John Gardner, Grendel Quotes

Talking, talking. Spinning a web of words, pale walls of dreams, between myself and all I see.

It would be, for me, mere pointless pleasure, an illusion of order for this one frail, foolish, flicker-flash in the long dull fall of eternity.

So childhood too feels good at first, before one happens to notice the terrible sameness, age after age.

They watch on, evil, incredibly stupid, enjoying my destruction.'Poor Grendel's had an accident, ' I whisper. 'So may you all.

My advice to you, my violent friend, is to seek out gold and sit on it.

When I was a child I truly loved:Unthinking love as calm and deepAs the North Sea. But I have lived, And now I do not sleep.

What do you call the Hrothgar-wrecker when Hrothgar has been wrecked?

I had a chance. I knew I had no more than that. it's all a hero asks for.

All order, I've come to understand, is theoretical, unreal — a harmless, sensible, smiling mask men slide between the two great, dark realities, the self and the world — two snake pits.

It's not easy to kill a mountain goat. He thinks with his spine.