Chris Leong

Fate: It’s Inevitable

             Thomas Hobbes, a famous writer, once wrote, “Life in the natural state is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”  This is extremely evident in the two poems The Seafarer and The Wanderer.  Both poems portray Anglo-Saxon living exactly how Thomas Hobbes described life.  The concepts of loss and consolation, as well as Fate and God, are deeply entwined within each poem.  The unknown poets depict these concepts through the questioning of God, the loss of faith and the fear of their unknown fate. 

            Loss plays a major role throughout The Seafarer.  This man is out at sea, cold and miserable, longing for, “All the joys of life among the cities/Safe from such fearful venturings” (l. 27-28).  He has lost everything familiar to him, “The harmonious harp/ring-receiving, the joy of woman/worldly hopes, or anything at all,” and all of these things have been replaced by, "The relentless rolling of the waves” (l. 43-46).  When one thinks of the treacherous events that are happening to this man, we tend to forget that not all pain is physical.  He is stranded out, “on an ice-cold sea, whirled in sorrow/Alone in a world blown clear of love” (l. 15-16).  To lose love is like losing a part of yourself; it just eats you up inside.  How did this man deal with this terrible loss?  He trusted his faith and continued onward. 

            Although loss has been ever present throughout The Seafarer, consolation also plays an important role.  How can this man go on and on living this hellish life?  Simple, it is his fate, his destiny.  He accepts this life, “because the joys of God mean more to [him]/than this dead transitory life on land” (l. 65-66).  God wants him to lead this life; He has a plan laid out for him.  The hardships and suffering will all be worth the acceptance to heaven.  The enduring faith that the seafarer possesses, presses him on through the wrath of the sea; it pushes him to seek out what fate God has planned for him. “The time for/journeys [came] and my soul/called me eagerly out, sent me over/the horizon, seeking foreigner's homes” (l. 42-45).  God works in mysterious ways, to live a life devoted to a deity that no one can see or touch takes tremendous faith.  The seafarer believes in God and is ready to take on anything that may come his way. 

            Not only was loss embodied into The Seafarer, but it was also embedded into the core of The Wanderer.  Death changes the course of history.  In this poem, it is no different.  This man was, “Homeless and helpless he fled from fate/thus saith the wanderer mindful of misery/grievous disasters, and death of kin” (l. 5-7).  The events that occurred to this man have led him to wander away in search of a new life.  He lost his home, his job, his friends and his family.  He not only lost a lord and a king, but, “The days of his youth” (l. 31).  He cried, “lonely and wretched I wailed my woe/no man is living, no comrade left/to whom I dare fully unlock my heart” (l. 9-11).  Can things really be this bad for someone?  It is very hard to imagine something like this happening to us, but yes it does happen.   It is extremely grieving to someone when they lose everything that is familiar to them; all the people they used to know, all the sounds they used to hear, all of it just gone in an instant.  Yet through the ashes of his past, the wanderer presses onward to uncover his fate, his future, his destiny.

             The fact that he is alive astounds and intrigues him; this may be somewhat of a consolation to the grief he has just experienced.  He pushes on to a new life; after all he is a warrior.  He experiences death first hand as a career.  Of course he should be used to death all around him, but that is on the battlefield.  Bringing the war home to his loved ones, that was strange to him and made him realize the evils of war.  To help overcome the shock of the recently unfolding events, he turns to God.  “God’s pity,” and, “compassionate love,” will always be there for the ones who believe (l. 2).  Faith plays a major role in this poem.  Without faith that God will protect him and make things work out for the best, he would be lost and his fate would be clouded with uncertainty.  His belief that God is guiding him towards a new life helps to console him. “Happy the man who seeketh for mercy/from his heavenly Father, our fortress and strength” (l. 109-110).

         Why did both men lose everything they had?  The answer is one simple word: fate.  According to Webster’s Dictionary, Fate is defined as “an event (or course of events) that will inevitably happen in the future.”   It seems to decide everything that happens; it states that there is a set path for everyone to live.  Both men’s paths are passing through pain and suffering now.  Unfair as it may seem, these individuals strongly believe that God has a plan for them.  So with a strong faith and persistence, these men will live on in search of their destiny for the rest of their uncertain lives.