The Ending of Beowulf (#3)

I believe that the lack of women in Beowulf's life, as well as in the whole poem, is reflective to how women were viewed during that time. Women served as housekeepers, lovers (but essentially objects), and child-bearers. They had to cater to the man's needs at all times. I think that this view is obviously shown by the few female characters in Beowulf. They did what they were told and rarely overstepped their boundaries. This is important to how the layout of the poem was displayed.

Something that stood out to me particularly at the end of Beowulf was the point that Beowulf never got married. Although the tragic poem never goes into great detail about Beowulf's family life, it seems like the aspect of women was lacking in his life. There was never any discussion of women being an interest to him and I found that very surprising. The poem somewhat gives the effect that he is more in love with obtaining glory than obtaining a wife. Beowulf spent the majority of his life seeking to gain that heroic status and seemed to put everything else on the back burner until it was too late. It is not until Beowulf is laying dying after being poisoned by the dragon that he voices any evidence of being lonely. As he was dying, he did not say anything about having regrets about not marrying, but you can see Beowulf's tone shift in a paternal way: "'Now is the time when I would have wanted my own son, had it been my fortune to have fathered an heir and live on in his flesh'" (2729-32). But even with that being said, Beowulf did not imply that he wanted a son for the sole reason of having a son. Instead, he wanted a son for the selfish reason of them carrying out his legacy. Maybe with some maternal structure, Beowulf's life would have turned out differently.

Comments

  1. UnknownSeptember 24, 2017 at 9:43 AM

    Yea I agree with you that Beowulf had a lack of women in his life and you did not really here much about Beowulf's mother either. Beowulf was so focused on glory and making a name for himself that he forgot to find a wife or have any kinds of his own. As Beowulf is laying there dying he thinks back on his life and what he is going to do about his people since he has no heir to his throne. I feel kind of bad for Beowulf in the end because he spent his whole life not really living. He was always in constant stress on how to rule his kingdom because did not think about what would happen to his people after he had died without a ruler. He did not think about all the enemies that he has that might come for the kingdom and know that he has no heir to the throne.

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  2. Raquel GorresSeptember 25, 2017 at 9:39 PM

    I love your interpretation that the way women are viewed and treated in the poem, is directly related to the lack of women in Beowulf’s life. I also love how you tied in the fact Beowulf never got married, and instead of regretting that, he regrets not having an heir, and even then, he didn’t regret it, he just wished he had one. I never would have come up with this theory, but I’m glad you were able to bring it to light. Beowulf never spoke about women, or of a desire to get married, he just wanted to fight and prove himself worthy in battle. That almost directly correlated to the lack of women throughout the text, and the women who are mentioned, their actions being focused on lifting the morale of the soldiers before or after a fight.

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