1/30/20 Kyle Chan PD1

1/30/2020 Kyle Chan Period 1 Aim: How is honor, earned through loyalty, emphasized in funerary rituals and traditions? We started the lesson by describing the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC. Our task was to explain the purpose and effect of the monument. As a class, we decided that the monument was used as a way to represent his importance, his accomplishments, his legacy, and a way to remember him and to last forever. We all agreed that the monument was similar to Beowulf where he wanted a statue to be erected in his honor. This was a way for him to be remembered and not fade away in society. After this, we read, "To Have Succeeded", by Bessie Anderson Stanley. Through this, we discussed how people attempt to transcend fate by leaving a legacy, doing the unexpected, or by having kids that accomplish more. We continued to analyze the text of Beowulf and discovered the irony in how the Geats abandoned Beowulf when he needed help while Beowulf would never abandon them. Next, we pondered on what the Dragon symbolizes. The class suggested it represented death and its inevitability, the opposite of Beowulf''s traits, and sin. We also mentioned how Beowulf's greed and arrogance led him to his demise. We then discussed Wiglaf's symbolism where he represents an angel figure baptising Beowulf. We related Beowulf back to the conversion of Pagans to Christians and made connections between the Christian values and the characters in the story. From today's lesson, I was reminded that Beowulf was a story written by a Christian monk during a time where the Christians were trying to portray the Old Pagan gods as evil. I learned about the symbolism of the characters and their importance to converting the Pagan people. We learned this so that when we read Beowulf and the tales of Beowulf, we can remember that the whole purpose of the story is to convert the Pagans to Christians. We can use this information to further understand the symbolism and plot of the different tales that branch off from Beowulf.