MAPACA

Mid-Atlantic Popular &
American Culture Association

The figure of Grendel’s mother is problematic. Her narrative lacks grounding, shifting on the tongues of various narrators, and burdened by the textual expectations of the heroic; similarly, scholarship has demonstrated that her identity is unstable, from the pointed absence of her name to her titles of “monster” and “hag.” Though many disagree on her narrative definition, most recognize the significance of reputation in the construction of Grendel’s mother, and her altercations with the titular hero. Reputation – significantly, Beowulf’s –drives the scholarship of Grendel’s mother, scholars citing legend- and name-building as primary motivators for the textual treatment this enigmatic monster receives. According to Dana Oswald, she threatens Beowulf’s reputation and the patriarchal system with her monstrous autonomy, and thus requires narrative marginalization, while Christine Alfano resents the traditional interpretation of the character as monstrous at all, calling for a feminist reevaluation of the linguistic tradition that codes her as such. Both of these readings focus on the negative connotations of Grendel’s mother’s identity, but another definition is suggested in the lines of the poem’s second struggle: that of monstrous mother as worthy and honorable adversary. Beowulf’s actions and words suggest that the “hag” possesses more honor than her man-guzzling son, and that she is owed (perhaps begrudgingly) respect for the strength of her body and her morality, in light of her own actions, and by comparison to the text’s other mothers. Ultimately, her otherness divorces her from the weak and negative examples of femininity and maternity of the text, suggesting that her monstrosity is superior to, and potentially more successful than, patriarchal traditions. “‘[G]rief-racked and ravenous’: Into the Cave with Grendel’s Mother” seeks to challenge the understanding of monstrosity as projected on Grendel’s mother, reexamining questions of threat and adversarial honor, and illuminating her role as a positively monstrous mother.