“In Geár-dagum”: Beowulf as an Anglo-Saxon Fornaldarsaga

The genre of Beowulf is a topic that continues to be hotly debated, as Breizmann has already noted[1], and as any scholar working in the field will have already observed. Indeed, Beowulf scholarship concerning matters of genre goes way back to the “Age of Enlightenment” of Beowulf criticism when J.R.R. Tolkien opened the floodgates through his revolutionary essay, The Monsters and the Critics[2]. Breizmann thoroughly documents the developments after Tolkien, citing, on top of the innovative critic and author: Irving, Earl, Greenfield, and Klein; and recording their classifications of Beowulf as a “fairy tale, elegy, heroic lay, oral-formulaic poetry, historical and legendary narrative, and Christian allegory.”[3] She adds to this her own proposal of Beowulf as romance. Moreover, there are scholars such as Greenfield who have contemplated on Beowulf’s essence as a tragedy[4]. Such a variety leads one to ask whether there may be an all-encompassing label for Beowulf, one that includes every category in Breizmann’s critical compilation. In this paper, I wish to offer my own categorisation of Beowulf as an Anglo-Saxon fornaldarsaga by exploring the definition(s) of fornaldarsögur then positioning Beowulf in such a context.

What then, we may ask, are fornaldarsögur? The term fornaldarsögur (“sagas of ancient times”) is a modern term derived from Carl Christian Rafn’s original coinage, “foraldar sögur Norðurlanda,”[5] which means “sagas of ancient times in the North.” Stephen Mitchell attempts to give a very broad definition of fornaldarsögur, writing that they are “Old Icelandic prose narratives based on traditional heroic themes, whose numerous fabulous episodes and motifs create an atmosphere of unreality.”[6] Whilst such a definition agrees with the traditional opinion that “the fornaldarsögur are heroic,”[7] it falls short when tested against contemporary standards of specificity in that its description can be applied to any of five more subdivisions of the saga genre, which include: kings’ sagas, sagas of Icelanders, bishops’ sagas, Sturlunga sagas, and riddarasögur (“knightly romances”)[8]. What can be potentially ambiguous, and thus a matter of contention, in Mitchell’s definition is its lack of a hair-splitting distinction between fornaldarsögur and riddarasögur. Torfi Tulinius, however, allows for a distinct separation between the two categories, writing that

the fornaldarsögur all take place in the North and deal with Nordic heroes but the riddarasögur take place in the south of Europe or even more remote places, and the heroes are “valiant knights” who were infrequent visitors here in the North. Furthermore, some literary characteristics distinguish between these groups of sagas[9].

Jakobsson clarifies what exactly these distinguishing literary characteristics are: “The tragic end of traditional fornaldarsögur – e.g. Hálfs saga, Hrólfs saga kraka, and Völsunga saga – also distinguishes them from adventure sagas and romance in general.”[10] Hermann Pálsson further divides the fornaldarsögur into two categories: “heroic legend” and “adventure tales.”[11] Tulinius explains that “the former are based on the same ancient heroic tradition in the tragic mode as the lays of the Edda and have links with similar traditions in other Germanic languages”; the “‘adventure tales’ usually end well about heroes undertaking a quest or series of quests.”[12]  And while there is, as yet, and despite all the aforementioned criticisms, no clear-cut authoritative definition for fornaldarsögur, Clunies-Ross provides two essential characteristics that many works which are considered fornaldarsögur share. She posits that firstly, “a number of fornaldarsögur represent a world of Scandinavian royal and heroic dynasties”[13] and that, secondly, the characters in the stories “frequently interact with beings that are not fully human.”[14]

In Beowulf, the first point in Clunies-Ross’ characterization of fornaldarsögur ­– its depiction of Scandinavian royal and heroic dynasties – becomes a major axis upon which the work’s action revolves. The poem’s narrator begins with “Hwæt wé Gár-Dena,”[15] invoking, through the use of the first-person plural pronoun “wé,” the Danish identity of both the speaker and his audience. Magennis notes, moreover, of the emphatic placement of “Gár-Dena” in Beowulf’s opening line. In light of this, Howe explains that “the setting of Beowulf may be understood as the homeland before conversion,”[16] and thus the “stories about the Danes and the Geats could serve as a powerful reminder of the Anglo-Saxon’s origins, both geographically and religiously.”[17] And if we are to divide the poem into two halves based on setting, the first being in Denmark, and the second in Geatland, we may observe in the first half an almost panoramic attention to the house of the Scyldings, the descendants of “héah Healfdene” (“the great Halfdane”)[18]. Indeed, while the first half marks the actions of the poem’s titular hero, it also prefigures and laments the downfall of the Scylding household: “nalles fácen-stafas / Þéod-Scyldingas þenden fremedon” (“The Scylding nation / was not yet familiar with feud and betrayal,” ll. 1018-1019). Such events as are referred to in Beowulf thus accentuate its essence as a fornaldarsaga, in that it “display[s] a lengthy continuity within the Nordic cultural context.”[19] Consequently, the poem aligns itself not only with Icelandic kings’ sagas such as Heimskringla[20] and Skjöldunga saga, but, more importantly, with other fornaldarsögur as well, such as Hrólfs saga kraka and Völsunga saga.

It is not surprising then, that, as North argues, “…the poet appears to draw on the unquantifiable sources of a living Danish mythology. Respectively he plays on Freyja’s Brísinga men, Óðinn’s vengeance for Baldr, and Þórr’s death by the World Serpent.”[21] Along with the quasi-mythological atmosphere of Beowulf and fornaldarsögur come the monsters and otherwordly beings. The world that their presence invokes is a world “when Scandinavia was still pagan,” and thus “the action of [fornaldarsögur] was removed from the world of the everyday, at least in part, but not so fully removed that its subject-matter could not be meaningful to [the audience].”[22] In this sense, it is difficult to fully agree with Tolkien when he writes that “it is just because the main foes in Beowulf are inhuman that the story is larger and more significant…It glimpses the cosmic and moves with the thought of all men concerning the fate of human life and efforts; it stands amid but above the petty wars of princes, and surpasses the dates and limits of historical periods, however important.”[23] In ignoring the antiquarian historicity—the reality of the pagan world—alluded to in the poem, we take away not only the full force of the Þórr myth as it is ascribed to Beowulf and his fight against the dragon[24], but also the pathos that the audience, the “Gár-Dena in géar-dagum,” are meant to feel towards their pagan ancestors. Black, et al. put the situation in a better perspective: “Whatever its underlying structural patterns, Beowulf is neither myth nor folktale; its stories of dragon-slaying and nocturnal struggles are set against a complex background of legendary history.”[25] This is what makes Beowulf a unique work of literature in the Old English tradition. Not only does it seem somewhat out of place with its “foreign-ness” (in terms of its Nordic connection) when compared with other Old English heroic poems like Judith (which stems from Biblical tradition) and The Battle of Maldon (which is set in Anglo-Saxon England), but the presence of the monsters, especially the dragon, invokes the mythic climate of the Eddas and other fornaldarsögur. Thus, it is easy to see how Richard North comes to observe there to be a growing consensus that the poet of Beowulf adapts tales connected with those of Norse mythology: Freyja’s Brísingamen; Höðr’s slaying of Baldr and Óðinn’s vengeance; and Þórr’s battle against the World Serpent,’’[26] since Beowulf belongs to what Tulinius calls “the Matter of the North” and its vast range of saga literature, as much as it belongs to the English—specifically Anglo-Saxon—tradition of poetry.

Categorising Beowulf as an Anglo-Saxon fornaldarsaga helps give us a wider perspective of the work’s historicity. It is among the many sagas that deal with Scandinavian heroic royalty, and one amongst many more that incorporate the mythic and legendary “past” of its contemporary audience, reworking themes and motifs that help(ed) shape their society and burgeoning nations. Such a grouping thus removes Beowulf from isolation and assimilates it into the wealth of Icelandic fornaldarsögur that give it context, removing our need to force it into labels which may undermine its historical and structural richness. Being a fornaldarsaga, it becomes at once a folktale, a tragedy, a romance, as well as a historical and legendary narrative.

 

 

Bibliography:

Beowulf, in The Broadview Anthology of British Literature, eds. Joseph Black et al. (Toronto: Broadview                 Press, 2016), 65-116.

Breizmann, Natalia. “”Beowulf” as Romance: Literary Interpretation as Quest.” MLN 113, no. 5                   (1998): 1022-035.

Fjalldal, Magnus. “An Unnoticed “Beowulf” Analogue in “Heimskringla.”(Critical                             Essay).” Notes and Queries 60, no. 3 (2013): 341-43.

Greenfield, Stanley. “”Beowulf” and Epic Tragedy.” Comparative Literature 14 (1962): 91.

Heaney, Seamus. Beowulf. London: Faber and Faber, 1999.

Howe, Nicholas, “Beowulf and the Ancestral Homeland,” in The Postmodern Beowulf: A Critical                          Casebook, edited by Eileen A. Joy and Mary K. Ramsey, 49-89. Morgantown: West Virginia                University Press, 2006.

Jakobsson, Armann. “The Royal Ideology and Genre of Hrolfs Saga Kraka.” Scandinavian Studies 71,             no. 2 (1999): 139.

Magennis, Hugh. The Cambridge Introduction to Anglo-Saxon Literature. Cambridge Introductions to                    Literature. Cambridge ; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011.

Mitchell, Stephen A. Heroic Sagas and Ballads. Myth and Poetics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press,                   1991.

North, Richard. The Origins of Beowulf : From Vergil to Wiglaf. Oxford ; New York: Oxford University               Press, 2006.

Ross, Margaret Clunies. The Cambridge Introduction to the Old Norse-Icelandic Saga. Cambridge                              Introductions to Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.

—. A History of Old Norse Poetry and Poetics. Cambridge, UK ; Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2005.

—. Old Icelandic Literature and Society. Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature ; 42. Cambridge, U.K.             New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

Stefán Einarsson. A History of Icelandic Literature. New York: Johns Hopkins Press for the American               -Scandinavian Foundation, 1957.

Tolkien, J. R. R., and Tolkien, Christopher. The Monsters and the Critics, and Other Essays. London ;                   Boston: Allen & Unwin, 1983.

 

 

 

[1] Natalia Breizmann. “”Beowulf” as Romance: Literary Interpretation as Quest.” MLN 113, no. 5 (1998): 1022.

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Monsters and the Critics, and Other Essays. (London ; Boston: Allen & Unwin, 1983).

[3] 1022.

[4] Stanley Greenfield, “”Beowulf” and Epic Tragedy.” Comparative Literature 14 (1962).

[5] Margaret Clunies-Ross, The Cambridge Introduction to the Old Norse-Icelandic Saga. Cambridge Introductions to Literature. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 28.

[6] Stephen Mitchell, Heroic Sagas and Ballads. Myth and Poetics. (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991), 27.

[7] Ármann Jakobsson, “The Royal Ideology and Genre of Hrolfs Saga Kraka.” Scandinavian Studies 71,no. 2 (1999): 142.

[8] Cf. Ibid.

[9] Cf. Jakobsson, 143.

[10] Ibid.

[11] Torfi Tulinius, “The Matter of the North: fiction and uncertain identities in thirteenth century Iceland” in Margaret Clunies-Ross, Old Icelandic Literature and Society, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature ; 42. Cambridge, U.K. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 243.

[12] Ibid.

[13] The Cambridge Introduction to the Old Norse-Icelandic Saga, 76.

[14] Ibid, 77.

[15] All lines from Beowulf here (in the original and in translation) are taken from Seamus Heaney’s version(1999).

[16] Nicholas Howe, “Beowulf and the Ancestral Homeland,” in The Postmodern Beowulf: A Critical Casebook, edited by Eileen A. Joy and Mary K. Ramse. (Morgantown: West Virginia University Press, 2006) 52.

[17] p. 53.

[18] line 57.

[19] Mitchell, 27.

[20] Cf. Magnus Fjalldal, “An Unnoticed “Beowulf” Analogue in “Heimskringla.”(Critical Essay).” Notes and Queries 60, no. 3 (2013): 341-43.

[21] Richard North, The Origins of Beowulf : From Vergil to Wiglaf. (Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), 194.

[22] Clunies-Ross, The Old Norse-Icelandic Saga, 58.

[23] J.R.R. Tolkien, The Monsters and the Critics, and Other Essays. (London ; Boston: Allen & Unwin, 1983), 33.

[24] Cf. North, 202.

[25] Beowulf, in The Broadview Anthology of British Literature, eds. Joseph Black et al. (Toronto: Broadview Press, 2016), 66.

[26] And here North cites substantially: “Dronke, ‘Beowulf and Ragnarök’, 311—18. D.G. Calder, ‘Setting and Ethos: The Pattern of Measure and Limit in Beowulf’, SP 69 (1972), 21 – 37, esp. 36. Frank, ‘Skaldic Verse and the Date of Beowulf’, 132 (Baldr and Óðinn). Beowulf: A Student Edition, ed. Jack, 101 (Brísingamen). Beowulf, ed. Mitchell and Robinson, 134 (Baldr and Óðinn). Orchard, Companion, 114-23 (all three motifs). Rauer, Beowulf and the Dragon, 136-7 (Þórr and the World Serpent). Niles (Beowulf, 193) is against, albeit he believes Beowulf was composed partly for Anglicized tenth-century Danes” (Cf. North, p. 205).

The Movement from the Parallactic Surreal into the Heimlich in McEwan’s The Child in Time

Two works of art came out in 1987. One is Gerhard Richter’s Abstraktes Bild (648-3): the Abstract Impressionist tone of the painting radiates a sense – if only an impression – of the surreal and the uncanny. The other is Ian McEwan’s novel The Child in Time. The novel opens with the dissolution of home caused by the loss of a child; what happens thenceforth builds up a sense of the dissolution of reality wherein the reader is taken through the realm of the uncanny. Indeed, there is in The Child in Time a dimensional shift into the Surreal, a realm through which Stephen recovers and reinstates his lost sense of home. For it is in this realm where Stephen deals with the repressed through a liberating process that helps him dissolve the Unheimlich into the Heimlich[i], transforming the repressed into the homely. Slavoj Žižek’s work on The Parallax View[ii] will help us gain further insight into the surreal and uncanny experiences in the novel, and, more importantly, into the intricate process that gives Stephen liberation.

One of Žižek’s great contributions to philosophy and theory is his concept of the “parallax gap”. He introduces it as “a kind of Kantian revenge over Hegel”[iii]: whereas Hegel’s philosophy seeks some sort of dialectical synthesis between a thesis and antithesis, a link between two binary oppositions, Kant points out an unbridgeable gap, a transcendental illusion, “the illusion of being able to use the same language for phenomena which are mutually untranslatable”[iv]. There is thus, in Hegelian diction, “a fundamental antinomy which can never be dialectically “mediated/ sublated” into a higher synthesis, since there is no common language, no shared ground, between the two levels”[v]. What Žižek then observes in Kant’s notion of the transcendental is the presence of what he calls the “parallax gap”, “the confrontation of two closely linked perspectives between which no neutral common ground is possible”[vi]. The parallax gap is made observable only through a shift, or a “minimal difference”[vii],  in the perspective of an object – a shift which Žižek further posits as an object itself. It is the third space between the phenomenal and the noumenal, a separate Dasein which we are able to contemplate.

An artistic notion that in the novel goes together with the concept of the parallax gap is that of Surrealism. André Breton in his first Surrealist Manifesto (1924) puts forth that “Surrealism is based on the belief in the superior reality of certain forms of previously neglected associations, in the omnipotence of dream, in the disinterested play of thought. It tends to ruin once and for all all other psychic mechanisms and to substitute itself for them in solving all the principal problems of life”. This “superior reality” is accordingly what Breton calls a surreality: the “resolution of these two states, dream and reality, which are seemingly so contradictory, into a kind of absolute reality”. We may then draw from this description of surreality its inherent nature of uncanniness. Being a synthesis of the state of reality and dreams, surreality delves into the realm of the unconscious, the repressed, and the uncanny. Moreover, being itself a dimension beyond reality – and, in a sense, one which encompasses reality – the realm of the surreal is free to constantly fluctuate between our familiar reality and the trans-natural domain of unconscious, psychic automatism. It is precisely such a presentation of the surreal that gives it a sense of the uncanny; it draws on the familiar and yet distinguishes itself as psychologically unfamiliar and enigmatic. The in-between-ness of surreality, its position between reality and the psychically transcendental, characterises it as a version of the parallax gap: the “reality” it offers is nothing but a transcendental illusion.

In The Child in Time[viii], Stephen is transported into the liminal realm of the parallactic surreal. His first experience with the surreal is described as such:

He set off, and within minutes found satisfaction in this new landscape. He was marching across a void. All sense of progress, and therefore all sense of time, disappeared. The trees on the far side did not come closer. This was an obsessive landscape – it thought only about wheat. The lack of hurry, the disappearance of any real sense of a destination, suited him. (p. 53)

 

Stephen thereafter is in a constant flux between surreality and reality, with no explicit struggle to understand his displacement from mundane reality. What he questions instead is the nature of time in his seemingly unnatural experiences: “What do you make of it, that thing about time?”[ix] he asks Joe regarding their accident. It is indeed difficult to clearly distinguish the real from the surreal in the novel if only because it is an attribute of the surreal to encompass the real within itself – but also because Stephen himself is unconscious of the transitions between the two dimensions. The surreal parallax gap wherein we often find him strikingly positioned is moreover an anachronistic gap between his past and his present that blurs the temporal boundaries between those two periods of his life. At times, Stephen is transported into what for him is a prenatal period, able to observe his parents from before he was born; at times, it would appear as if he is rooted in present reality – though again it is almost impossible to draw proper boundaries between reality and surreality. The surreal in the novel occurs as a “minimal difference” between the perspectives of reality and the uncanny, and the object for which these perspectives offer such a difference is Stephen himself.

What is then evoked in this surreal realm is the return of the repressed as it is symbolically and obliquely personalized for Stephen. Consequently, his two major surrealistic experiences contain maternal motifs. The scene of the lorry accident presents a birthing scene: “There was a head at Stephen’s feet. It protruded from a vertical gash in the steel. There was a bare arm too. . .”[x] The scene continues until Stephen “took hold of the man’s shoulder with one hand, and cupped the other under his face and pulled. The man groaned”[xi]. The other scene involves Stephen’s mother in a pub (p.62) where we eventually learn of her pregnancy. The scene radiates an unconscious and uncanny pathos for Stephen from which he feels “a cold, infant despondency. . .a bitter sense of exclusion and longing”[xii]. The scenes taken together thus indicate that the repressed desire for Stephen returns is the actual unheimlich desire in its most Freudian sense, the Oedipal desire to return to “the former Heim [home] of all human beings, to the place where each one of us lived once upon a time and in the beginning”[xiii]. This desire expresses itself in Stephen’s consciousness: “home, he was home, enclosed, safe and therefore able to provide, home where he owned and was owned. Home, why be anywhere else?”[xiv] In a parallel perspective, the transposition of such a repressed, unconscious desire for Stephen into the realm of reality reveals his actual but subconscious[xv] desire to repair the lost sense of “home” in his family. What, in other words, Stephen longs for after the kidnapping of Kate is the restoration of the sense of the homely – to be able to return to Julie and re-establish their shattered home.

Stephen’s experience in the parallactic surreal, while often submersing him in the realm of the repressed, paradoxically liberates him from the selfsame paralyzing realm. Such is one of the many functions of the parallax gap. For the gap, being what Žižek calls “the third space between phenomena and the noumenon itself”[xvi], contains our freedom: “Our freedom persists only in a space between the phenomenal and the noumenal”[xvii]. For Stephen, freedom from the repressed involves a form of “separation”. According to Otto Rank, it is a process of

the overcoming of previous supporting egos and ideologies from which the individual has to free himself according to the measure and speed of his own growth, a separation which is so hard, not only because it involves persons and ideas that one reveres, but because victory is always, at bottom and in some form, won over a part of one’s own ego[xviii].

It is indeed an extremely difficult struggle for Stephen to liberate the ego from paralysis. The novel depicts his struggle as such: “Almost three years on and still stuck, still trapped in the dark, enfolded with his loss, shaped by it, lost to the ordinary currents of feeling that moved far above him and belonged exclusively to other people”[xix]. What is arguably the most poignant of the surreal scenes in the novel is that which also helps liberate Stephen. “Perhaps he was crying as he backed away from the window, perhaps he was wailing like a baby walking in the night. . .”[xx]. The vision of his mother at The Bell changes from a moment of the uncanny, the unheimlich, into a moment of das Heimliche [homely][xxi]. Wells explains that “he [Stephen] imagines it. . .as a stage in a process that will lead to new life. . .Stephen’s brush with non-existence through contact with his parents’ ‘ghosts’ prompted him to follow the ‘forking path’ that led to intercourse with Julie”[xxii]. Stephen’s journey through surreality encompasses and eventually refashions the melancholia and paralysis that he experiences: “he understood that his experience there had not only been reciprocal with his parents’, it had been a continuation, a kind of repetition. He had a premonition followed instantly by a certainty…that all the sorrow, all the empty waiting had been enclosed within meaningful time, within the richest unfolding conceivable”[xxiii]. What is thus expressed here is the total transubstantiation of the Unheimlich into the Heimlich, the uncanny – and with it, the repressed – into the homely. Stephen’s surreal experience at The Bell becomes a “continuation” from an uncanny prenatal “memory” into a present reality with Julie, a reality wherein the homely may be re-established, where “the feel of the warm boards under his feet brought to mind again the idea of home”[xxiv]. The parallax gap of the surreal becomes transformed itself, from an unbridgeable gap between Stephen’s paralyzing repression and his ideal Heimlich reality, into precisely the synthesis that allows for the conversion and transition of the former to the latter, a synthesis that paves the way towards Stephen’s freedom.

The Child in Time deals with the dissolution of home in its own unique way. Stephen’s uncanny experiences become the remedy that leads him towards his healing. His submersion in the realm of the surreal becomes his therapy, for it is in this realm that the repressed becomes deconstructed and reconstructed into the very thing that provides him with closure. The Unheimlich, once a gap wherein no higher synthesis is possible, becomes the higher synthesis for Stephen, the bridge that connects his experience in The Bell with his present situation, leading him back to Julie, endowing him with a new sense of home, and finally giving him the restoration of everything he lost in the beginning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[i] I use the original German terms because they contain not only the concept of the canny and uncanny, but more importantly the key connotations of the homely and un-homely that may not be so apparent in their English counterparts.

[ii] The Parallax View (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2006).

[iii] p. 4.

[iv] Ibid.

[v] Ibid.

[vi] Ibid.

[vii] Žižek, 18.

[viii] All quotes taken from Ian McEwan’s The Child in Time (Vintage Canada, 1987).

[ix] p.107.

[x] p. 109.

[xi] p. 105.

[xii] p. 62.

[xiii] p. 528, Sigmund Freud, in “The ‘Uncanny’” in The Critical Tradition: Classic Texts and Contemporary Trends, edited by David H. Richter (Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2007), 514-532.

[xiv] McEwan, p. 68.

[xv] As opposed to unconscious.

[xvi] p. 22.

[xvii] Žižek, 23.

[xviii] p. 375 in Otto Rank’s Art and Artist: Creative Urge and Personality Development (W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1932).

[xix] McEwan, 141.

[xx] McEwan, 62.

[xxi] Coined from Freud, 526.

[xxii] p. 54 in Lynn Wells’ Ian McEwan (Palgrave, 2009).

[xxiii] McEwan, 235.

[xxiv] McEwan, 237.

WRITING AND EXISTENCE IN MARTIN AMIS’ MONEY

Martin Amis opens Money with the following inscription: “This is a suicide note. By the time you lay it aside…John Self will no longer exist. Or at any rate that’s the idea. You can never tell, though, with suicide notes, can you?” With such a statement, Amis immediately puts into perspective the idea of death – but it is an idea that is subsequently superimposed with doubt. “Will John Self die?” the reader may ask. Or to be more specific: “Will John Self cease to exist?” In a novel that contains John Self’s past-tense narrative of what to him is his ever-dynamic present, his neverending “now”, these are questions that the readers are supposed to keep in mind upon reading the beginning all the way to the novel’s ending. Indeed, Money, as a suicide note, depicts John Self’s retrospective attempt to establish, through the reader, an existence that will survive his future inexistence. The novel, in this light, captures the totality of John Self’s essence as he writes and narrates events of his life to the readers. Jean-Paul Sartre’s work, Why Write?, and Peter Brooks’ work on Freud’s Masterplot will help us further understand and explain John Self’s search for such an existence.

Brooks states that “ultimately…the passion that animates us as readers of narrative is the passion for (of) meaning”, which passion “appears to be finally a desire for the end” (1162). This end, for Brooks as it was for Freud, is death. It is the final stroke of death that gives completion and meaning to the life that precedes it. “All narration is obituary in that life acquires definable meaning only at, and through, death”, says Brooks, connecting literary narratives with life and death (1163). As such, literary narratives are rendered incomplete, fragmentary, and meaningless without their appointed endings. Brooks points out that beginnings “presuppose the end” (1163),  and readers, upon reading a narrative’s beginning, assume a desire for its end. Amis taps on this expectation of death and endings, and the meaning which these bear with them, when he marks Money as a suicide note and announces, however ambiguously, John Self’s future inexistence.

Money thus becomes what Sartre would call an “appeal” by the writer to his/ her readers. In the preface to Why Write, Richter explains: “We who know that the physical world we animate with our perceptions will go on darkly after we are gone must write to make something that will survive us” (660). According to Sartre, the process of writing stems from a writer’s need to remain essential in a future wherein he no longer exists. In writing, the writer “meets everywhere only his knowledge, his will, his plans, in short, himself” (Sartre 663). The writer leaves an implant of his/her essence in the written word – a legacy that survives the writer even when he/she is gone. Ultimately, Sartre explains: “Since the creation [the written work] can find its fulfillment only in reading, since the artist must entrust to another the job of carrying out what he has begun, since it is only through the consciousness of the reader that he can regard himself as essential to his work, all literary work is an appeal” (665). “To write”, Sartre concludes, “is to have recourse to the consciousness of others in order to make one’s self be recognized as essential to the totality of being; it is to wish to live this essentiality by means of interposed persons” (670). Thus, in writing –a process that appeals to the reader’s sense of freedom to read –  the writer relays his/her being through the reader and the reader’s process of reading, and with this process of reading, the existence of the writer lives on.

 

The writer in the artistic frame of Money is John Self. The novel is an account of John Self’s experiences, conversations, and other such interactions that help readers construct a view of his character. Self’s is the main authoritative voice in the novel, and it is primarily through his own recapitulation of his own actions and conversations where we may form opinions about him. There is very little informative self-reflection and there are only very few instances where Martin Amis breaks the artistic frame to explain the dramatic ironies that concern John Self. What we have, then, is a first- person past-tense narration of Self’s experiences. In this perspective, moreover, John Self may be seen as writing in retrospect, with an end in mind even from the beginning of the novel.

The end of the novel contains the narrative of Self’s near-death experience, and the end of John Self’s narrative expresses the extra-narrative note of Martin Amis whereby “John Self will no longer exist”. Such an ending affects the overall tone of Self’s narrative. His narration thus ceases to be a mere retelling of events in his life, but, with the threat of inexistence and nothingness in the novel’s Beyond looming over his existence as a charcter, becomes an appeal. The narrative becomes Self’s appeal for a connection with the readers through his writing. In fact, Amis notes: “To whom is the note addressed? To Martina, to Fielding, to Vera, to Alec, to Selina, to Barry – to John Self? No. It is meant for you out there, the dear, the gentle”. Self’s writing, in turn, becomes a space wherein he can write out the essence of his character, so that he no longer remains simply as a voice, but becomes a being whose essence and experiences are imprinted in what he writes. The novel itself, the “note”, becomes John Self. Amis states that “usually the note is the thing. You complete it, and then resume your time travel. It is the note and not the life that is cancelled out. Or the other way round. Or death. You never can tell, though, can you, with suicide notes”. In our case for the novel, the note is not canelled out: the note becomes the life.

 

As he comes closer to disappearance in the novel, John Self begins to exist not in the past, but in the present, a time between the past and what Richter calls the “as-yet-nonexistent future” (659), the future that will be John Self’s void of inexistence. Self tells the readers: “You know, during that time of pills and booze, during that time of suicide, my entire future flashed through my head. And guess what. It was all a drag! My past at least was – what? It was…rich. And now my life has lost its form. Now my life is only present, more present, continuous present” (392). Here, Self’s present becomes in tune with that of his readers – supposing that they have read his story thus far –  marking the fulfillment of their unity through reading, an achievement which in turn grants security in Self’s existence. With the survival of his existence secured through the process of writing and reading, John Self accordingly “signs off” (392). He says further, “I’m closer to you, I hope, than he’ll ever be” (392). Though the answer to whom “he” might be remains vague, it may be postulated that he is the Self of the past. The Self of the present indeed is closer to the reader than the Self living in the past.

John Self is a memorable character – though not necessarily the most likeable one. But it is also his unique character that draws the reader along through the novel. In this way, his carnivalesque character helps him in his case to find essentiality in his future inexistence by making the readers at least interested enough to see him through the narrative’s end, and, having such an end, give meaning and completion to the life retold in the novel. The novel is John Self’s life, and in the act of opening the book and reading its contents, the readers in their freedom breathe life into its words and pages, giving John Self a voice, a character, and ,ultimately, an existence.

 

 

 

WORKS CITED:

 

Amis, Martin. Money. Vintage, 2005

 

Brooks, Peters. Freud’s Masterplot. The Critical Tradition: Classic Texts and Contemporary                   Trends, ed. David H. Richter, 1161-1171. Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2007.

 

Sartre, Jean-Paul. Why Write? The Critical Tradition: Classic Texts and Contemporary Trends,               ed. David H. Richter, 659-672. Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2007.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

An Introduction to Allusions in Beowulf

The Oxford English Dictionary defines allusion as “an implied, indirect, or passing reference to a person or thing” or “any reference to someone or something”. When it comes to literature, however, it becomes a difficult task to avoid accidentally falling into affective and intentional fallacies when exploring whether or not certain words, phrases, or narratives are meant by the author to be distinct and relevant allusions to particular people or events. In works such as Beowulf, moreover, the task of pointing out allusions and understanding their meaning becomes even more difficult due to the obscurity of their context and cultural situations. Nevertheless, what I aim to explore are some allusions to elements present in Old Norse literature which are readily available to us in the text:  elements which we may assume to have been passed down to Beowulf’s author(s) through the culture of the Danelaw.

The Scyldings

One of the most notable of these allusions is that of the Scyldings. A prominent family not only in Beowulf, their stories also appear in Snorra Edda (Snorri Sturluson’s Prose Edda) and Hrólfs saga kraka (The Saga of King Hrolf Kraki). In the Edda, Skjöldur (Scyld Scefing), the founder of the Skjöldungar (Scyldings), is portrayed as a descendant of the god Óðinn himself. The legends of his descendants are recorded in Beowulf and Hrólfs saga kraka. Being slightly different in perspective to Beowulf, the focus of Hrólfs saga kraka is more so on Hroðgar’s nephew Hrólfur than on himself. Both narratives however include a troll-like being terrorising the halls at nightfall and a hero that comes and eradicates such threats.

Eotenas ond ylfe and gígantas

J.R.R. Tolkien notes in lines 112-113 the author’s use of two culturally different etymological sources to describe the race of Grendel and the descendants of Cain. On the one hand, Tolkien observes the use of gígantas in line 113 as a word borrowed from the Latin version of the Bible. On the other hand, he marks the words eotenas and ylfe in line 112 as distinctly Norse, coming from the words jötnar (giants) and álfar (elves). These words not only depict the author’s blending of pagan and Christian elements into the story of Beowulf, but as cultural allusions they furthermore offer a twofold perspective on Grendel’s background as a fiend – that is, he not only is an enemy of the Christians, being a descendant of Cain and the giants, but also at the sight of the pagan heroes he is considered an outcast of the Norse gods and humanity.

Wæls and Sigemund

The bard in Hroðgar’s hall recounts the story of Sigemund the dragon-slayer in lines 883-915 as words of praise, encouragement, and admonition to Beowulf. Similar narratives can be found in the Snorra Edda and the Völsunga Saga where Völsungur’s (Wæl’s) descendant Sigurður slays a dragon and takes possession of a treasure hoard. Placing these narratives in the context of Beowulf allows its author to portray ironies foreshadowing Beowulf’s death, but also comparative praise, as Sigurður is and will ever be remembered in Northern legend as Fáfnisbani –  the slayer of the dragon Fáfnir – after his death.

Thus allusions such as these allow us to understand more comprehensively the story of Beowulf. They give the text particular shades which reflect dramatic ironies that are not always obvious when the allusions are missed. And although many of these allusions and possibly the text itself are rendered obscure to us as modern audiences, their importance to the Anglo-Saxon audience as antiquarian reflections and contemporary innovations should never be understated, wont as the Anglo-Saxons would have been to do so.

 

 

Works Consulted:

Heaney, Seamus. Beowulf. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2000. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary. Ed. Christopher Tolkien. London:        Harper Collins Publishers, 2014. Print.

— . The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays. Ed. Christopher Tolkien. London:                  George Allen & Unwin Publishers, 1983. Print.

 

 

 

 

DUALITY AS A TRAGIC MOTIF IN SHAKESPEARE’S MACBETH

Russ McDonald’s statement that “Shakespearean tragedy depends on a paradox” could not be better suited to any other play than in Macbeth[1]. The actions and the structure of the play hinge on the paradoxes found in accepted truths, language, and signifiers. The theme of duality, in particular, comes into special significance in Macbeth. Shakespeare utilizes duality as a tragic motif in Macbeth; that is, it is used to contextualize and procure Macbeth’s hamartia, and also to lead the hero eventually to his downfall and death. Theories from Friedrich Nietzsche’s essay “On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense” and Sigmund Freud’s “The ‘Uncanny’” would help us further understand the significance of duality in Shakespeare’s play.

The theme of duality is uncannily pervasive in Macbeth,[2] as is depicted in the diction of the characters. The witches “speak in paradoxes: ‘When the battle’s lost and won,’ ‘Fair is foul, and foul is fair’ (1.1.4,11),”[3] “Double, double, toil and trouble” (4.1.10). The human characters themselves speak at times through duality if not in paradoxes: “All our service / In every point twice done, and then done double” (1.6.15), “Hear it not, Duncan, for it is a knell / That summons thee to heaven or to hell” (2.1.64-65). Macduff, moreover, makes note of “such welcome and unwelcome things at once / ‘Tis hard to reconcile” (4.3.139-140). This extensive use of duality and paradox serves to reflect the play’s consciousness of and emphasis on the arbitrariness of language and words as signifiers.

Indeed, Nietzsche describes words as having “arbitrary assignments…beyond the canon of uncertainty” and “arbitrary differentiations”, explaining that “we believe we know something of the things themselves when we speak of trees, colors, snow, and flowers; and yet we possess nothing but metaphors of things, which do not at all agree with the original entities.”[4] The human being’s “arrogance associated with knowing and feeling,”[5] as Nietzsche terms it, is tested in Macbeth, where Hecate remarks that “security / Is mortals’ chiefest enemy” (3.5.32). To be secure in the stability of language in Macbeth is to forget that “truths are illusions that have become worn out and sensuously powerless.”[6] Macbeth, who, in the beginning of the play, is “sensitive and aware”[7] of the arbitrariness of language—for in fact he notes that “two truths are told (1.3.128) which “cannot be ill, cannot be good” (1.3.132)—in the end forgets the instability of words and signifiers, that they “speak metaphorically or metonymically to a single aspect of the signified; they cannot convey its essence.”[8] Macbeth perceives the admonitions of the apparitions only in their literal sense, and confidently declares that they “will never be” (4.1.94). He forgets Banquo’s warning that “the instruments of darkness tell us truths, / Win us with honest trifles, to betray’s / In deepest consequence” (1.3.123-126). This situation William Scott explains thus: “In becoming a part of the self-deluding show and undoing some literalisms to confirm another, he [Macbeth] skews the boundaries of literal and figurative and of perceiver and perceived, with paradoxical results.”[9] As much as Macbeth, in self-delusion, “skews the boundaries of literal and figurative”, the witches do so as well, if not better, using Macbeth’s ambition-driven over-assurance in language to deceive him who so readily would be deceived. Accordingly, the witches’ use of seemingly impossible predictions and “hopeful messages”[10] effects the dissolution of Macbeth’s awareness of the arbitrariness of language: he who, being unprepared, thus becomes a servant to defect[11]. Hence Macbeth declares ironically that “damned [be] all those that trust them” (4.1.139), not realizing that he himself belongs with the damned.

Macbeth’s defective action, then—his hamartia,[12]—is precisely that he blindly disregards the existence of dualities in the realm of the play. This gives him a false and unhealthy sense of security as, after saying, “I cannot taint with fear…. / The mind I sway by and the heart I bear / Shall never sag with doubt nor shake with fear” (5.3.3,9-10), Macbeth, in response to the servant’s entry, and in what is consequently an expression of his paranoia, says “The devil damn thee black, though cream-faced loon! / Where got’st thou that goose look?” (5.3.11-12). This sense of security is, in turn, haunted by the duality that Macbeth overlooks, and such effects Macbeth’s tragic recognition and reversal.

Informing and qualifying the notion of this haunting duality in Macbeth is Freud’s concept of the “double”[13]. In Macbeth there can be found characters whom Freud would identify as the “doubling, dividing and interchanging of the self.”[14] In fact, two stages of Freud’s “double” are represented in the play: that which “was originally an insurance against the destruction of the ego, an ‘energetic denial of the power of death,’”[15] and that which, “from having been an assurance of immortality…becomes the uncanny harbinger of death.”[16] The titular character of the play possesses three of these “doubles” in the figures of Lady Macbeth, the witches, and Macduff—and these figures offer Macbeth unique stages of his own recognition and reversal..

Lady Macbeth, as one of Macbeth’s “doubles,” figuratively completes him, exhibiting characteristics and performing actions that are either opposite or almost like his. In Act 1 Scene 5, she calls on the spirits (l. 40) to “take [her] milk for gall” (l. 48), since her husband is “too full o’th’ milk of human kindness” (l. 17). Her apostrophe to night beginning in line 50 of the same scene, resembling that of Juliet’s in Romeo and Juliet[17], is echoed by Macbeth in Act 3 Scene 2 when he calls on, “Come, seeling night” (l. 49). They both find themselves reluctant before the execution of their murderous actions, yet Lady Macbeth’s power over Macbeth’s identity earlier on in the play is such that he attempts to affirm his masculinity through Lady Macbeth so much so that “he sins to win her approbation.”[18] She inevitably corrupts his masculine identity by using it against him during his times of hesitation. Eventually Macbeth becomes “in blood / Stepped in so far that, should [he] wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o’er” (3.4.137-139). Lady Macbeth realises only too late that “What’s done cannot be undone” (5.1.68). When it becomes her turn to regret the actions of herself and her husband, telling him “You must leave this” (3.2.39), Macbeth only informs her of a forthcoming plan for her to “applaud the deed” (3.2.49). Such has become of the situation of Macbeth’s identity as it relates to Lady Macbeth, that his actions have become mere performances, “deeds”, that need the applause of his one audience, his wife. Her death consequently triggers his speech in Act 5 Scene 5 wherein life is but “a poor player / That struts and frets his hour upon the stage / And then is heard no more” (ll. 24-26) –  a description of life that is very much pertinent to his own.

Realising such a fact, Macbeth “turns unsuccessfully to the witches for the power he needs to make him author of himself.”[19] The witches, who are characteristically duplicitous, symbolise Macbeth’s “double” that is supposed to assure him of immortality. They are beings who may be figuratively associated with Macbeth. Macbeth’s first words “So foul and fair a day I have not seen” (1.3.38) echo the witches’ last ones in Act 1 Scene 1 where they say “Fair is foul, and foul is fair” (1.1.11) Cheung observes this of the witches’ interaction with Macbeth:

Significantly, it is not a surprise encounter but a meeting that is to take place. Already there is a hint of intercourse between the witches and Macbeth, so what seems to be an external temptation also can be interpreted, as many critics have done, as a psychological projection.[20]

The witches not only embody the external “multiplying villainies of nature / [that] Do swarm upon him” (1.2.11), but also they symbolize the internal, “black and deep desires” (1.4.51) already present in Macbeth’s character. Viewing their relationship thus makes it easier to relate such a relationship with Freud’s idea of the double where “the one possesses knowledge, feelings and experience in common with the other.”[21] Indeed, the witches prove to be effective because, according to Scott, “they seemed to have access to the frightening secrets of his heart.”[22] The power in the duality of their nature, being representative of both the external and internal forces of evil that besiege Macbeth, makes it highly difficult for Macbeth to resist the temptation of accessing and utilizing the murderous ambition that their prophecies leave as a readily-available option for him. However, it is exactly this duality in nature that opens up and leads Macbeth to his downfall. He recognises that he has fallen into this pitfall, but only too late: “And be these juggling fiends no more believed / That palter with us in a double sense, / That keep the word of promise to our ear / And break it to our hope” (5.8.19-22).

In the face of this realisation, Macbeth finds himself pitted against Macduff, the “double” who is the “uncanny harbinger of death” for Macbeth. For, being what Campbell terms as a “figure of the tyrant-monster”[23], Macbeth’s presence inevitably calls for “the redeeming hero, the carrier of the shining blade, whose blow, whose touch, whose existence will liberate the land.”[24] And Scotland must needs be liberated from Macbeth, as it is described by Lennox as a “suffering country / Under a hand accursed” (3.6.49-50). Indeed, Macduff becomes for Macbeth “a thing of terror,”[25] who tells him: “Despair thy charm, / And let the angel whom thou still hast served / Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother’s womb / Untimely ripped” (5.8.13-16)[26]. Hence is Macduff qualified to be the nemesis of Macbeth, whereby he is also portrayed as a figure that is the direct opposite of Macbeth, a figure of “the self-creating and invulnerable masculinity that Macbeth cannot fashion for himself.”[27] Macduff’s character moreover serves to haunt Macbeth with the duality that the tragic character forgets persists in the play’s dramatic universe. The very fact of Macduff’s birth and existence, the circumstances of which Macbeth deems impossible, shakes Macbeth out of his self-inflicted tragic delusion and reverses his expectation of the witches’ equivocal prophecy. His death in the hands of Macduff symbolises the taking-over of the “double”: the former, suffering self, represented in Macbeth, is replaced by the projected and more perfect – though not entirely unscathed[28] –  self in the person of Macduff[29].

This ending for Macbeth is not to be restricted with a tragic affect. “Tragedy is the shattering of the forms and of our attachment to the forms,”[30] writes Joseph Campbell. Macbeth, in this light, is at once tragic and liberating. The titular character is tragic because he, blinded by ambition, undermines if not forgets about the existence of duplicity and the prevalence thereof in the world he lives – but on the same note, this selfsame duplicity allows for the liberation of the imprisoned and corrupted self in Macbeth and transfigures it into the more complete, more heroically-realised self in Macduff.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[1] R. McDonald, The Bedford Companion to Shakespeare: An Introduction with Documents (Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s: 2001), 86.

[2] All quotations from Macbeth are taken from D. Bevington, The Necessary Shakespeare (The University of Chicago: 2013), 710-747.

[3] D. Bevington, The Necessary Shakespeare, 712.

[4] F. Nietzsche, “On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense,” in The Critical Tradition: Classic Texts and Contemporary Trends, ed. David H. Richter (Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s: 2007), 454.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid, 455.

[7] D. Bevington, The Necessary Shakepeare,711.

[8] D. H. Richter, The Critical Tradition, 438.

[9] W. Scott, “Macbeth’s—And Our—Self-Equivocations” (Shakespeare Quarterly: 1986), 160-174.

[10] Ibid, 171.

[11] I am referring here to 2.1.17-18: “Being unprepared, / Our will became the servant to defect”.

[12] Russ McDonald reminds us that hamartia would be “a term more properly understood as an error in action rather than as fatal weakness of character”. The Bedford Companion, 88.

[13] Quotes from Freud are collectively taken from “The ‘Uncanny’” in The Critical Tradition: Classic Texts and Contemporary Trends, ed. David H. Richter (Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s: 2007), 514-532.

[14]Ibid, 522.

[15] Ibid.

[16] Ibid, 523

[17] See Juliet’s soliloquy in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet in The Necessary Shakespeare ed. D. Bevington (The University of Chicago: 2013), 3.2.5

[18] D. Bevington, 712.

[19] Ibid, 713.

[20] K.K. Cheung, “’Dread’ in Macbeth” (Shakespeare Quarterly: 1984), 431.

[21] S. Freud, 522.

[22] W. Scott, 170.

[23] The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Joseph Campbell Foundation: 2008), 11

[24] Ibid.

[25] S. Freud, 523.

[26] Macbeth is certainly made terrified by this statement, saying “it hath cowed my better part of man” (5.8.18).

[27] D. Bevington, 713

[28] For Macduff has also suffered loss: the death of his wife and children.

[29] Not coincidentally, Macbeth uncannily tries to refuse killing Macduff: “Of all men else I have avoided thee” (5.8.5). He sees a vision of a more perfect and unsullied self in Macduff – to him, there is something of the uncanny in Macduff, something, according to Freud in p. 526, “familiar and old-established in the mind and which has become alienated from it only through the process of repression.” This more perfect and now-alienated self that Macbeth finds in Macduff he has repressed in his murderous drive towards kingship.

[30] The Hero with a Thousand Faces, 21.

OLD ENGLISH ELEGIAC LOSS AND SELF-IDENTITY IN “THE WANDERER” AND “THE SEAFARER”

In this essay I argue that the Old English elegies “The Wanderer” and “The Seafarer” demonstrate the instability and fragility of Anglo-Saxon society. The reason for such instability is that the members of the un-Christian Anglo-Saxon society have no knowledge of God nor subsequently could they have any relationship with him. My analogies are based primarily on Plato’s “Myth of the Cave” from Book 7 of The Republic, and shall be furthermore expounded upon with Plotinus’ writing “On the Intellectual Beauty”. After discussing the essential content of Plato’s myth and the relationship thereof with Plotinus’ work, I shall apply them both as filters for my interpretation first to “The Wanderer”, and then to “The Seafarer”.

Plato’s “Myth of the Cave” demonstrates an individual’s release from ignorance into a profound experience upon seeing the very image of  God, whom he calls the True, Good, and Beautiful, and whom Plotinus, in his work, calls the “One”. This encounter with God allows the individual to receive enlightenment, where, being thus released from ignorance, he is given the opportunity to contemplate God as he is (Plato 280). And being enlightened by such an experience, he can no longer see the “shadows which he formerly saw”, but rather only the realities of the world outside the cave (Plato 280). It also gives the individual a “perfect self-identity”, as he “forms a multiple unity with the God silently present” (117). This enlightenment causes an individual’s separation[1] from society, as it “upholds some beings, and they see; the lower are dazzled and turn away, unfit to gaze upon that sun” (Plotinus 117). Moreover, it causes the individual to reflect upon his alienation and the state of his fellow-prisoners who are left in the cave, pitying therefore their condition as members of an unenlightened society (Plato 281). Plato explains as well that “those who attain to this beatific vision are unwilling to descend to human affairs; for their souls are ever hastening into the upper world where they desire to dwell” (282). It is this beatific vision that is the profound experience – the conversion point – of the individuals exemplified in Plato’s and Plotinus’ works.

The individual’s conversion point prompts the individual to a journey to reach what Plotinus terms as “the Beauty There” (117), the place of the True, the Good, and the Beautiful in Plato’s universe, the residence of God, which is heaven. The journey is, however, not only a spiritual undertaking towards the ideal paradise, but it is, more importantly for the individual, a quest for ultimate self-identity. Plotinus implies that nearness to God allows an individual to see an image of himself in the light of a “better beauty” (Plotinus 117). The individual then would exhibit a desire to set upon a journey to reconcile his image of a better beauty with the reality upon which it is based, a reality which is in the same realm as God, which is the Beauty There. This reconciliation allows the “two [to] become one”, a unity which, in Christian terms, brings together the individual’s soul and God’s own being (Plotinus 117). This, following Plato’s and Plotinus’ works, is thus the objective of the Christian journey, a journey which, upon completion, gives the individual a perfect form of self-identity to be found only in his union with God.

The foundation built upon an individual’s union with God and the journey for such a unity are precisely what concern(s) the author(s) of both “The Wanderer” and “The Seafarer”. According to Crossley-Holland, both poems are chiefly concerned with the topic of loss (46). It is through the loss of the essential elements of their Anglo-Saxon societies that the speakers in the poems mark their alienation from their comitatus. This loss and alienation of the speakers evolves in the poems into a loss of their identity. Sharma suggests that “identity is always correlative to a cultural world” (611). Removing the individual from his society would thus be taking away his identity. The poems present this problem of identity and attempt to show the solution by having the speakers base the foundation of their identities not on their society but entirely on God.

In “The Wanderer” there is a longing to find a “ground for a self threatened by fragmentation and an abject loss of coherence on account of cultural upheaval” (Sharma 612). The cultural upheaval is experienced by the speaker of the poem through the “death of kinsmen” (line 7), his removal from his homeland (20), and his deprivation of the essential elements that make up his Anglo-Saxon heroic society, elements such as a hall and “a lord of rings” (25). All of these aspects of Anglo-Saxon culture that are specified in the poem point out to the speaker’s identity as an archetypal warrior of his society. And so his “loss of heroic culture”, as Sharma puts it, results in a loss of heroic identity (612). Indeed, the speaker laments over the complete ruin of his heroic society. He contemplates on “how the time has passed / …as if it never was” (95-96), how “that happy time is no more” (36), and, in lines 92-95, voices out his nostalgia for an atmosphere reflective of his heroic society; for ultimately the speaker stands as the last man of the Heroic Age, being placed in the poem in a “‘fiction’ of the apocalypse” (Green 502) as the Anglo-Saxons would have imagined it. Therefore such is the threat to the speaker’s self-identity that, due to the decline of the Anglo-Saxon heroic world, he experiences an “anxiety of meaninglessness”[2], an anxiety that makes him yearn for a sense stability for his identity.

This sense of stability he cannot find in his society but in God. In a world where kinsmen “fade on their way” (54), where the “middle-earth / from day to day dwindles and fails” (62-63), a world where “all is wretchedness in the realm of earth” (104), and almost everything is fleeting (108-109), the speaker turns to God for relief (1-2). It is in Him where “eal seo fæstnung stondeð” (115). In finding God, the speaker, as Plotinus explains it, “sinks into a perfect self-identity” (117). Through such a kind of self-awareness, the speaker “will learn how to achieve disillusionment, to move from destructive grief to healthy negativity” which is a kind of “melancholy logic” (Champion 195). This healthy negativity manifests itself in the form of the poem, the elegy recited by the speaker, which becomes the remedy, the bote (line 113) of the “good man” (112) for his grief. Where the “memories of kinsmen” (51) fail to bring him consolation, God offers the speaker the experience he needs to attain wisdom, for “no one is wise without his share of winters” (64). It is wisdom that allows the speaker in “The Wanderer”, being a figure representative of the released prisoners in Plato’s Cave, to reflect on his enlightened state and compare it to the state of those still left to “observe the passing shadows” (Plato 281).  Thus, being identified in the last segment of the poem as “snottor on mode”, he is consequently described as one who is “sundor æt rune” (111). The speaker, sundered in his stage of wisdom, and given a perspective through which he can contrast his condition with that of his foregone heroic comitatus, mourns the fleetingness and passing-away of their heroic society through a series of repetitions of “hwær” (92-93), “eala” (94-95), and “læne” (108-109). His final remark in the poem serves to emphasise his “frofre” (115) in the steadfastness of God that is in stark contrast with the venerating lamentation that makes up most of his speech.

In “The Seafarer” there is a more apparent sense of immediacy expressed by the speaker to undertake a journey towards the “Beauty There”. He states his dissatisfaction with earthly life, saying, “Forþon me hatran sind / dryhtnes dreamas þonne þis deade lif, / læne on londe” (64-66). He is described by Greenfield as “an aspiring peregrinus, a voluntary exile who will relinquish earthly pleasures for the greater joys of Heaven” (15). At first, the speaker perceives his journey in the sea to be “a time of hardship” (3), a “wræccan lastum” (15), and furthermore describes himself to have “harboured bitter sorrow” (4), being a “sea-weary man” (12) who is “careworn and cut off from [his] kinsmen” (14). But his perspective on his sea-voyages changes beginning on line 33, marked by the word “nu” and a subsequent change of tense from the past to the present, where he is forthwith “stirred” (34) by his “heart’s longings / …to undertake a journey” (36-37). It is a “journey”, Calder explains, “to find the heavenly land” (272). Which journey is prompted by the speaker’s attempt to “locate [his life] in a meaningless present” (Green 506).

Indeed, the speaker is attempting to find a sense of belonging in a world where the “days of great glory / …are gone forever” (81-82) and “his former friends, / the sons of princes, have been placed in the earth” (93-94). And, as the speaker in “The Wanderer”, the speaker in “The Seafarer” endeavors to find his “perfect self-identity” in God. The chief catalyst that threatens to trap permanently the speaker in a meaningless present is the loss of his lord, whereupon there will no longer be a “protector-kinsman for his wretched spirit to travel toward” (Empric 25). His reaction to the threat, as exhibited in the word-play on the word “dryhten” in lines 41 and 43, is to shift his focus from earthly to spiritual pursuits (Greenfield 19-20). No longer does he need to rely on an earthly dryhten to give him a sense of self-identity; he realizes that “the splendours of this earth will [not] survive for ever” (66-67). Instead he looks to God and His “ecan eadignesse” (120) for permanent stability.

Upon thus being able to contemplate and unify their identity with God – the Sun in Plato’s myth – the speakers of both poems shift their speech from something that reflects the personal to something that ponders on the universal[3]. Their unification with God elevates the speakers to a place of greater vision and enlightenment, the place outside Plato’s Cave, whereupon they may contemplate not only their own condition, but also, in a new light, that of their un-Christianised comitatus. It is with this transcendent understanding that they gain the wisdom to talk about the instability of their society that is deprived of the knowledge of God. And it is also with such an understanding that they share in the poems the final mutual advice that invites their audience to find their perfect self-identification in God.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bibliography:

 

Primary sources:

 

Plato. Book VII, The Republic. Plato: Selected Dialogues. Trans. Benjamin Jowett.           Pennsylvania: The Franklin Centre, 1983. 279-282. Print.

 

Plotinus. “On the Intellectual Beauty”. The Critical Tradition: Classic Texts and                Contemporary Trends. Ed. David H. Richter. Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2007. 111      -119. Print.

 

“The Wanderer”. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Ed. Stephen Greenblatt.      W.W. Norton & Company, 2013. 107-110. Print.

 

“The Wanderer”. The Old English Elegies: A Critical Edition and Genre Study. Ed.            Anne L. Klinck. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1992.       75-78. Print.

 

“The Seafarer”. The Old English Elegies: A Critical Edition and Genre Study. Ed. Anne    L. Klinck. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1992. 79   -83. Print.

 

 

 

 

Secondary sources:

 

Beaston, Lawrence. “The Wanderer’s Courage”. Neophilologus, 2005. Vol. 89: 119-          137. Online.

 

Calder, Daniel G. “Setting and Mode in ‘The Seafarer’ and ‘The Wanderer’.                      Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, 1971. Vol. 72 No. 2: 264-275. Online.

 

Champion, Margaret Gunnarsdóttir. “From Plaint to Praise: Language as Cure in ‘The       Wanderer’”. Studia Neophilologica, 2008. Vol. 69 No. 2: 187-202. Online.

 

Empric, Julienne H. “’The Seafarer’: An Experience in Displacement”. Notre Dame           English Journal. University of Notre Dame, 1972. Vol. 7 No. 2: 23-33. Online.

 

Green, Martin. “Man, Time, and Apocalypse in ‘The Wanderer’, ‘The Seafarer’, and          ‘Beowulf’”. The Journal of English and Germanic Philology. University of        Illinois Press, 1975. Vol. 74 No. 4: 502-518. Online.

 

Greenfield, Stanley B. “Attitudes and Values in ‘The Seafarer’. Studies in Philology.         University of North Carolina Press, 1954. Vol. 51 No. 1: 15-20. Online.

 

“The Seafarer”. The Anglo-Saxon World: An Anthology. Ed. Kevin Crossley-Holland.        Oxford: University of Oxford Press, 2009. 53-56. Print.

Sharma, Manish. “Heroic Subject and Cultural Substance in The Wanderer”.                      Neophilologus, 2012. Vol 96: 611-629. Online.

[1] Perhaps elevation would be a better term. An individual’s enlightenment causes him to see himself in a better state than that of the prisoners in the cave (Plato 281).

[2] ‘The anxiety of meaninglessness…is anxiety about the loss of an ultimate concern, of a meaning which gives meaning to all meanings’ (Beaston 126)

[3] See Sharma 621, Champion 197, and Empric 23.

The New Historicist Approach to Beowulf

In his revolutionary essay entitled “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics”, Professor J.R.R. Tolkien remarked that “Beowulfiana is, while rich in many departments, specially poor in one. It is poor in criticism” (5). This comment certainly is not true of current Beowulfiana criticism anymore. It is no longer a question of approaching Beowulf as a poem instead of merely as an historical artifact, but a question of what works best in approaching and fully understanding the poem and the themes at work therein. This paper intends to analyze Beowulf through a New Historicist perspective, contextualizing the relevance of the poem’s author, readership, and of Anglo-Saxon England, and through this filter, to furthermore seek out themes and literary techniques that a modern audience may overlook.

The critical theory in question is indeed a useful tool for understanding Beowulf because it requires the readers to not only close-read the text, but also to make relevant cultural connections that would help them grasp the ideals and poetic techniques that the author has craftily weaved into the poem. What then is New Historicism? Stephen Greenblatt, in his introduction to The Power of Forms in the English Renaissance explains that

…literary works are no longer regarded either as a fixed set of texts that are set apart from all other forms of expression and that contain their own determinate meanings or as a stable set of reflections of historical facts that lie beyond them. The [New Historicist] critical practice…challenges the assumptions that guarantee a secure distinction between ‘literary foreground’ and ‘political background’ or, more generally, between artistic production and other kinds of social production. Such distinctions do in fact exist, but they are not intrinsic to the texts; rather they are made up and constantly redrawn by artists, audiences, and readers. These collective social constructions on the one hand define the range of aesthetic possibilities within a given representational mode and, on the other, link that mode to the complex network of institutions, practices, and beliefs that constitute the culture as a whole (1445).

In essence, the New Historicists assert that “literature is conceived to mirror the period’s beliefs, but to mirror them, as it were, from a safe distance” (Greenblatt 1444). With regards to Beowulf, this means that a New Historicist reading would necessitate the understanding of the background of the author, his audience, and of Anglo-Saxon society, language[1], and culture in order to fully appreciate the artistry at work in the poem; consequently, the absence of such an undertaking would place the readers in a difficult position where they are lost in vague references to unfamiliar ideals.

Most of the issues faced by modern readers in trying to understand Beowulf are due to the fact that the events depicted and the values that are prized in the poem are so far removed from their understanding of the world. Yet the key here is to understand that “every expressive act is embedded in a network of material practices” (Veeser xi).

The most influential material practices that directly affect major themes in Beowulf are the Christian tradition and the native Germanic heroic values. There is in Beowulf, a fusion “of the old and new”, a blending of ideals from Northern antiquity with Christian virtues (Tolkien Critics 20). These traditions do not, as modern readers might be inclined to suppose, create in the poem binary oppositions that heavily contradict each other, but instead we see “in the figure of Beowulf the heroic ideals of Germanic paganism and of Anglo-Saxon Christendom have been reconciled and fused, so that the hero exemplifies the best of both” (Brodeur 183).

The author and his audience were, without a doubt, Christian. Heather O’Donoghue explains that the “Anglo-Saxon authors were Christians, perhaps mostly clerics, and clerical culture dominated literary production” (11). There is plenty of evidence for this fact even within the text of Beowulf, not the least is the fact that the poet uses the Latin-borrowed term gígantas as one of his many nomenclatures when referring to the race of Grendel[2]. The poet’s audience moreover were “Christians whose conversion was neither partial nor superficial. He expects them to understand his allusions to biblical events without his troubling to be explicit about them” (Whitelock 280). The Anglo-Saxons were a deeply antiquarian people who strongly adhered to their Germanic past[3], and their author was no exception.

The Anglo-Saxons took special pride in their ancestry, and we see this pride expressed in the opening lines of Beowulf: “Hwæt wé Gár-Dena in géar-dagum / þéod-cyninga þrym gefrúnon” [Lo! The glory of the kings of the people of the Spear-Danes in days of old we have heard tell, how those princes did deeds of valour][4] (lines 1-2). E.G. Stanley comments that “the beginning of the poem with its piece of Danish history is relevant to England, to English kings” because “Beowulf could well have written late enough for at least some of the Danes mentioned in the poem to have been regarded by the poet and his audience as ancestors of Anglo-Saxon kings in England” (71). If the poem is read – in either the original Old English or in the translation – merely as an organic unity where external context is irrelevant, then the meaning of the opening lines becomes lost, and the lines may consequently be deemed unnecessary. Seeing the context of the opening lines with regards to the author and the audiences’ background, however, we begin to understand the sentiment that the Anglo-Saxons have felt upon hearing them recited in their mead-halls; their pride in the past and their heroic ancestors are at once invoked and their emotions stirred.

Another aspect of the poem that may be easily missed by a modern audience is the gravity of Hrothgar’s shame after the desolation of Grendel upon Heorot. The poem describes it thus:

Swá ðá mæl-ceare       maga Healfdenes

singála séað;                ne mihte snotor hæleð

wéan onwendan;        wæs þæt gewin tó swýð,

láþ ond longsum

[Even thus over the sorrows of that time did the son of Healfdene brood unceasingly, nor could that wise prince put aside his grief; too strong was that strife, too dire and weary to endure][5] (189-192).

This grief, to a modern audience, would seem to be simply grief on one level: one which Hrothgar experiences because his fellow men were murdered. But to an Anglo-Saxon audience, there is another level. Hrothgar is inconsolable not only because of the deaths of his retainers, but also because he cannot exact wergild, or man-price, from Grendel. Nor could he personally try to seek vengeance against a being as powerful and ruthless as Grendel (Greenblatt et al. 1: 38). Only a hero of Beowulf’s calibre could have defeated such an enemy.

Beowulf’s victory against Grendel meant not only the important preservation of Heorot, it also meant the restoration of Hrothgar’s honour and especially the advancing of Beowulf’s glory. The bard understood the importance of glory in the life of a heroic warrior. In their life in the mortal world, this quest for glory was the warrior’s primary goal. This belief can be exactly paralleled to that of the Anglo-Saxons’ Norse neighbours, a belief that was expressed in their old religion:

Odin came to know that the world would end in a great battle known as Ragnarök, during which the wolf Fenrir would swallow him. His son Vidar would then avenge him. Odin knew the fate of all the gods – who among them would survive Ragnarök and who would not – and also that the universe would be largely destroyed. His foreknowledge in some ways echoes the Norse warrior’s fatalism: death is inevitable, but word-fame lasts forever.

…The Twilight of the Gods is in many ways a metaphor for the personal Ragnarök that each Viking warrior faces when his time comes. His fate was decided long ago, just like those of his gods, and he goes to meet it with a brave heart, although he is spared the burden of knowledge that Odin carried. If it is his time, then he will die and go to wait for the day of Ragnarök. If not, then he can hope that there will be other battles.

It is not hard to see how these beliefs tended to produce fearless warriors who would face any odds and were not deterred by hardship. A hopeless battle was not something to be avoided; it was an opportunity to win undying word-fame in the mortal world and ultimately a place in the golden age after Ragnarök (Dougherty 28, 39).

Consequently, only a glorious and fame-worthy death would give justice to the life of Beowulf. Thus the poet provides Beowulf with his last fight against a dragon, not unlike the fight of the Norse warrior-god Thor against the Midgard Serpent. In very similar ways, they fight to preserve their society but also to secure their legendary status which gives them a place amongst the greatest of Germanic warriors-heroes.

A modern reader unfamiliar with northern medieval culture and beliefs will find it difficult to understand these complex messages within Beowulf. In uncovering these themes and messages, a New Historicist approach will yield the most successful results because it takes into account the history and context of both the author and the work, as well as the critics and readers who deal with them, which factors are of utmost import when dealing with a poem like Beowulf that is comparable to no other.

Works Cited:

Brodeur, Arthur. The Art of Beowulf. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969.    Print.

Dougherty, Martin. Vikings. London: Amber Books, 2013. Print.

Greenblatt, Stephen. “Introduction to The Power of Forms in the English Renaissance”. The        Critical Tradition: Classic Texts and Contemporary Trends, 1443- 1445. New York:           Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2007. Print.

Greenblatt, Stephen. Simpson, and Alfred David. The Norton Anthology of English           Literature. 2 vols. New York: W.W. Norton &Company, 1962-2013. Print.

Heaney, Seamus. Beowulf. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2000. Print.

Hill, Thomas. “The Christian Language and Theme of Beowulf”. Companion to Old English         Poetry. Amsterdam: VU UP, 1994. Print.

O’Donohue, Heather. English Poetry and Old Norse Myth. Oxford: Oxford University Press,

2014. Print.

Stanley, E.G. “Manuscript – Sources – Audience”. Beowulf: A Norton Critical Editions, 71.          New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1975. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary. Ed. Christopher Tolkien. London:         Harper Collins Publishers, 2014. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays. Ed. Christopher Tolkien.   London: George Allen & Unwin Publishers, 1983. Print.

Tuso, Joseph. Beowulf: A Norton Critical Editions. New York: W.W. Norton & Company,            Inc., 1975. Print.

Veeser, H. Aram. The New Historicism. New York: Chapman and Hall Inc., 1989. Print.

Whitelock, Dorothy. “The Audience of Beowulf”. Old English Literature. Yale UP: 2002.                        Print.

[1] By an understanding of the language I cannot specifically refer to the reader’s actual fluency – translations in hand are useful, but for a more thorough understanding of the poem, a grasp of Old English, however minimal it is, will be greatly insightful.

[2] See Tolkien’s Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary, p. 162

[3] Hill, 64

[4] Trans. Tolkien, Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary, p.13

[5] Ibid p.18

Beowulf and the Aristotelian Tragic Hero

In this paper I argue that the titular character of Beowulf is, in accordance with Aristotle’s perspective, a tragic hero. I will apply Aristotle’s ideas from the Poetics into the plot and characterisation of Beowulf. I will first look into the definition of a tragedy in Chapter 6, and proceed to examine the idea of the tragic hero in Chapter 13. Therefrom I will work with the overall plot and structure of Beowulf, then direct my attention specifically towards the character Beowulf. My essay and criticism draw ideas from the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, Robert Emmett Finnegan, Seamus Heaney, Arthur Brodeur, Frederick Klaeber, et al. I will also take to consideration the culture and ideals of the Anglo-Saxon audience to which the author of Beowulf wrote, observing how they might identify with the hero and the circumstances that affect him.

In setting the ground for us to expound on Aristotle’s idea of a tragic hero, it is of chief import to know and understand first the definition of a tragedy. Aristotle explains the essence of a tragedy in Chapter 6 of his Poetics:

Tragedy is…an imitation of a noble and complete action, having the proper magnitude; it employs language that has been artistically enhanced by each of the kinds of linguistic adornment, applied separately in the various parts of the play; it is presented in dramatic, not narrative form, and achieves, through the representation of pitiable and fearful incidents, the catharsis of such pitiable and fearful incidents.

…In addition to the arguments already given, the most important factors by means of which tragedy exerts an influence on the soul are the parts of the plot, the reversal and recognition[1].

In Chapter 13, we have the definition of a tragic hero, defined thus: “This would be a person who is neither perfect in virtue and justice, nor one who falls into misfortune through vice and depravity; but rather, one who succumbs through some miscalculation”. We are then equipped with the proper elements of tragedy: the catharsis, reversal, recognition, and suffering – and the hero who succumbs because of Hamartia.

Trying to incorporate Aristotelian ideas into Beowulf presents us with a minor, solvable problem. It is uncertain whether the author of Beowulf, whoever he may be, had any knowledge of Aristotle’s Poetics. Although he was most likely a cleric (O’Donohue 11), knowledgeable in Latin[2], possessing “a considerable learning in native lays and traditions” (Tolkien, Monsters and the Critics 26-27), and thus was a learned man. In any case, there is no evidence in the text that he was interested in purposely trying to assimilate Aristotelian ideals into his work. This does not mean, however, that they are not present in Beowulf. Rather, being elegiac in tone, we can find it rife with elements of a tragedy.

How, then, is Beowulf a tragedy? As an “imitation of a noble and complete action, having the proper magnitude”, the story depicts the actions of King Hrothgar, Ruler of the Danes, descendant of the Shieldings[3], and, more importantly, those of Beowulf, Géata dryhten, Ruler of the Geats (l. 2576). In style, it is written in Old English alliterative verse, abounding with kennings such as hron-ráde (10) and different names for mythological creatures such as eotenas, ylfe, orcneas, gígantas (112-113); “a product of thought and deep emotion” (Tolkien, Monsters and the Critics 20). Beowulf, moreover, depicts plenty of pitiable and fearful events (and the catharses of such) regarding the Danish and Geatish people.

We hear first of the desolation caused by Grendel’s gúð-cræft (127). What had started as a celebration of God’s creation actually brought about the attention of Grendel:

…sé þe in þrýstrum bád,

þæt hé dógora gehwám    dréam gehýrde

hlúdne in healle (87-89).

Grendel’s “powers of destruction were plain” (Heaney 127) “as dawn brightened” (Heaney 126). Thus we are presented with the story’s first example of peripeteia, anagnorisis, and consequently of suffering. Hrothgar himself admits to believing

…þæt ic mé ænigne

under swegles begong                  gesacan ne tealde.

Hwæt mé þæs on éple                  edwenden cwóm

gyrn æfter gomne,                        seoþðan Grendel wearð,

eald-gewinna,                               ingenga mín (1772-1774).

Herein comes Beowulf, our tragic hero; and along with him, the audiences’ realisation of what is meant to be a foreknown beleaguering of Hrothgar’s hall by Grendel. Hrothgar and Heorot do not appear only in Beowulf, but in a few other sources as well, most noteworthy of which is Widsith. R.W. Chambers remarks: “The chief value of the references to Heorot in Widsith lies in their correcting the impressions which we get from Beowulf” (79). By this he meant that “the poet meant Beowulf to stand out in contrast to the masters of Heorot, a house of heroes second to none in all northern story, but tainted by incest and the murder of kin[4]” (84).

We are thus given a very ironic picture of Heorot, which is furthermore intensified with the introduction of Unferth in the story. Unferth, whose name means Unpeace or Quarrel (Tolkien, Beowulf 209), is guilty of sifjaslit[5], the murder of kinsmen. “Þéah ðú þínum bróðrum tó banan wurde, / héafod-mægum” (587-588). And yet he is one of Hrothgar’s trusted men, his þyle.Being accused of sifjaslit was not something to be taken lightly in Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian societies. The death of the beloved god Baldr was caused by the betrayal of Loki, his kin. This triggered the events which would eventually lead to Ragnarök.

The same grievous offence is charged against Grendel’s clan, where God himself made them outcasts and set a curse upon their kin (ll. 107-114). It comes as no surprise, then, that a monster representative of kin-slaying would lay waste to a tribe whose roots are tainted with the same sin. Only a hero endowed with módgan mægnes, Metodes hyldo (670) would reasonably be able to defeat Grendel. The only reason why Beowulf won the battle, as the poet puts it, was because God’s favour was upon him – Beowulf’s might was a gift from God:

…hwæþre hé gemunde                 mægnes strenge,

gim-fæste gife,                             ðe him God scealde,

ond him tó An-waldan                 áre gelýfde,

frófre ond fultum (1270-1273).

It is the same favour that grants Beowulf victory in his battle against Grendel’s mother. Hrunting, Unferth’s sword, offers him no offensive nor defensive prowess against her. As Robert Emmett Finnegan puts it, “the defenses Beowulf’s society affords him against the evils of the mere are insufficient for victory….Even so, the poet attributes the hero’s ultimate salvation to God” (49). Beowulf himself exclaims:

Ic þæt unsófte                  ealdre gedíge,

wigge under wætere,       weorc genéþde

earfoðlíceæ                       ætrihte wæs

gúð getwæfed,                 nymðe mec God scylde (1555-1558).

And so Beowulf lives many years thereafter to become king of the Geats, where we “find the young proud Beowulf so much like Hrothgar so soon as the Link or Interlude of his return home is over (Tolkien, Beowulf 312). But it is in his rule here as king of the Geats where we will see his final and tragic encounter with the dragon.

Upon hearing about the dragon, Beowulf became “restless hastening toward death: the fate very nigh indeed that was to assail that aged one, to attack the guarded soul within and sunder life from body – not for long thereafter was the spirit of the prince in flesh entrammelled” (Tolkien, Beowulf 84). He had erstwhile not known how he would die (Tolkien, Beowulf 102), and so he “disdained with a host and mighty army to go against that creature flying far abroad. For himself he did not fear the contest, nor account as anything the valour of the serpent, nor his might and courage” (Tolkien, Beowulf 81-82). Too late does he realise that “the defences he brings against the beast are essentially those of his society, and are therefore essentially flawed” (Finnegan, 54).

Moreover, the blessing of God, which was present in Beowulf’s battle against Grendel and his mother, is alarmingly absent in his fight against the dragon. It may well be that it was not the “Almighty’s will” (Heaney 192). Or it may be wyrd that goes ever as it must (Tolkien, Beowulf, 243)[6].

Where, then, can we find Beowulf’s hamartia? “Is Beowulf’s decision to fight the dragon imprudent?”… “Wiglaf criticises Beowulf’s retaliation, and the retainers, Wiglaf testifies, tried to dissuade Beowulf from the attack” (Gwara 243). “Should the hero have accepted help?” (Gwara 267) Perhaps he should have, as Hrothgar would have advised (1771-1784). Had he more retainers with him when he fought the dragon, the outcome would of course be vastly different. However, the poet comments: “Appointed was it that the prince proven of old should find now the end of his fleeting days, of life in this world” (Tolkien, Beowulf 81). Finnegan explains his situation:

…as the hero becomes increasingly entrammeled in the meshes of the society of which he is a part, the victory becomes harder, as in the struggle with Grendel’s mother, until it finally becomes impossible. With the failure of the best of men of his time to overcome the dragon, the society which he as king represents is judged and found wanting (54).

Beowulf’s pagan society is ultimately found defenceless without the help of God. As the poet has lamented in lines 183-186:

Wa bíð þæm ðe sceal

þurh slíðe níð                    sáwle bescúfan

in fýres fæþm,                  frófre ne wénan,

wihte gewendan!

A more positive yet similar expression may be found in the last lines of The Wanderer:

Wel bið þam þe him are seceð,

Frofre to fæder on heofonum,     þærus eal seo fæstnung stondeð.

Beowulf as a Northern hero trusted in his own might, not in God’s power – nor could he, for he knew not God. Thus to be simply himself, the ideal hero, would yet be lacking, and the ideals and the values which he represents, though noble, are “found wanting”. And though this be so, the poet deals with the characters with reverence, and not with condemnation, as he epitaphs Beowulf with

manna mildust      ond mon-ðwærust,

leodum líðost       one lof-geornost (3181-3182).

[1] In Chapter 11 of the Poetics, Aristotle furthermore says, “these are the two parts of the plot, reversal and recognition, and there is also a third part, suffering”; a statement which we will add to his definition.

[2] See Tolkien’s Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary, p. 162

[3] The Shieldings (Skjöldungs) themselves are descended from the Norse god Odin (Sturluson, Prose Edda 7).

[4] “Equally with the poet of Widsith, the poet of Beowulf cannot mention Hrothulf and Hrothgar together without foreboding evil” (Chambers 83).

[5] See Snorri Sturlusson’s “Gylfaginning”, Chapter 51.

[6] Gæð á wyrd swá hío scel (l. 455)

Works cited:

 

Chambers, R.W. Widsith: A Study in Old English Heroic Legend. Cambridge: University Press, 1912. Print.

Finnegan, Robert Emmett. Beowulf at the Mere (and elsewhere). Winnipeg: University of  Manitoba Press, 1978. Print.

Gwara, Scott. Heroic Identity in the World of Beowulf. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV, 2008.

Heaney, Seamus. Beowulf. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2000. Print.

O’Donohue, Heather. English Poetry and Old Norse Myth. Oxford: Oxford University Press,

2014. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary. Ed. Christopher Tolkien. London:         Harper Collins Publishers, 2014. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays. Ed. Christopher Tolkien.   London: George Allen & Unwin Publishers, 1983. Print.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Works Consulted:

1979. and E. Keary. The Heroes of Asgard. New York: Mayflower Books, 1979. Print.

Anlezark, Daniel. Myths, Legends, and Heroes. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011.

Print.

Bloom, Harold. Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations: Beowulf, Updated Edition. New             York: Infobase Publishing, 2007.

Brodeur, Arthur. The Art of Beowulf. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969.    Print.

—. The Prose Edda. New York: American Scandinavian Foundation, 1916. Print.

Byock, Jesse. The Prose Edda. London: Penguin Books, 2005. Print.

Chambers, R.W. Widsith: A Study in Old English Heroic Legend. Cambridge: University Press, 1912. Print.

Crossley- Holland, Kevin. The Anglo-Saxon World: An Anthology. Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 2009. Print.

Dougherty, Martin. Vikings. London: Amber Books, 2013. Print.

Earl, James. Thinking About Beowulf. California: Stanford University Press, 1994. Print.

Finnegan, Robert Emmett. Beowulf at the Mere (and elsewhere). Winnipeg: University of  Manitoba Press, 1978. Print.

Greenblatt, Stephen. Simpson, and Alfred David. The Norton Anthology of English           Literature. 2 vols. New York: W.W. Norton &Company, 1962-2013. Print.

Gwara, Scott. Heroic Identity in the World of Beowulf. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV, 2008.

Hall, John. A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1916.          Print.

Heaney, Seamus. Beowulf. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2000. Print.

Jones, Gwyn. Kings Beasts and Heroes. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972. Print.

Jónsson, Guðni. Fornaldar Sögur Norðurlanda. Reykjavík: Prentsmiðjan Edda, 1950. Print.

Jónsson, Finnur. Sæmundar-Edda. Reykjavík: Prentsmiðja D. Östlunds, 1905. Print.

Jónsson, Guðni. Edda Snorra Sturlusonar. Reykjavík: Prentfell, 1949. Print.

Klaeber, Frederick. Beowulf. Toronto: University of Toronot Press, 2008. Print.

Larrington, Carolyne. The Poetic Edda. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Print.

Mitchell, Bruce. An Invitation to Old English and Anglo-Saxon England. Oxford: Blackwell          Publishers, 1995. Print.

Mitchell, B. and Robinson, F. A Guide to Old English. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons Ltd,           2012. Print.

New International Version. Caloocan: Image Builders Services and Publishing Foundation,           1984. Print.

O’Donohue, Heather. English Poetry and Old Norse Myth. Oxford: Oxford University Press,

2014. Print.

Portnoy, Phyllis. The Remnant: Essays on a Theme in Old English Verse. London: Runetree         Press, 2005. Print.

Stitt, J. Michael. Beowulf and the Bear’s Son. New York: Garland Publishing, 1992. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary. Ed. Christopher Tolkien. London:         Harper Collins Publishers, 2014. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays. Ed. Christopher Tolkien.   London: George Allen & Unwin Publishers, 1983. Print.

Tripp, Raymond P. Jr. More about the Fight with the Dragon. Lanham: University Press of            America, 1983. Print.

Zoega, Geir. A Concise Dictionary of Old Icelandic. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990.        Print.

Beowulf: The Anglo-Saxon Thor

Any student versed in both Norse and Anglo-Saxon literatures may immediately recognise similarities between the Norse god Thor and the Anglo-Saxon hero, Beowulf. The text of Beowulf, it may be observed, suggests all throughout many parallelisms not only in the stories of the two characters, but also in the contexts in which both are situated. I would argue that Beowulf not only exemplifies aspects of Thor, but that, moreover, it is in the Beowulf poet’s intention to represent in Beowulf the human figure of the god himself. It is important to recognize this perspective especially in Beowulf’s final battle with the dragon, in order for us to be able to observe how the poet, with beautiful, elegiac undertones, wistfully celebrates Northern heroism.

It is a widely accepted fact in Beowulf’s readership that the author was a Christian writing for a Christian audience. Heather O’Donohue specifically implies that the author was most likely a cleric: “Anglo-Saxon authors were Christians, perhaps mostly clerics, and clerical culture dominated literary production” (11). J.R.R. Tolkien gives the clerical identity of the author more clarity as he expounds on him thus:

…he brought probably first to his task a knowledge of Christian poetry, especially that of the Caedmon school, and especially Genesis. He makes his minstrel sing in Heorot of the Creation of the earth and the lights of Heaven….Secondly, to his task the poet brought a considerable learning in native lays and traditions: only by learning and training could such things be acquired (Monsters and the Critics 26-27).

This blending of the old and new[1], the Christian and the pagan, is a possibility construed from the conditions of the poet’s native land. Harold Bloom thus describes a firmly Christian nation that has “established control of a mixed and somewhat turbulent Anglo-Scandinavian society” (37). It can then be asserted that Beowulf’s author was supplied with enough materials from the past and a sufficient understanding of his present time to be able to compose a poem that could recount the old days with a certain novelty. Furthermore, it can be said of Beowulf (and indeed of any Anglo-Saxon poetry) that the poems “concerned themselves with the resigned but wistful recreation of a distant and faded past, and meditations on ends and beginnings” (O’Donohue, 11).

The antiquarian author of Beowulf artfully draws forth some themes in Norse literature that may not be too apparent at first glance[2]. The principal of these – and my chief concern – is the insinuation of Thor’s characteristics and background into Beowulf. One of the first similarities that arises is the presence of the necklace of the Brosings. Beowulf receives it as an award after killing Grendel (1197-1201). Thor as well wears it in a quest in Þrymsviða:

Létu und hánum

hrynja lukla

ok kvenváðir

of kné falla,

en á brjósti

breiða steinna,

ok hagl ga

of höfuð typðu (19).

O‘Donohue additionally recounts three other common exploits of the heroes. “Both Thor and Beowulf, when young, contend with a sea monster or monsters, out in the ocean, and best their companion; their safe return is carefully noted….Both Thor and Beowulf wrestle with an old woman….Finally, both Thor and Beowulf have a close encounter with a giant’s glove”(20).

I observe two more relevant and related events. Both Beowulf and Thor have a final battle against a serpentine or dragon-like creature about to lay their kingdoms to waste. These occasions have been foreshadowed in the Völuspá for Thor and in the story of Sigemund (ll. 898-915) for Beowulf. The heroes eventually succeed in slaying the dragons, and likewise both die from the battle wounds. It is from these encounters that the heroes achieve their most praiseworthy deed. Tolkien may add:

…as far as we know anything about these old poets, we know this: the prince of the heroes of the North, supremely memorable – hans nafn mun uppi meðan veröldin stendr – was a dragon-slayer. And his most renowned deed, from which in Norse he derived his title Fáfnisbani, was the slaying of the prince of legendary worms (Monsters and the Critics 16).

He also mentions that Beowulf’s first major fight – the one against Grendel – makes for a perfect balance when contrasted against the climactic battle against the wyrm, the dragon[3]. Finnegan observes this buildup thus: “as the hero becomes increasingly entrammeled in the meshes of the society of which he is a part, the victory becomes harder, as in the struggle with Grendel’s mother, until it becomes finally impossible[4]” (54). There is here a sense that is deeply connected with Beowulfian and Viking society, where “a hopeless battle was not something to be avoided; it was an opportunity to win undying word-fame in the mortal world and ultimately a place in the golden age after Ragnarök” (Dougherty 39).

Seamus Heaney further emphasizes the importance and full meaning of the dragon in Beowulf. “He [the dragon] lodges himself in the imagination as wyrd [fate/destiny] rather than wyrm, more a destiny than a set of reptilian vertebrae” (xix). So represented then is the power of Fate – “Gæð a wyrd swa hio scel”, Fate goes ever as she must (line 445).

Fate in Beowulf is directly linked to God, who is oftentimes referred to in the poem as Metod (in line 180, for example), which is also a word for fate. It is he who decides ultimately the fate of the hero Beowulf. It may be said that his divine blessing is what gives Beowulf protection in his first two major encounters. In his fight with Grendel the poet declares thus:

Ac him Dryhten forgeaf

wig-speda gewiofu,         Wedera leodum,

frofor ond fultum,            þæt hie feond heora

durh anes cræft                ealle ofercomon,

selfes mihtum.                  Soð is gecyþed,

þæt mihtig God                manna cynnes

weold wide-ferð (696-702).

Here God is described as a seamster of fate who rules over mankind, weaving victory for the “Weather-Geats”. In Beowulf’s battle against Grendel’s mother, the poet notes that “halig God / geweold wig-sigor” – “holy God decided the victory” (1553-1554). These blessings are alarmingly absent in Beowulf’s final clash. Thus the hero, boastful – as a Northern hero is wont to be – in his own strength and might, is left to pay the final wages of his heroic endeavours: “the wages of heroism is death” (Tolkien, Monsters and the Critics 26). Finnegan notes that “the dragon fight, particularly when compared with the Grendel battle, is more overtly pagan in tone” (53). Recalling its connections with Thor’s encounter with the Midgard Serpent, this last battle indeed brings with it certain elements from Norse mythology.

What is interesting here is the silence of the poem about God’s actions; neither the poet nor any of the characters speak of God at this point. What the readers see instead is an unfolding of events taken right from the story of Thor’s fight with Jörmungandr. God’s actions are either suspended or withheld, and the pagan clash is allowed to take place without restraint. The aftereffects, as the poet presents them, are plaintively devastating. The gold that Beowulf fought for proves to be useless[5]. Beowulf’s death, moreover, signifies the end of his Geatish kingdom (O’Donohue 22-23).

It seems fitting to say that the poet is weaving the ending into a sombre celebration of Beowulf’s death. Victorious he was indeed, as was Thor, in ridding the world of the evil wyrm, but the poet laments the godlessness of the characters in Beowulf and perhaps the vanity of the heroes’ deaths. Hrólfs Saga Kraka ends in a similar, yet more outspoken note. Master Galterus, seemingly randomly inserted into the final passage of the saga, voices out what I believe to be a remark that Beowulf’s poet only hints at: “Sagði meistarinn Galterus, at mannligir kraftar máttu ekki standast við slíkum fjanda krafti, utan máttr guðs hefði á móti komit, — ‘ok stóð þér þat eitt fyrir sigrinum, Hrólfr konungr, at þú hafðir ekki skyn á skapara þínum’” (Förnaldar 104)[6].

It will feel even more woeful when the readers keep in mind that Heorot, the Great Hall of Hrothgar, a symbol of Valhalla transfigured into the mortal world[7], has been at this point burnt down by the dragon. We may say that it is a representation that helps the poet’s “resigned but wistful recreation” of the past (O’Donohue 11). Likewise, Beowulf’s dirge brings us back to the melancholic tone of an elegy, mourning the loss of a great leader beloved by all.

So the sole might and power of the Thor-like Beowulf, lacking the aid of the Almighty, equates to nought upon facing his Fated doom. Yet here also he finds his glory, his most renowned deed – a licence which in a more ancient time would have given him full permission to enter Valhalla. Fate and Metod have set aside this time for Beowulf, a king beloved and a warrior valiant, to receive lof, the fame, which he, as a Northern hero (right down to the marrow), seeks most eagerly and deserves indubitably.  Thus hans nafn mun uppi meðan veröldin stendr.

[1] Alluding to Tolkien’s quote in The Monsters and the Critics, p.20

[2] O’Donohue notes that we “can only expect carefully meditated allusions at best”. (11) The author has indeed put some careful meditation and deep thought into weaving the story of Beowulf together.

[3] See The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays, p.32

[4] Finnegan states that the armor is “symbolic of the defenses his society can afford him in the battle” (49)

[5] As Finnegan notes in p. 54

[6] In essence: “Human strength cannot stand such fiendish power, unless the strength of God is employed against it” (Byock)

[7] James Earl suggests this relationship between Heorot and Valhalla in Thinking about Beowulf, pp. 115-116

Bibliography/ Works Consulted:

1979. and E. Keary. The Heroes of Asgard. New York: Mayflower Books, 1979. Print.

Anlezark, Daniel. Myths, Legends, and Heroes. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011.

Print.

Bloom, Harold. Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations: Beowulf, Updated Edition. New             York: Infobase Publishing, 2007.

Brodeur, Arthur. The Art of Beowulf. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969.    Print.

—. The Prose Edda. New York: American Scandinavian Foundation, 1916. Print.

Byock, Jesse. The Prose Edda. London: Penguin Books, 2005. Print.

Crossley- Holland, Kevin. The Anglo-Saxon World: An Anthology. Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 2009. Print.

Dougherty, Martin. Vikings. London: Amber Books, 2013. Print.

Earl, James. Thinking About Beowulf. California: Stanford University Press, 1994. Print.

Finnegan, Robert Emmett. Beowulf at the Mere (and elsewhere). Winnipeg: University of  Manitoba Press, 1978. Print.

Greenblatt, Stephen. Simpson, and Alfred David. The Norton Anthology of English           Literature. 2 vols. New York: W.W. Norton &Company, 1962-2013. Print.

Gwara, Scott. Heroic Identity in the World of Beowulf. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV, 2008.

Hall, John. A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1916.          Print.

Heaney, Seamus. Beowulf. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2000. Print.

Jones, Gwyn. Kings Beasts and Heroes. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972. Print.

Jónsson, Guðni. Fornaldar Sögur Norðurlanda. Reykjavík: Prentsmiðjan Edda, 1950. Print.

Jónsson, Finnur. Sæmundar-Edda. Reykjavík: Prentsmiðja D. Östlunds, 1905. Print.

Jónsson, Guðni. Edda Snorra Sturlusonar. Reykjavík: Prentfell, 1949. Print.

Larrington, Carolyne. The Poetic Edda. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Print.

Mitchell, Bruce. An Invitation to Old English and Anglo-Saxon England. Oxford: Blackwell          Publishers, 1995. Print.

Mitchell, B. and Robinson, F. A Guide to Old English. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons Ltd,           2012. Print.

New International Version. Caloocan: Image Builders Services and Publishing Foundation,           1984. Print.

O’Donohue, Heather. English Poetry and Old Norse Myth. Oxford: Oxford University Press,

2014. Print.

Portnoy, Phyllis. The Remnant: Essays on a Theme in Old English Verse. London: Runetree         Press, 2005. Print.

Stitt, J. Michael. Beowulf and the Bear’s Son. New York: Garland Publishing, 1992. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary. Ed. Christopher Tolkien. London:         Harper Collins Publishers, 2014. Print.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays. Ed. Christopher Tolkien.   London: George Allen & Unwin Publishers, 1983. Print.

Tripp, Raymond P. Jr. More about the Fight with the Dragon. Lanham: University Press of            America, 1983. Print.

Zoega, Geir. A Concise Dictionary of Old Icelandic. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990.        Print.

Beowulf — The Bard and His Tale

“Hwæt!” This Old English expression marks the prelude to Beowulf, a remnant of a people from an age now vastly distinct from ours in various ways. Beowulf has survived ages of conquests and wars, yet just a few people truly understand the profound themes its highly sophisticated society presents within the work. Many who have studied it have a tendency to misinterpret its content, and the very scholars of English literature fail to comprehend the literary powers at work. Indeed, its unfamiliar references make it a foreign tale to many. Quests for everlasting personal glory and unbreakable bonds of kinship, for instance, may seem to modern readers to be aspects of life so far removed from theirs that they may be deemed as elements present only in works of pure fiction. Yet the ancient English people and their Germanic cousins steadfastly clung to these beliefs, and from this way of life there sprouted stories and legendary heroes whose splendour remains unmatched today.

Accordingly, it may be said of Beowulf that it is a literary work of the highest order, being a poetry that incorporates heroic elements (insinuated with mythological allusions) along with historical insights and an awareness of its society’s present conditions. We see its author weaving the themes to form a reflection, an insight, and a criticism of the ancient Anglo-Saxon society and its legends. We may say then that the author was to Anglo-Saxon literature what Snorri Sturluson was to that of the Icelanders: with the antiquarian knowledge he has obtained, he uses the stories we see in Beowulf as instruments to draw up, with reverence, visions of their glorious past, and at the same time to point out their faults. Beowulf’s penman is retelling something of an ancient, probably well-known legend with a different perspective. Its story is indeed set in the past, but its people are of its author’s period, making the characters entirely relatable to the readership. Beowulf should thus be treated not only as a poem, but also as a classic literature (in the modern sense) of the Anglo-Saxon world – an evaluation of a preceding society towards which the poet, the scop, felt a strong sense of piety; a work which both the laymen and the learned of that period read or heard to better understand their present identity, as we do now with the works, for example, of Shakespeare or Dickens.

In comparing Beowulf’s author with Sturluson, we can therefore reasonably apply to him Arthur Brodeur’s descriptions of Sturluson’s trait as a writer who cherished the tales of the past:

 

His interest in these wondrous things, like Scott’s love for the heroes, beliefs, and customs of the Scottish folk, was, I think, primarily antiquarian. Indefatigable in research, with an artist’s eye for the picturesque, a poet’s feeling for the dramatic and the human, he created the most vivid, vital histories that have yet been penned. Accurate beyond the manner of his age, gifted with the genius for expression, divining the human personalities, the comic or tragic interplay of ambitions, passions, and destinies behind the mere chronicled events, he had almost ideal qualities as an historian….Poet he was too… (Edda xii).

 

These historian-like qualities of Beowulf’s author, reflected in the poem, must have been the source of the mistakes in approach that Tolkien refers to in his revolutionary essay, Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics. He claims that “the illusion of historical truth and perspective, that has made Beowulf seem such an attractive quarry, is largely a product of art”, and that “the seekers after history must beware lest the glamour of Poesis overcome them” (7). However, we should not view Beowulf only as a work of art, nor simply as a work of poetry, but also as a work in which the author reflects upon the connections of the past and present. He recounts the ancient days, the traditions of which were not entirely forgotten back then, and makes his audiences aware of the inherent dangers of those traditions – all the while still highlighting its many virtues. Every figure integrated in Beowulf is the author’s way of representing to his audiences, in a way more comprehensible and memorable, the abstract ideals of their inherited traditions. In discovering the meaning of the poem, one must take heed the words which Snorri implies to his readership: “‘Do not lose sight of these splendid tales of the fathers, but remember always that these old legends are to be used to point a moral or adorn a tale, and not to be believed, or to be altered without authority of ancient skalds who knew them’” (Brodeur, Edda xvi-xvii). With this instruction and understanding, we may, with fresh, keen eyes, look deeper into the interplay of the themes in Beowulf.

Beowulf provides an excellent source of insight into the Germanic heroic society, to which the Anglo-Saxons belong. However, even during the estimated time of its composition, “the heroic world of poetry…was already remote from the Christian world of Anglo-Saxon England” (Greenblatt et al. 1: 8). This is true, at least perhaps if it pertains to the change of their beliefs and not their heroic culture. Harold Bloom, in his book Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations: Beowulf, further explains this relationship:

 

Rather than reflecting the static conditions of a single or simple age, Beowulf represents a broad collective response to changes that affected a complex society during a period of major crisis and transformation. To note only the most obvious of these transformations: by the time that this poem was put down in writing, the English-speaking peoples of Britain had turned away from pagan beliefs and had embraced the teachings of Christianity. They had weathered the storm of Viking invasions and had established control of a mixed and somewhat turbulent Anglo-Scandinavian society (37).

 

What with the given conditions of his diverse country, Beowulf’s author was supplied with enough materials from the past and a sufficient understanding of his present time to form a poem that could recount the old days with a certain novelty; it is, in the words of Tolkien, “a poem by an Englishman using afresh ancient and largely traditional material” (9). He also describes it as “a fusion that has occurred at a given point of contact between old and new, a product of thought and deep emotion” (20). The creatures of Germanic mythology and folklore are thus given a new essence, whilst their native symbolisms endure; traditional themes are provided with a new perspective. Beowulf reflects the state of Anglo-Saxon England in a way that it combines the ideals of both its local Germanic heroic society and that of the Christian faith.

It is now an established fact (after years of scholarly arguments) that Beowulf’s author was a Christian – and here all the unanimity ends. The opinions regarding the Christian elements in the poem vary greatly. There are plenty of scholars who claim that the fusion of the heroic code and Christian ideals creates conflicts; this is, for the most part, simply wrong. It is true that in every society there arises a certain degree of disharmony among beliefs and traditions; but in the case of Beowulf, Christianity actually complements the heroic ideals more than opposes them. It is of the opinion of many that Christianity is a faith disposed to be tender and mild, teaching its followers to “turn the other cheek”. This is a serious misconception that stems from a quote being taken out of context. The misunderstanding of this factor may lead to mistranslations and misinterpretations of Beowulf’s themes. It is something far from gentle, that which teaches its believers to “be strong and courageous” (New International Version, Joshua 1:9), and even repeats this commandment frequently enough (Deut. 31:7; 31:23; Joshua 1:6; 1:18). The Bible agrees with the heroic warriors’ readiness for battle when it says, “Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Eph. 6:11).

Much of the confusion also arises from the conception that Beowulf is a muddled mixture of Christianity and Germanic paganism. Clarity can be attained if we think of the latter ingredient simply as Germanic tradition. To refer to it as paganism is imply that the people (or at least the main characters) in the story worshiped the heathen gods. In no case is this true, save for a brief moment when the author laments of the Danes backsliding into “their heathenish hope” (179). To add to this confusion, there is written the even more baffling lines 180-182: “The Almighty Judge / of good deeds and bad, the Lord God, / Head of the Heavens and High King of the World, / was unknown to them”.  This has often been quoted to imply the Danes’ lack of knowledge of God; but when we translate this literally, suggests otherwise. The original Old English quote runs so: “…Metod hie ne cuþon, / dæda Demend, ne wiston hie Drihten God / ne hie huru heofena Helm herian ne cuþon, / wuldres Wealdend”. All poetic fanciness aside, the lines (thanks to John Hall’s A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary) would translate into “…they knew not Metod, the dæda Demend; they knew not Drihten God, nor did they even know how to praise heofena Helm, wuldres Wealdend” – entirely different from most modern translations. For the most part, they lack the keyword “to praise”. To further lessen the complications, and thus better understand the lines, it is necessary to comprehend how “the Lord God…was unknown to them [the Danes or their counsellors in particular]”. The same unawareness of God can be compared to that described in the Book of Isaiah: “The ox knows his master, the donkey his owner’s manger, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand” (1:3). This unawareness is thus not an actual unfamiliarity with God but simply a refusal to acknowledge him and his presence as wuldres Wealdend. What remains then is a more reasonable conclusion that the Danes merely refused to praise or to be conscious of God. Either way, this regression to pagan beliefs did not refer to an act of the general population, but only that of the Danish counsellors. And such an inconsistency – if it is one – is common in older works of gargantuan proportion where the authors neither had the materials nor a reason to alter mistakes which to them were maybe only trivial.  

 Simpson and David noted that “it is difficult and probably futile to draw a line between ‘heroic’ and ‘Christian’, for the best poetry crosses that boundary” (Greenblatt et al. 1: 8). There is truth in this: for the Christian enhances the heroic; and the heroic, more often than not, emphasises the Christian. This beautiful synthesis can be seen all throughout the poem, as personified by the characters and as idealised in its themes. “In the figure of Beowulf the heroic ideals of Germanic paganism and of Anglo-Saxon Christendom have been reconciled and fused, so that the hero exemplifies the best of both” (Brodeur, Beowulf 183). Beowulf personified the Christian heroic warrior, a warrior of God. He “was mindful of his mighty strength, / the wondrous gifts God has showered on him: / he relied for help on the Lord of All, / on His care and favor” (lines 1270- 1273). The Danish king Hrothgar depicts the Christian heroic king. Throughout the poem, he put his trust in God, the Ælmightiga; “Friends and kinsmen flocked to his ranks, / young followers, a force that grew / to be a mighty army” (lines 65-67). Moreover, as rich as Beowulf is with many Christian ideals, its heroic themes also overflow and echoes from its Germanic traditions resonate in its passages.

The Anglo-Saxon audience of Beowulf represented a fraction of a huge network of Germanic tribes who, generally speaking, shared very similar beliefs. When viewed as a historical document (though Tolkien strongly admonishes against the folly of overdoing this), it can be said of Beowulf that it depicts this cultural relationship. This close-knit relationship is evident in the fact that the events in the poem, though written in the Old English tongue, concern the tribal Danes and the Geats, with occasional references to the Swedes, Franks, and Frisians. Most specially, among other tribal ties, bountiful similarities can be drawn between the Norse and Anglo-Saxon cultures and their surviving works of literature. The abundance of Anglo-Saxon heroic themes and practices that parallel and allude to those of Norse society proves the author’s (and his readers’) familiarity and connection with the history and culture of their Scandinavian neighbours.

The Germanic heroic society, as exemplified in Beowulf, paid particular attention to bonds of kinship, especially the “relationships…which existed between the warrior – the thane – and his lord” (Greenblatt et al. 1: 37). Kinship, along with its different forms and the duties that go along with it, are therefore central themes in many of the great sagas and poems of the North. Fragments of this culture survive today, fragments which have worked their way into our words, though we may not be aware of their presence. Both the modern English words king and kin are descended from the same word in Old English: “the king…is called cyning – a son or descendant or a member of the cyn [kin]” (Earl 108). It was the duty of a lord to protect his people – as the word lord implied in Old English, having been “derived from…hlaf, ‘loaf,’ plus weard, ‘protector’” (Greenblatt et al. 1: 8). The kings and lords, therefore, were responsible for providing for their kin; and kinsmen and warriors were to protect their lords and fellow kinsmen. Of this complex relationship, James Earl observes:

 

Conflicts that arise in the system, between blood ties and marriage ties, or between kinship obligations and sword obligations, have always been recognized as one of the great themes in Anglo-Saxon and other Germanic literature – the unavoidable and unresolvable clash of loyalties that results in tragedy. Much of the fascination of northern literature lies in the picture it presents of a society governed largely by the arcane rules and complications of the kin-feud (107).

 

These conflicts appear in the Finnsburg Episode, a poem within Beowulf, which demonstrates the absurdity of the blood feuds. The problems depicted in this lay are products of the inherent moral obligation of kinsmen to avenge their slain (whether their death be accidental or deliberate). In their society, they must either accept compensation in the form of money (called wergild, or man-price), or take revenge upon the offenders – and often this vengeance ends up as a bloody feud. The feuds for a time may seem to be settled, but circumstances oftentimes call for them to be rekindled. In Vikings: A History of the Norse People, Michael Dougherty thoroughly explains this process (though the actual Anglo-Saxon version may have differed to a slight degree):

 

A feud was socially acceptable and was often seen as necessary to restore honour after an insult or to take vengeance for a crime. It essentially took the form of small war declared between the feuding parties. There were rules in place governing who was allowed to take part in a feud, which went some way towards preventing a minor incident from expanding to include every kinsman, friend and neighbour of the feuding parties, plus anyone else they could persuade to help out.

A feud could simmer for a long time, especially where the enemies were all matched and needed to be cautious about attacking one another. Without a clear advantage, escalating the level of violence was highly risky and while Viking men were not overly concerned with personal safety, losing a feud might have consequences beyond simply dying in battle….Feuds were characterized by acts of violence, even when started by something as trivial as a perceived insult (59).

 

We see moreover in Hrothgar’s position the effects of the responsibilities of avenging one’s kin. After Grendel’s devastating attack on Heorot, Hrothgar “sat stricken and helpless, / humiliated by the loss of his guard, / bewildered and stunned, staring aghast / at the demon’s trail, in deep distress” (130-133). “Hrothgar’s anguish over the murders committed by Grendel is not only for the loss of his men but also for the shame of his inability either to kill Grendel or to exact a ‘death-price’ from the killer” (Greenblatt et al. 1: 38). One can only imagine the pressure he faces, having been descended from a line of “good kings” and being a protector of his people. Failure to redress the death of his kinsmen would mean that “he must endure woes / and live with grief for as long as his hall / stands at the horizon on its high ground” (283- 285).

Beowulf’s author shows the readers of the vanity of these seemingly never-ending feuds also in the character of Grendel’s mother. She “sallied forth on a savage journey, / grief-racked and ravenous, desperate for revenge” (1277-1278).  Vengeance seems to be the sole reason for her attacks. Hrothgar expected this calamity (1340) – he understands that one day the desperate feuds would take their toll on their society. Indeed it would seem that the characters in the story have enough sagacity to realise the pointlessness of these blood-feuds. Beowulf, in a conversation with his uncle Hygelac, observes, “generally the spear / is prompt to retaliate when a prince is killed, / no matter how admirable the bride may be” (2029-2031). This is his comment on the engagement of Freawaru, Hrothgar’s daughter, to Ingeld, whose father was killed by the Danes. Additionally, he expresses that there is only a fine line that keeps the wronged from further pursuing the feud, saying that it may only take “some heirloom that brings alive / memories of the massacre…until one…lies / spattered in blood” (2042-2043, 2059-2060). In these passages, the readers can hear the poet’s remorse for this tradition. Valiant it may seem at first, to protect one’s own kin; however, he reminds them that, when taken too far, all the nobility of this bond will crumble their society into ruins.

The poet describes as well the state of Heorot, having been brought low by Grendel: “the greatest house / in the world stood empty, a deserted wallstead” (145-146). The impact of the onslaught upon Heorot must have been to the beholders in the poem as well as to the readers of it, extremely distressing; for the hall was not only a feasting place for the nobles and warriors, or even as the headquarters of their defence – it stood as the very heart of their society. Earl best explains the hall’s significance:

 

When the Anglo-Saxons invaded Britain, they settled in scattered villages instead of cities, and they built their houses of wood instead of stone – an apparent regress from the Romano-British civilization they supplanted…

The stubborn preservation of this ancient form of building is related to the hall’s symbolism. Originally, the hall was not primarily a form of habitation; it was a meðelstede, a formal place. In its traditional form and usages the hall defined and structured a traditional way of life. It preserved a constellation of values and distinctions essential to the culture and therefore was not to be exchanged lightly for some more “advanced” form, such as the city, the villa, the castle, or the palace (114-115).

 

Furthermore, the most important of relationships in Germanic heroic society thrived in their mead-halls. “The life of lord and warrior was centred in the hall where the lord had his throne and he and his warriors shared its pleasures” (Mitchell, 200). We begin to understand the implications of Grendel’s attacks on Heorot and Beowulf’s defending it once we explore in depth the symbolisms of the hall. According the Seamus Heaney:

 

…each lord’s hall is an actual and a symbolic refuge. Here is heat and light, rank and ceremony, human solidarity and culture; the duguð share the mead-benches with the geogoð, the veterans with their tales of warrior kings and hero-saviours from the past rub shoulders with young braves – þegnas, eorlas, thanes, retainers – keen to win such renown in the future. The prospect of gaining a glorious name in the wael-raes, in the rush of battle-slaughter, the pride of defending one’s lord and bearing heroic witness to the integrity of the bond between him and his hall-companions – a bond sealed in the gleo and gidd of peace-time feasting and ring-giving – this is what gave drive and sanction to the Germanic warrior-culture enshrined in Beowulf.

Heorot and Hygelac’s hall are the hubs of this value system upon which the poem’s action turns (xv-xvi).

 

To this insight we might attach Earl’s, taken from his book Thinking About Beowulf:

 

   The hall symbolizes not only this world but the other one too. The only clear image of an afterlife we find in northern myth is Valhalla, the hall of the slain…. It serves the same function in the mythic world that the hall does in society: it is from Valhalla that the heroes venture out against the forces of chaos at Ragnarök, the final battle.

Beowulf provides the most detailed picture we have of the cosmic hall. The building of the great hall is a metaphor for the birth of civilization in the poem; it is celebrated with a hymn of God’s creation. The whole poem takes place in a world defined by the hall. Fully alive in language, Beowulf seems to throw a bright light into the darkest corner of Anglo-Saxon history, illuminating the hall as the vital center of the human world (115-116).

 

The mead-hall was thus the life-force of the Germanic heroic society. It was a symbol that was not to be put down lightly; an attack upon it would be an affront against the very soul of that society. And yet the hall’s sacred significance would naturally make it a prime target of evil. There live in Beowulf’s world (perhaps as a reflection of ours) creatures and men who live simply to hate what is innocent and noble, not caring what waste they lay upon their wake. Grendel, as described by the scop, embodies those characters:

 

…a powerful demon, a prowler through the dark,

nursed a hard grievance. It harrowed him

to hear the din of the loud banquet

every day in the hall, the harp being struck

and the clear song of a skilled poet

telling with mastery of man’s beginnings…(lines 86-91).

 

He aptly represents the forces that sought to destroy the world of Germanic heroic society – a monster constantly lurking in the dark outside the hall, a creature grim ond grædig, “greedy and grim” (122). A reason for his grudge comes from him being an outcast of that society, a being bereft of company, joy, and a chance at personal glory. Yet another, rather darker, reason perhaps would be because Grendel is a God-cursed and heaven-forsaken descendant of Cain. Upon hearing the mirth of the Danes echoing from the warmth of their hall, and their singing of how God – the Metod, the Scyppend – created the world, Grendel, in a fit of demonic reaction, becomes filled with extreme resentment; and the outpouring of this hatred is expressed in his “vicious raids and ravages…his long and unrelenting feud, / nothing but war…his lonely war” (152-154, 164). We see then that Grendel is a twofold force of evil. The author uses him as the personification of the physical threat against their society, and also of the spiritual threat against the newfound faith of the Anglo-Saxons. Tolkien remarks of Grendel and his kind:

 

They are directly connected with Scripture, yet they cannot be dissociated from the creatures of northern myth, the ever-watchful foes of the gods (and men). The undoubtedly scriptural Cain is connected with eotenas and ylfe, which are the jötnar and the álfar of Norse. But this is not due to mere confusion – it is rather an indication of the precise point at which an imagination, pondering old and new, was kindled. At this point new Scripture and old tradition touched and ignited. It is for this reason that these elements of Scripture alone appear in a poem dealing of design with the noble pagan of old days. For they are precisely the elements which bear upon this theme. Man alien in a hostile world, engaged in a struggle which he cannot win while the world lasts, is assured that his foes are the foes also of Dryhten, that his courage noble in itself is also the highest loyalty… (26).

 

And so evil was not meant to win. Grendel, from the beginning, was already a twice-damned creature, being a reject of society and a cursed descendant of Cain (whose damnation interestingly is a result of him killing his brother, his own kin), whose plans were inherently bound to fail. Grendel’s killing spree ends as Beowulf comes to defend the Danes and Hrothgar’s honour. Heorot endures: “The hall clattered and hammered, but somehow / survived the onslaught and kept standing” (770-771). Beowulf’s victory meant not only the important preservation of Heorot, the life and light of the Beowulfian society – it also meant the restoration of Hrothgar’s honour and especially the advancing of Beowulf’s glory.

The bard understood the importance of glory in the life of a heroic warrior – and, indeed, of any worthy man in his society. In their life in the mortal world, this quest for glory was the warrior’s primary goal. This belief can be exactly paralleled to that of the Anglo-Saxons’ Norse neighbours, which in turn was mirrored in their old religion:

 

Odin came to know that the world would end in a great battle known as Ragnarök, during which the wolf Fenrir would swallow him. His son Vidar would then avenge him. Odin knew the fate of all the gods – who among them would survive Ragnarök and who would not – and also that the universe would be largely destroyed. His foreknowledge in some ways echoes the Norse warrior’s fatalism: death is inevitable, but word-fame lasts forever.

…The Twilight of the Gods is in many ways a metaphor for the personal Ragnarök that each Viking warrior faces when his time comes. His fate was decided long ago, just like those of his gods, and he goes to meet it with a brave heart, although he is spared the burden of knowledge that Odin carried. If it is his time, then he will die and go to wait for the day of Ragnarök. If not, then he can hope that there will be other battles.

It is not hard to see how these beliefs tended to produce fearless warriors who would face any odds and were not deterred by hardship. A hopeless battle was not something to be avoided; it was an opportunity to win undying word-fame in the mortal world and ultimately a place in the golden age after Ragnarök (Dougherty 28, 39).

 

This belief – at least the quest for glory – got carried on even until the poet’s time. The poet intended, of course, for Beowulf to be both a heroic warrior and a Christian man. It may be said that he is not meant to be the ideal Christian man – no mortal may ever be. However Beowulf is, at the core, the ideal Germanic hero, someone the author’s audiences can look up to; and at that, one whose courage is strengthened by his Christian faith. Fearless as tradition already raises him to be, even more so is this courage strengthened when he follows the commandment to “be strong and courageous”. Furthermore, Beowulf grounded his life upon wyrd, or fate, as designed by God the Metod. He states: “Fate goes ever as fate must…may the Divine Lord / in His wisdom grant the glory of victory / to whichever side He sees fit” (455, 685-687). “Thus Beowulf bore himself with valor; / he was formidable in battle yet behaved with honor and took no advantage; never cut down a comrade who was drunk, kept his temper / and, warrior that he was, watched and controlled / his God-sent strength and his outstanding natural powers” (2177-2183).  

Consequently, only a glorious and fame-worthy death would give justice to the life of this already-glorified hero. It is therefore even necessary, if Beowulf wishes his life to not reach a plateau. In many ways, the characters of the Germanic gods reflected the life of the Germanic peoples, so that once more, we may compare their fate to that of our hero. Upon an initial perception, Loki’s only role in mythology would seem to be purely to bring about chaos upon the gods. But when we understand the significance of a glorious death in the beliefs of the Germanic tribes, we see that Loki is, in fact, a necessary evil:

 

This is a common theme in Viking mythology – heroes and gods who die fighting or just after vanquishing their greatest foe. It may seem tragic from a modern perspective but to the Vikings a heroic death battling one’s sworn enemy was the very best way to go – what remained to a warrior after his arch-nemesis was defeated? Any further deeds would be anticlimactic and he might even suffer the terrible fate of dying of old age, forgotten or eclipsed by younger warriors.

Thus Loki provided several of the Norse gods with a suitable ending to their tale. Heimdall died fighting a kinsman-god turned evil, and other gods were provided with their ultimate challenge by Loki’s deeds. In this, he is one of the most important of the Norse gods – heroes are, after all, defined by the magnitude of the challenges they face (Dougherty 33-34).

 

Hence, the scop provides Beowulf with the dragon: most stupendous of the monsters, a beast legendary even within legends, whose majesty transcends the mythological. The dragon, the wyrm, is shown as an other-worldly creature, vastly different from Grendel and his mother, and in degrees far more terrible and dangerous:

 

Once he is wakened, there is something glorious in the way he manifests himself, a Fourth of July effulgence fire-working its path across the night sky; and yet, because of the centuries he has spent dormant in the tumulus, there is a foundedness as well as a lambency about him. He is at once a stratum of the earth and a streamer in the air, no painted dragon but a figure or real, oneiric power, one that can easily survive the prejudice which arises at the very mention of the word “dragon.” Whether in medieval art or in modern Disney cartoons, the dragon can strike us as far less horrific than he is meant to be, but in the final movement of Beowulf, he lodges himself in the imagination as wyrd rather than wyrm, more a destiny than a set of reptilian vertebrae.

…Dragon equals shadow-line, the psalmist’s valley of the shadow of death, the embodiment of a knowledge deeply ingrained in the species which is the very knowledge of the price to be paid for physical and spiritual survival (Heaney xix).

 

Upon seeing this dire beast, Beowulf aptly recognises his own death. The poet shows his readers that this brave warrior, renowned for his courage and might, displays a very human emotion. “It threw the hero / into deep anguish and darkened his mood….His mind was in turmoil, / unaccustomed anxiety and gloom / confused his brain” (2327-2328, 2331-2333). Such was the effect of the terror of this beast. Beowulf did not express this type of fear when he fought against Grendel and his mother. And yet, despite all this, Beowulf was “ready, sensing his death” (2420). One can only imagine the internal turmoil with which Beowulf is struggling. We see here the genius of the poet in creating the character of Beowulf. He uses irony and contrasts to exhibit the conflicts within Beowulf’s mind. The readers are presented with the now aged Beowulf, who, in physicality, is far from the younger and stronger warrior, as we would reasonably expect. The encounter serves as his final test: would he, in his fear, back down? Or would he fight and so defend his glory and that of his own people?

The fight against the dragon, among many others, is prefigured for the audience in the story of Sigemund. The story is a fitting celebration of Beowulf’s triumph against Grendel; and, as a case of dramatic irony, it also foreshadows Beowulf’s eventual meeting and slaying of the dragon. It echoes Odin’s prescience about the end of the world and of Thor’s battle against the Midgard wyrm, Jörmungand. Tolkien remarks:

 

…dragons, real dragons, essential both to the machinery and the ideas of a poem or tale, are actually rare. In northern literature there are only two that are significant. If we omit from consideration the vast and vague Encircler of the World, Miðgarðsormr, the doom of the great gods and no matter for heroes, we have but the dragon of the Völsungs, Fáfnir, and Beowulf’s bane. It is true that both of these are in Beowulf, one in the main story, and the other spoken of by a minstrel praising Beowulf himself. But this is not a wilderness of dragons. Indeed the allusion to the more renowned worm killed by the Wælsing is sufficient indication that the poet selected a dragon of well-founded purpose (or saw its significance in the plot as it had reached him), even as he was careful to compare this hero, Beowulf son of Ecgtheow, to the prince of the heroes of the North, the dragon-slaying Wælsing.

…As for the dragon: as far as we know anything about these old poets, we know this: the prince of the heroes of the North, supremely memorable – hans nafn mun uppi meðan veröldin stendr – was a dragon-slayer. And his most renowned deed, from which in Norse he derived his title Fáfnirsbani, was the slaying of the prince of legendary worms. Although there is plainly considerable difference between the later Norse and the ancient English form of the story alluded to in Beowulf, already there it had these two primary features: the dragon, and the slaying of him as the chief deed of the greatest heroes – he wæs wreccena wide mærost (9, 16).

 

Yet we will not disregard Jörmungand simply because there is no reason to do so. Similarities then begin to arise between the stories of Thor and Beowulf. Thor, in one final and glorious act, slays the Midgard serpent, who symbolised perhaps the evil that encircled the world. Beowulf too, must slay the nameless wyrm to save his kingdom from ruin. Both of them die shortly afterward. But it is for these deeds that they are best known, as it is for the warrior entitled Fáfnirsbani, bane of the dragon Fáfnir. A parallelism may be drawn as well between the endings of Beowulf and Norse mythology. A Geat woman laments of “her nation [being] invaded, / enemies on the rampage, bodies in piles, / slavery and abasement. Heaven swallowed the smoke” (3153-3155). So does Odin too, with his foreknowledge, upon seeing Nidhögg, who heralded Ragnarök and the end of days. But we see in this mythology that the end is not an end, rather the beginning of a better world’s rebirth, where the sons of the martyr gods rule and the great evil is finally vanquished. We may say the same of Beowulf’s ending. The coming of the Swedes, Franks, and Frisians prefigures the beginning of a better heroic society – one that perhaps would resemble that of the author’s.

In a way, Beowulf is a poetic social assessment. In many aspects, it is a metaphor of Germanic heroic society. Of its poetic magnificence, Tolkien praises:

 

   The lines do not go according to a tune. They are founded on a balance; an opposition between two halves of roughly equivalent phonetic weight, and significant content, which are more often rhythmically contrasted than similar. They are more like masonry than music. In this fundamental fact of poetic expression I think there is a parallel to the total structure of Beowulf. Beowulf is indeed the most successful Old English poem because in its elements, language, metre, theme, structure, are all most nearly in harmony….We have none the less in Beowulf a method and structure that within the limits of the verse-kind approaches rather to sculpture or painting. It is a composition not a tune.

   …When new Beowulf was already antiquarian, in a good sense, and it now produces a singular effect. For it is now to us itself ancient; and yet its maker was telling of things already old and weighted with regret, and he expended his art in making keen that touch upon the heart which sorrows have that are both poignant and remote. If the funeral of Beowulf moved once like the echo of an ancient dirge, far-off and hopeless, it is to us as a memory brought over the hills, an echo of an echo. There is not much poetry in the world like this; and though Beowulf may not be among the very greatest poems of our western world and its tradition, it has its own individual character, and peculiar solemnity; it would still have power had it been written in some time or place unknown and without posterity, if it contained no named that could now be recognized or identified by research (30, 33).

 

Truly there are only a few poems like this in the world that exist. Beowulf is indeed one of the few works that remain in our hands that can give us an insight into Anglo-Saxon society – and we are lucky to have such a rich resource. As a work of classic Anglo-Saxon literature it rivals those in our modern time. We see such beauty in the poem that we may rightfully remark of the scop what Brodeur remarked of Snorri: he, “though a Christian, tells the old pagan tales with obvious relish, and often, in the enthusiasm of the true antiquary, rises to magnificent heights” (Edda xv). We see in Beowulf a wonderful fusion of the Christian and the heroic, a moving interplay of Germanic elements, and a beautiful picture of its ancient society – all within a poem that is so skilfully written by an author whose passion is expressly woven in its passages. It is a shame that, as a work of English literature, it is severely understudied and undervalued. For, as a work of art, it is extremely majestic; as a social criticism, it is revealing; and as a story, it is legendary. Beowulf’s glory has stood the test of time; and, as our hero’s pyre, it continues to shine and light the way for those seeking to understand the past. Hwæt, Beowulf’s fame shall continue to be remembered.

 

Works Cited

A. and E. Keary. The Heroes of Asgard. New York: Mayflower Books, 1979. Print.

Bloom, Harold. Bloom’s Modern Critical Interpretations: Beowulf, Updated Edition. New             York: Infobase Publishing, 2007.

Brodeur, Arthur. The Art of Beowulf. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969.    Print.

—. The Prose Edda. New York: American Scandinavian Foundation, 1916. Print.

Dougherty, Martin. Vikings. London: Amber Books, 2013. Print.

Earl, James. Thinking About Beowulf. California: Stanford University Press, 1994. Print.

Greenblatt, Stephen. Simpson, and Alfred David. The Norton Anthology of English           Literature. 2 vols. New York: W.W. Norton &Company, 1962-2013. Print.

Hall, John. A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1916.          Print.

Heaney, Seamus. Beowulf. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2000. Print.

Mitchell, Bruce. An Invitation to Old English and Anglo-Saxon England. Oxford: Blackwell          Publishers, 1995. Print.

New International Version. Caloocan: Image Builders Services and Publishing Foundation,           1984.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays. Ed. Christopher Tolkien.   London: George Allen & Unwin Publishers, 1983. Print.