List of artistic depictions of Grendel's mother

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This list of artistic depictions of Grendel's mother (Old English: Grendles modor) refers to the figure of Grendel's mother. She is one of three antagonists (along with Grendel and the dragon) in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf (c. 700 – 1000 AD); she is never given a name in the text.

Grendel's mother has been adapted in a number of different media including film, literature, and graphic/illustrated novels or comic books.

Cinema

Grendel's mother, as portrayed by Layla Roberts in Beowulf

Layla Roberts portrayed Grendel's mother in Beowulf (1999), a fantasy/science fiction retelling directed by Graham Baker. While some of the film remains true to the original poem, other plot elements deviate from the original poem. She is depicted as a large black serpent-like creature whose heart is as evil as the devil himself. Her mate apparently is Cain after he had slain his brother Abel.

A "mother of the Wendol" appeared in The 13th Warrior (1999), directed by John McTiernan. The film is adapted from Eaters of the Dead, a 1976 novel by Michael Crichton. The novel and film are both reworkings of Beowulf which turn Grendel into cannibalistic hominids called "Wendol" (implied though not said definitively to be Neanderthals in the novel). Here Grendel's mother is the matriarch of the Wendol community, and they make effigies of her which are similar to the Venus of Willendorf.

Elva Ósk Ólafsdóttir portrayed Grendel's mother (referred to and billed as the "Sea Hag") in Beowulf & Grendel (2005), directed by Sturla Gunnarsson. While some of the film remains true to the original poem, other plot elements deviate from it. For example, three new characters are introduced – Grendel's father, the witch Selma, and Grendel's son – supplementing the action ascribed to Grendel's mother in the poem.

Angelina Jolie portrayed Grendel's mother in Beowulf (2007), directed by Robert Zemeckis. Her portrayal in this cinematic adaptation deviates from the original poem. As with Layla Robert's portrayal eight years prior, Jolie's character is a shapeshifting "seductress". Her true form, which resembles a golden-scaled amphibian-like creature, is only vaguely glimpsed in the film (but a figure sculpt released shows it in full.[1]). She convinces Beowulf to spare her life by appearing to him in the form of a beautiful naked woman, offering to make him the greatest king who ever lived if he will agree to give her a son to replace Grendel. She later gives birth to a dragon who attacks Beowulf's kingdom, and gives Beowulf a final kiss before his ship sinks into the sea. The movie ends ambiguously with the implication that she may attempt to seduce Wiglaf.

Literature

Grendel's mother has appeared in a few works of contemporary literature. Perhaps the most well known appearance is in the 1971 John Gardner novel, Grendel. In this retelling of the Beowulf from Grendel's point of view, Grendel describes his mother as "my pale, slightly glowing, fat mother [...] life-bloated, baffled, long-suffering hag. Guilty, she imagines, of some unremembered, perhaps ancestral crime."[2] He further states later in the text, "she gets up on all fours, brushing dry bits of bone from her path, and with a look of terror, rising as if by unnatural power, she hurls herself across the void and buries me in her bristly fur [...] she smells of wild pig and fish."[3]

Grendel's mother appears in Eaters of the Dead by Michael Crichton, as the "mother of the Wendol", hominids attacking and eating Hrothgar's people. She is described as resembling a Venus figurine.

Both Grendel and his mother appear in Neil Gaiman's novella The Monarch of the Glen.

Grendel and "Grendel's ma" or "Grendel's mum" are also characters in Suniti Namjoshi's 1993 postmodern collection of feminist fairytales, St Suniti and the Dragon.[4][5] Consisting of non-sequential poetry and prose, St Suniti and the Dragon focuses on the adventures of St. Suniti, a female saint-in-training. During these adventures, St. Suniti has a number of encounters with Grendel and Grendel's ma.

Caitlin R. Kiernan's novelization of the 2007 Robert Zemeckis film Beowulf develops the background of this version of Grendel's mother.[6] In Kiernan's version, Grendel's mother is the Germanic fertility goddess Nerthus: "Long before the coming of the Danes, there were men in this land who named her Hertha and Nerthus [...] they worshiped her in sacred groves" (156). She is also a dökkálfar: "You listen to me Unferth, Ecglaf's son, and heed my words. I cannot say for certain what that thing is, for there is glamour upon it. The most powerful glamour I have ever glimpsed. There is dökkálfar magic at work here, I believe. I have seen their handiwork before" (254).

Susan Signe Morrison adapts the character in her recent novel Grendel's Mother: The Saga of the Wyrd-Wife using "alliterative, lyric prose that evokes the Old English of her source text."[7] In Morrison's text, Grendel's mother is portrayed as being human, washed upon the shores of Denmark. Morrison's Grendel's mother focuses on a human rather than a supernatural retelling of the classic text, with the character representing an integration between the old ways of the Scandinavian/Germanic tribes, and early Christianity.[8]

Comics

Video games

Music

Television

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Grendel's Mother figurine
  2. ↑ Gardner, John. "Grendel." New York: Knopf, 1971:11.
  3. ↑ Gardner, John. "Grendel." New York: Knopf, 1971:29.
  4. ↑ Namjoshi, Suniti. St Suniti and the Dragon, North Melbourne: Spinifex, 1993.
  5. ↑ St Suniti And The Dragon
  6. ↑ Beowulf by Catilin R. Keirnan
  7. ↑
  8. ↑
  9. ↑ Grendel's mother, Beowulf: Dragon Slayer, Issue 2 Archived October 24, 2009, at the Wayback Machine.
  10. ↑ Grendel's mother, Beowulf (1984) Archived October 16, 2007, at the Wayback Machine.
  11. ↑ Grendel's mother, Beowulf (1987) Archived September 27, 2007, at the Wayback Machine.
  12. ↑ Zopilote Machine
  13. ↑ "The Rheingold" in Xena: Warrior Princess (season 6)
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