There are multiple steps to the Hero’s Journey but one would not recognize the Hero’s Journey without the Call to Adventure, or going from the familiar into the unfamiliar with, Crossing the First Threshold and lastly, the Freedom to Live. These three steps are evident in the stories of Beowulf written by Seamus Heaney and The Old Man and the Sea written by, Earnest Hemingway. Beowulf is a story of a young man trying to make a name for himself by battling multiple monsters and defending his father’s honor; as he matures he realizes the battle was more about defending his own people. There are three different cycles of the Hero’s Journey shown in Beowulf, two of the three discussed in this paper. The Old Man and the Sea is a story of Santiago, a Cuban fisherman, and his journey on catching a great fish. In this story there is only one cycle of the Hero’s Journey but it is one exciting one. The first cycle is the Call to Adventure. This cycle is a heroic calling that anyone can receive; this person can choose to take action or refuse it. In the story Beowulf, Grendel is a demon from the woods, which preys on the people of Heorot. The hero of the story, Beowulf’s Call to Adventure was hearing about Grendel, “When he heard about Grendel, Hygelac’s thane was on home ground, over in Geatland. There was no one else like him alive”(Heaney 194-196). Beowulf receiving and accepting the Call to Adventure is important to the people of Heorot because if he didn’t they would have been completely wiped out by Grendel. Crossing the First Threshold, is the person going from the known land into unknown land, for example me traveling from my house to Spain. In the cycle of Grendel, Crossing the First Threshold happens when, “ Time went by, the boat was on water Over the waves, with the wind behind her and foam at her neck, she flew like a bird until her curved prow had covered the distance and on the following dayIt was the end of their voyage and the Geats vaulted over the side They thanked God for that easy crossing on the calm sea” (Heaney 210-228). In this quote Beowulf and his men are leaving the familiar, Geatland, and headed into the unfamiliar lands of Heorot. If Beowulf and his army did not go from known to unknown, they would have never traveled to Heorot, to even here if the