Beowulf and Grendel: the fight

ANALISI

The text is extracted from the old English poem Beowulf (lines 710-717; 738-753; 804; 814-827). 

It deals with the fight between Beowulf and the monster Grendel. 

The lines reported have different structure and lengths. 

There are four paragraphs, each of which describe different scenes of the fight. The first paragraph introduces Grendel (the monster) that comes looking for it’s prey in Hrothgar’s dwelling. The second paragraph describes the monsters violent and aggressive attacks and his first encounter with Beowulf and his surprisingly physical strength. The third paragraph continues discussing the struggle between Beowulf, Grendel and Beowulf’s warriors coming in his defence unknowingly that their weapons would not harm the monster. The fourth and last paragraph tells of Beowulf’s victory against the monster who is driven to his desolate lair, fatally hurt.

Generally when you analyze the text you can notice the presence of many enjambments and alliterations and particular narrative strategies adopted by the narrator to express different situations and descriptions.

Section one is interesting to bring to surface the narrative strategy adopted by the narrator to describe the characteristics of the location: it’s gloomy, misty, dark and cloudy. Features that are all suggested by the language used. Immediately in this paragraph the narrator wants to give a first idea of the monster’s features, such as his being a predator looking for his prey on the grounds of Hrothgar’s dwelling. His predatory nature is marked by the verb “hunting” at line 4. At line 2 there is a repetition of the sound g- that recalls the name of the monster (Grendel), underlines one of his features (greedy) and the fact that he is God-cursed.

Section two is extremely interesting to bring to surface the narrative strategy adopted by the narrator to make the reader visualise the monster’s features and attitude. He is immediate, fast, sudden, voracious, a predator and, last but not least, greedy. All that is suggested by the language used. Literary use of lines connects different parts of the narration, highlighting certain aspects and leading others in the background. The use of inversion at line 9 puts “the expression” the creature into a better focus. What the narrator is interested in bringing to surface is the nature of the monster. Struck and started in, together with grab, bite and gorged are all action verbs that make the reader see the monsters behaviour and in addition they are all monosyllabic verbs recreating the dynamism of the monsters behaviour. The reader can really feel what is going on and symbolically the figure of the victim rests in its bloody parts, utterly lifeless. There are many alliterations in the whole paragraph, like at line 12, where there is a repetition of the sound b- to mark and make the reader really feel the sounds and actions produced by Grendel in killing the man – sound (b-) which is also used at line 23, but to underline the fear of the monster, understanding he had no escape.

Section three brings to the surface the narrative strategy adopted by the narrator to describe Beowulf’s warriors who come to defend their lord and fight with courage during the battle against Grendel, the monster. They are loyal, strong and try to do their best, striking out on every side, seeking to cut straight to the soul. But they can’t damage their enemy because their weapons had been tricked. This last particular is dramatically underlined by the narrator, as if he wanted the reader to understand the immortality of the monster to human strength (lines 31-32-33). At line 31 the intelligent reader can see the unawareness of what the men were going up against, at line 32 the narrator points out the immortality of Grendel against mortal objects, and at line 33 the word “ever” underlines even more the power of the demon opponent. Even in this paragraph there are some alliterations, like the repetition of the sound l- at line 27, to mark the presence of Beowulf’s warriors, who had arrived to protect their lord.