Beowulf and His Monsters

Beowulf fights three monsters: Grendel, Grendel's mother, and the dragon. These Anglo-Saxon monsters tell us a lot about the Anglo-Saxons and their suppressed doubts about themselves. After all, narrative monsters appear only when identities are in crisis.
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01:33 - Grendel
07:11 - Grendel's Mother
10:38 - The Dragon

[jessegonzales]

This was fantastic!!! Definitely deserves more views. Found my way here while researching for an assignment, but by happenstance I was just thinking today about how I think the best villains are ones that are uncomfortable reflections of us...Gollum for instance not only serves as a dark mirror to Frodo but displays the dangers of turning to unhealthy coping mechanisms and/or addictions. They can serve as a comfort for sadness but more often exacerbate it.

Thanks for these interesting insights!

[JulioRoman]

Interesting analysis. As a English student I am a big fan of Beowulf and hoped that more fantasy story is like it though in my opinion only Mr. Tolkien comes evenly close to it along with Robert E. Howard(Most fantasy authors these days are obsessive and nerdy not much in story and more interested in cosmology).

I would like to offer some extra commentary though
1.) Beowulf sword, the first one is hrunting given by Unferth who mocked beowulf for not beating Breca in swimming after Beowulf kill grendel, he offers his ancestor's sword which as describe in the poem as bloody which may also the reason why it fails to kill Grendel's mother because the sword is stained and Unferth in the poem is rather untrustworthy and seem to not really hold the hero in high-esteem

2.) There is also the character hondscio which is mentioned by-passing I do wonder if this character has significance since he is the only companion in Beowulf that is named. One thing we have to note as well is that Beowulf is damaged by fire and as such much of the poem given to us is only an extant of its full story(which is saddening and is also the reason why translating such a work is difficult)

3.) The sword Beowulf use to slay the mother is a sword forged by Giants at least the one similar to norse mythos, but it could have christian element to it by way of the sword vanishing after it was use to slay the mother signifiying that these giants are pagan in nature and as such imperfect craftsman, I would propose that both Grendel and his Mother could be giants as seen in such mythos albeit an anglo saxon variant(Anglo saxon has many different variant of norse mythos from the name of their pagan gods, to the creatures such as elves and giants etc.). I also see Grendel's mother as a sort of witch as she seem to know a lot of the heathenistic legacy in her though she known no magic she does possess utter wickedness and has kept sword forge by giants.

4.) Grendel is the kin of Cain. I am not much sure how aware the scribe is when it comes to biblical stories but in the bible it is mentioned that whoever struck down cain's descendant will be curse many times depending on how long that descendant is from the line, so one could wonder if Beowulf was cursed the moment he slew Grendel and then Grendel's mother and was fated a painful death by the fight of the dragon as a symbol of his fate being sealed though it could may be argue against due to amount of time ot passed since the battle of both beast.

These are few of my observations, studying this poem was interesting and as an fantasy author I am influenced by these and classical epic poems, I find them more interesting than book series that seems the talk of today.

[berkayakkaya]

Good talk sir. Helped me a lot. Such an interesting subject to have a chat about.