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: Beowulf to Lord of the Rings... John Grigson and Doris Lee Gomez  ( 5621 )
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« : November 17, 2005, 03:47:32 PM »

Doris and John have said that we can copy their flowchart here for us to read and comment on:


Here I am again in my pondering form with a refined but not yet polished chart of Beowulf connections. Please comment John or anyone so I can continue to improve it.
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GRIGSBY'S RESEARCH ON ANCIENT FERTILITY MYTHS
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STORYLINE # Two-faced fertility goddess is GIVER(maiden/spring)-TAKER(hag/late fall). Her husband/son is a sheaf (grain) god who dies (is harvested) in late fall to sprout in the spring as a seedling-young again. Earth is seem as both womb and tomb

BASIS #Tragic tale based on agricultural cycle, death leads to new life in a yearly cycle.

KEY ELEMENTS #Goddess worship linked to rivers and lakes. Sometimes goddess lives under the lake. Priestesses drink intoxicating mead which gives them power to tell future. Males sacrificed to the goddess strangled and sunk in a bog to rise again in spring. -Myths involve trolls, orcs, elves, dwarves and giants.

Goddess as taker/psychopomp in form of animal spirit (raven, wolf, sow) takes souls of dead to otherworld for rebirth.
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GRIGSBY'S RESEARCH ON ODIN MYTHOLOGY
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STORYLINE #Odin,god of war, also known as Geat ‘the Goth’, chooses those who died bravely on the battlefield to live again in Valhalla(mead hall in the sky), (derived from role of Goddess as psychopomp) practicing battle skills daily for RAGNAROK , an end of world battle against the unworthy, held prisoner in Hel. Between Valhalla and Hel is "Middle Earth"

BASIS #Hero Cycle Saga based on war-hero's quest to triumph bravely over the physical challenges of war. Good vs Evil. Heroic death leads to new life.The end of all life in postponed to RAGNAROK

KEY ELEMENTS #Odin barters an eye to gain the intoxicating drink of inspiration. He has two wolves in his hall which are linked to his image. He wanders through his worlds disguised as an old grey-bearded man in a wide brimmed hat. Through knowledge of rebirth gleaned from fertility Goddesses is able to die and be reborn on the world tree Yggdrasil. Men sometimes believed to be "hag ridden" suffocated by an old woman straddling their chests. Heroic dead buried in ships. Myths include dwarves and rings of power.

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BERZINS' FILM, BEOWULF AND GRENDEL, RETELLING BEOWULF POEM
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STORYLINE #Beowulf the Geat journeys to Daneland to help King Hrothgar slay an evil troll, Grendel who has been killing the king's warriors in the mead hall. Once there he encounters a young beautiful witch (priestess)who can fortell people's deaths. This witch bestrides him and figuratively "takes his breath away". Through her, Beowulf learns that Grendel the troll has been wronged by Hrothgar's warriors. The tale ends much as the poem with the death of the troll and the hag trying to strangle Beowulf who defends himself with her powerful sword and kills her.

BASIS #Classic tragedy with flawed men sowing the seeds of their own destruction, based on possible raw human events that serve as a prequel to the Beowulf poem. Hero triumphs over a physical challenge, but is spiritually torn by the choices he makes. Not good vs evil, but human shades of grey

KEY ELEMENTS #Beowulf, warriors, a quest, mead hall witch/priestess able to tell future associated with troll and a hag who lives under a lake and tries to strangle Beowulf.

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GRIGSBYS RESEARCH ON ORAL BEOWULF SAGA
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STORYLINE # Beowulf (literally barley grain-wolf) comes as a righteous warrior to kill Grendel, an evil troll who has been beheading the warriors of King Hrothgar the Ring-Giver in the mead hall. Ultimately Sea Hag, the troll's mother, who lives under the lake is also killed after bestriding and trying to strangle Beowulf. Beowulf uses her sword which loses its powers after her death. Beowulf emerges triumphant from what might have been a watery grave, to be killed as an old man, slaying a dragon and buried in a burial mound. Monsters include troll, Sea Hag, giants and orc.

BASIS # Hero cycle saga, celebrating triumph of Odin, represented by Beowulf, over older fertility goddesses represented by the troll and hag. Hero's quest is to physically triumph over symbols of earlier fertility goddess. Good vs evil.

KEY ELEMENTS # Sheaf god/ Odin/Geat (Symbol wolves)folded into Beowulf the Geat, fertility godesses living under the lake appear as Sea Hag-sword representing her power which shrinks after she dies, hero must descent into water as early male sacrifices were sunk into bogs, but emerges victorious.

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WRITTEN BEOWULF POEM
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STORYLINE # Same story as before but framed with a Christian viewpoint. Troll becomes spawn of Cain. Warrior virtues are reinterpreted to be triumph of Christian values over pagan myths.

BASIS #Hero cycle story with Christian motifs laid over a pagan tale. Hero's quest is a physical and spiritual triumph over pagan myths.

KEY ELEMENTS # Same as Oral Beowulf

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TOLKIEN'S LORD OF THE RINGS
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STORYLINE #Frodo is entrusted with the ring of power which he must carry to Mount Doom to be destroyed. On the journey he is aided by Gandalf(old wizard in broad-brimmed hat), elves (whose queen, referred to as the ‘Lady’ - 'Freyja?-, can tell the future), dwarves the Riders of Rohan and an army of dead rising from a marsh., but is hindered by All-Seeing Eye, orcs and evil wizards. The quest begins as a physical journey, which becomes a spiritual struggle at it's end. Ultimately, Frodo is triumphant, but weakened by the ordeal he dies, passing to "Grey Haven" in a boat. (Frodo is not said to ‘die’ as such – but we can perhaps see his passing beyond the Grey havens as a metaphor for death as it is certainly the end of his life in this world)
Q. Might Celeborn and Galadriel – Lord and Lady be derivatives of Freyr and Freyja?
BASIS #Story begins as a hero cycle quest of physical challenges and ends as a spiritual struggle in which Frodo triumphs, but is mortally damaged (old Beowulf in his fight with the dragon.) This is a romantic tale of Good vs Evil with many moral shades of grey.

KEY ELEMENTS # Quest, horseback riding warriors(Riders of Rohan) future-telling powerful woman (Galadriel), the ring giver(Lord of the Rings), wide-brimmed hatted grey beard, Odin (Gandalf) who undergoes death and rebirth, orcs, dwarves, trolls, elves, dragons, Middle Earth, dead reborn from the marsh.

One more thought…not relevant to Tolkien as such, but to the LOTR films. One key element of Beowulf is his disappearance and presumed drowning in the marsh in which he fights Grendel’s mother – termed in the poem a ‘weargh’ or ‘warg’. In The Two Towers movie Aragorn, clearly the Beowulf of the tale, while fighting wargs – falls over a cliff and is presumed drowned – only to emerge safe to his friend’s relief and happiness. Was this rebirth symbolism introduced into the film consciously – or is the echo with Beowulf due to the recurrence of the same archetypal motif?
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Hope some of this is useful
John



All Keeps Well for those who Wait. Nai tiruvantel ar varyuvantel i Valar tielyanna nu Vilya
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« #1 : November 19, 2005, 02:31:51 AM »

  That was incredibly interesting to read..  I'd always heard that Tolkien dearly loved the story of Beowulf and drew great amounts of inspiration from it, but I'd never heard much about the actual story before..  That was really enlightening..

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« #2 : November 20, 2005, 05:17:51 AM »

Quote
Auerbach's use of 'political' may at first sight seem more justified; but it is not, I think, really admissible-not even if we acknowledge the weariness to which mere 'errantry' was reduced as the pastime reading of a class chiefly interested in feats of arms and love.  About as amusing to us (or to me) as are stories about cricket, or yarns about a touring team, to those who (like me) find cricket (as it now is) a ridiculous bore. But the feats of arms in (say) Arthurian Romance, or romances attached to that great centre of imagination, do not need to 'fit into a politically purposive pattern'.  So it was in the earlier Arthurian traditions. Or at least this thread of primitive but powerful imagination was an important element in them. As also in Beowulf. Auerbach should approve of Beowulf, for in it an author tried to fit a deed of 'errantry' into a complex political field: the English traditions of the international relations of Denmark, Gotland, and Sweden in ancient days. But that is not the strength of the story, rather its weakness. Beowulf's personal objects in his journey to Denmark are precisely those of a later Knight: his own renown, and above that the glory of his lord and king; but all the time we glimpse something deeper. Grendel is an enemy who has attacked the centre of the realm, and brought into the royal hall the outer darkness, so that only in daylight can the king sit upon the throne. This is something quite different and more horrible than a 'political' invasion of equals – men of another similar realm, such as Ingeld's later assault upon Heorot.
The overthrow of Grendel makes a good wonder-tale, because he is too strong and dangerous for any ordinary man to defeat, but it is a victory in which all men can rejoice because he was a monster, hostile to all men and to all humane fellowship and joy. Compared with him even the long politically hostile Danes and Gears were Friends, on the same side. It is the monstrosity and fairy-tale quality of Grendel that really makes the tale important, surviving still when the politics have become dim and the healing of Danish-Geatish relations in an 'entente cordiale' between two ruling houses a minor matter of obscure history. In that political world Grendel looks silly, though he certainly is not silly, however naif may be the poet's imagination and description of him.
Letter 183



All Keeps Well for those who Wait. Nai tiruvantel ar varyuvantel i Valar tielyanna nu Vilya
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