The extract is taken from the epic poem Beowulf.

It consists of a single section which deals about Beowulf's voyage to help his neighbour Heorot. It is a narrative text organizes into couplets and mainly focuses on the hero's departure and communicates all the actions done and needed to go to see.

It goes withoutsaying that it tells about Beoqulf, the protagonist, providing his characterization as well as the idea of the setting so that the intelligent reader can make up a mental picture of what is reading.

One cannot forget that the language of the extract is not the original version but is rather a contemporary rendering of an epic poem written in Old English. Old English was a German dialect and could not be understood today.

The text opens with immediate reference to Grendel so that the reader understands who the monste is and who the protagonist Beowulf is going to fight against. The danger represented by the monster is suggested by the verb “heard” which comes right at the beginning of the line in an allitterative use of the language. This is done on to convey its terrible reputation. Immediately after the reader is provided with informations, details, about the setting. So that he can better understand where events take place. Geatland is the focus of the setting. Immediately, the intelligent reader understands the narrative strategy of the : the narrator wants to highlight the unique qualities of th hero that may become such just because he is ready to risk his life for a good cause: showing generosity and solidariety with they who are in danger.

Beowulf is created as of a single personality, not as an ordinary man. “No one else” and “like him” make that clear right from the start. In addition, expressions like “alive” and “on earth” underline his particular strenght and courage suggesting that people different from him could not .

Besides re-inforcing his highly positive reputation, the narrator underlines his feasibility in doing any sort of duty. He was “the mightiest man”. Again, the use of an allitteration of the sound “m” anticipates other features of this character who is from a prestigious family ( ) and who has got a power that nobody wants to put into dscussion. He was a smart man able to make the right choice at the right time. He manage to choose the most suitable boat for the voyage one “that would ply the waves”. Besides, when he announced his plan for the voyage and the battle, nobody tried to keep him from going, and this another sign of the figure of the hero Beowulf. The hero conquists the glory with actions that are very dangerous for a common man and, when he passes the fight, for example, he finally become the hero, an amazing man that everybody want to be.

Beowulf's friends ask to their oracle how the battle will be finished: in this period of the text, the reader understands an important aspect of the Anglo Saxons: in fact, they were a very religious civilization and the answer of their God or oracles were undeniable. The hero usually is the boss so, during the voyage, Beowulf was the captain of the boat and the warriors that follow him. On the boat, warriors climbed up many things, but some weapons are more important than others: war-gear are the simbol of the Anglo-Saxons's warriors because without war they cannot live; war, for all of them, is the most important activity in life and become a warrior means become a man.

From line 24 to line 30, there is a period/part of the text where the narrator explains the voyage and the course of the boat that “flew like a bird” and covered the distance in about one day.

In the last sequence, the reader can understand that Beowulf and his warriors are arrived to help the famous prince who needed defenders in his land because they heard “a clash of mail” and “a tresh of gear”, sounds that remind us to the sounds that you can hear in battle. The allitteration of the sound “r” recalls the reader to an hard and rumorous place.