible and would not face the same vulnerable death as all of those he had killed. So when he ends up facing his own death, realizing that he too must face the suffering and impermanence of life not as the perpetrator but as the victim, he latches onto one last hope: that his death is, indeed, an "accident," a giant mess-up on the part of the universe. Even in his last moments, Grendel refuses to face the fact that he exists on the same plane as all other beings, and that the universe will not treat him as if he is special.

I am really struck by the twist of the last sentence: "So may you all." For so long, Grendel has tiptoed the line between indifference for humans and vitriol for humans. At one point, he adored their hypnotic and heart-wrenching music, the words of the Shaper reducing him to tears. At another, he venerated the queen Wealtheow, admiring the way she erased Unferth's murderous past with a single sentence. But he has always been disgusted by the way humans interacted with each other: "It was confusing and frightening, not in a way I could untangle. I was safe in my tree, and the men who fought were nothing to me, except of course that they talked in something akin to my language, which meant that we were, incredibly, related. I was sickened, if only at the waste of it: all they killed - cows, horses, men - they left to rot or burn" (Gardner 36). In the beginning, Grendel casually spoke of humans as a mere headache: "I am not in a mood, just yet, to talk of men" (Gardner 8).
But the last expression confirms how Grendel really feels about humans - he wishes death upon them in the most painful and horrific way. Just as death consumes Grendel, so does vengeance.