Grendel and the Pleasures and Uses of Fear

1. Grendel and the Pleasures and Uses of Fear Alice Jorgensen School of English Trinity College, Dublin

2. Gliding through the shadows came the walker in the night; the warriors slept whose task was to hold the horned building, all except one. It was well-known to men that the demon could not drag them to the shades without God’s willing it; yet the one man kept unblinking watch. He awaited, heart swelling with anger against his foe, the ordeal of battle. Down off the moorlands’ misting fells came Grendel stalking; God’s brand was on him. The spoiler meant to snatch away from the high hall some of the human race. He came on under the clouds, clearly saw at last the gold-hall of men, the mead-drinking place nailed with gold plates. That was not the first visit he had paid to the hall of Hrothgar the Dane; he never before and never after harder luck nor hall-guards found. Walking to the hall came this warlike creature condemned to agony. The door gave way, toughened with iron, at the touch of those hands. Rage-inflamed, wreckage-bent, he ripped open the jaws of the hall. Hastening on, the foe then stepped onto the unstained floor, angrily advanced: out of his eyes stood an unlovely light like that of fire. Beowulf 702b-27 Trans. Michael Alexander

3. Lines 4-11: King Scyld Oft Scyld Scefing     sceaþena þreatum, monegum mægþum,     meodosetla ofteah, egsode eorlas.     Syððan ærest wearð feasceaft funden,     he þæs frofre gebad, weox under wolcnum,     weorðmyndum þah, oðþæt him æghwylc     þara ymbsittendra ofer hronrade     hyran scolde, gomban gyldan.     Þæt wæs god cyning! Often Scyld Scefing dragged away the mead benches from bands of foes, from many tribes – struck terror into men. From the time when first he was found destitute (he received consolation for that) he flourished beneath the skies, prospered in honours until every one of those who dwelt around about him across the whale’s road had to obey him, pay him tribute. That was a great king! - Trans. Michael Swanton

4. Terror and sorrow • Danish counsellors discuss what to do ‘wiðfærgryrum’ (l. 174) (‘against sudden terrors’) • Beowulf has heard that a ‘deogoldædhata…eaweðþurhegsanuncuðnenið’ (275-6), a ‘mysterious persecutor …shows unheard-of hostility through terror’ • the gryreof Grendel’s mother is ‘the less by just so much as the power of girls, the war-terror (wiggryre) of a woman, is that of an armed man’ (1282-4) • At Grendel’s attacks Hrothgar suffers torn (147) andexperiences sidrasorga‘wide sorrows’ (149)

5. 138-46: Danes sleep elsewhere Þa wæs eaðfynde     þe him elles hwær gerumlicor     ræste sohte, bed æfter burum,     ða him gebeacnod wæs, gesægd soðlice     sweotolan tacne healðegnes hete;     heold hyne syðþan fyr ond fæstor     se þæm feonde ætwand. Swa rixode     ond wið rihte wan, ana wið eallum,     oðþæt idel stod husa selest.     Then it was easy to find the man who was seeking a couch for himself elsewhere, a bed among the outbuildings farther away, once this hall-thane’s hatred was made clear by manifest proof. Whoever escaped the fiend held himself afterwards farther off and more securely. Thus one held sway over all and strove against right until the best of houses stood deserted.

6. 473-9: Hrothgar speaks of Grendel Sorh is me to secganne     on sefan minum gumena ængum     hwæt me Grendel hafað hynðo on Heorote     mid his heteþancum, færniða gefremed.     Is min fletwerod, wigheap gewanod;     hie wyrd forsweop on Grendles gryre.     God eaþe mæg þone dolsceaðan     dæda getwæfan. It grieves my heart to tell any man what humiliation, sudden violence, Grendel has inflicted on me in Heorot with his notions of hatred. My hall-troop, fighting band, has shrunk; fate has swept them away in Grendel’s terror. God could easily sever the mad ravager from his deeds!

7. 1468-71: Unferth fails to win glory Selfane dorste under yðagewinaldregeneþan, drihtscypedreogan; þær he dome forleas, ellenmærðum. He himself did not dare risk his life, perform noble deeds of valour beneath the turmoil of waves; there he forfeited glory, his reputation for courage.

8. 1992-4: Hygelac’s anxiety for Beowulf Ic ðæs modceare sorhwylmum seað,     siðe ne truwode leofes mannes I have brooded over this with anxiety of mind, surging grief, mistrusting the venture of my beloved man

9. The ‘hydraulic model’ • Leslie Lockett, Anglo-Saxon Psychologies in the Vernacular and Latin Traditions (Toronto, 2011) • Emotions such as rage and grief cause surging, boiling, heat and constriction in the chest cavity • Relief from such emotions is associated with roominess and cooling • Lockett argues this is understood as a physical process, not a metaphor

10. 445-51: Beowulf envisages his possible fate Na þuminneþearft hafalanhydan,     ac he me habban wile dreorefahne,     gif mecdeaðnimeð. Byreðblodigwæl,     byrgeanþenceð, eteðangengaunmurnlice, mearcaðmorhopu;     no ðuymb mines ne þearft licesfeormelengsorgian. You will have no need to cover my head if death takes me, for he will have me dripping with gore; he will carry away the bloody corpse, intent on eating it. The lone prowler will devour it remorselessly, staining his wasteland retreat; you will no longer need to trouble yourself about caring for my body.

11. 3148b-55: The Geats Mourn Beowulf Higum unrote modceare mændon,     mondryhtnes cwealm; swylce giomorgyd     Geatisc meowle bundenheorde song sorgcearig     swiðe geneahhe þæt hio hyre heofungdagas     hearde ondrede, wælfylla worn,     werudes egesan, hynðo ond hæftnyd.     Heofon rece swealg. With cheerless spirits they bewailed their souls’ sorrow, the death of their leader. Likewise, a Geatish woman, sorrowful, her hair bound up, sang a mournful lay, chanted clamorously again and again that she sorely feared days of lamentation for herself, a multitude of slaughters, the terror of an army, humiliation and captivity. Heaven swallowed up the smoke.

12. Because Anglo-Saxon England was continuously faced with challenges to its integrity and self-definition, the hybrid body of the monster becomes a communal form for expressing anxieties about the limits and fragility of identity. Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Of Giants: Sex, Monsters, and the Middle Ages (Minneapolis, 1999), p. xvii

13. British Library, Cotton Vitellius A. xv (s. x/xi) • Life of St Christopher • Marvels of the East (also in BL Cotton Tiberius B.v) • The Letter of Alexander to Aristotle • Beowulf • Judith Left: f. 102v, detail

14. Left: Pitt-Rivers’ excavation of Wor Barrow, Dorset (1893-4) Tenth- and eleventh-century charter boundaries record the pools, bogs, meres, and ditches where the þyrs(monster), scucca(demon), ent(giant), pūca(goblin), and nicor(water spirit) lurked; we even find Grendelespyttand Grendelesgata. John Blair, Building Anglo-Saxon England (Princeton, 2018), p. 76

15. Let the Word of God be read at the clergy’s meals. There it is proper to hear the reader, not the harpist; the sermons of the Fathers, not the songs of the heathens. What has Ingeld to do with Christ? The house is narrow, it cannot hold them both. The King of heaven will have no fellowship with so-called kings who are pagan and damned, for the Eternal King reigns in Heaven, while the pagan is damned and laments in Hell. The voices of readers should be heard in your houses, not the crowd of revelers in the streets. Letter of Alcuin to ‘Speratus’, dated 797

16. Vercelli IV, ll. 1-4 Men þaleofestan, iceowbidde 7 eaðmodlicelæreþætgewepen 7 forhtien on þyssemedmiclan tide for eowrumsynnum, for þan ne bioðeowretearas 7 eowrehreowsunga for nohtgetealde on þæretoweardanworulde. Most beloved men, I bid and humbly teach you that you weep and fear for your sins in this short time, because your tears and your lamentations will be reckoned as nothing in the world to come.

17. 175-85 The hope of heathens Hwilum hie geheton     æt hærgtrafum wigweorþunga,     wordum bædon þæt him gastbona     geoce gefremede wið þeodþreaum.     Swylc wæs þeaw hyra, hæþenra hyht;     helle gemundon in modsefan,     metod hie ne cuþon, dæda demend,     ne wiston hie drihten god, ne hie huru heofena helm     herian ne cuþon, wuldres waldend.     Wa bið þæm ðe sceal þurh sliðne nið     sawle bescufan in fyres fæþm At times they took vows of idol-worship at heathen shrines, prayed aloud that the slayer of souls would render aid against the nation’s calamities. Such was their custom, the hope of heathens; they turned their minds towards hell; they were ignorant of Providence, the Judge of deeds, they knew not the Lord God, nor indeed did they know how to worship the Protector of Heaven, the Ruler of Glory. It will go ill for him who as a result of terrible malice must thrust his soul into the fire’s embrace.

18. 494b-8: Poetry and Joy in Heorot Þegn nytte beheold, se þe on handa bær     hroden ealowæge, scencte scir wered.     Scop hwilum sang hador on Heorote.     Þær wæs hæleða dream, duguð unlytel     Dena ond Wedera. The thane who carried in his hands a decorated ale-cup did his duty, poured out the sweet drink. From time to time a minstrel sang, a clear voice in Heorot. There was rejoicing among heroes, no small company of Danes and Weders.