Annotation: Christine Alfano - "The Issue of Feminine Monstrosity"

Since the last annotation I put up was of Signe Carlson's "The Monsters of Beowulf," it seemed appropriate to continue along the path she opened up for the next two annotations. Carlson's argument is solid in its conclusion about Grendel's Mother, but is flawed in its methodology overall in the assumption that you can strip the Christianity out of Beowulf. The article I've annotated for today's post focuses squarely on Grendel's Mother and builds upon Carlson's work. In news related to the project, I just got two books in. Yesterday I got Short Stuff, an anthology of YA queer love stories centered on the theme of the meet cute. Julia Ember's story in there, "Gilded Scales," is loosely inspired by Beowulf. No analogues for Grendel or his Mother in the story (only the dragon), so not a lot of room for the story to be involved in the project, but it's a good read that's timely in Pride month. The story very much fits the cute part of the meet cute. Definitely worth a read. This morning I got Toni Morrison's Mouth Full of Blood. One of the obvious reasons for buying it is because of the essay "Grendel and His Mother," which will soon have an annotation and be included in the large wealth of resources gathered here. I do look forward to reading several of the pieces here. There's an essay called "Race and Fascism," which seems particularly relevant as we see the response from the government to the current protests following the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor (and so many others over the years). Honestly, there's a lot of room for thinking about race in relation to Grendel and his Mother, and Maria Dahvana Headley's The Mere Wife is a book that recasts the Beowulf narrative into a modern narrative that is highly appropriate to current events. I have a feeling that when I'm working on Headley's and some other adaptations, Toni Morrison will be very helpful. I also suspect that Morrison's essay will fit well with the Carlson and Alfano essays (and the Hennequin essay I'll post as my next annotation). And if you haven't guessed at this point, to be clear: Black Lives Matter, and I'm not interested in perpetuating the racism that is rather endemic to medieval studies and academia. But we'll talk more about racism in academia and medieval studies in the future - there are plenty of annotations to work with on that theme.

And with that, here's the annotation for Christine Alfano's article.

Alfano, Christine. “The Issue of Feminine Monstrosity: A Reevaluation of Grendel’s Mother,” Comitatus: A Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 23.1 (1992): 1-16.

Alfano picks up from Carlson, and not a lot has changed about the perception of Grendel’s Mother since feminist literary criticism has emerged. Alfano disabuses us of the notion that feminist criticism or even an increased number of women doing scholarship would rescue Grendel’s Mother from her unearned monstrous reputation (10). Alfano picks up from Carlson and analyzes the wording in the Old English, discusses how translation and lexicography influences the perception of Grendel’s Mother, and assesses the state of criticism in 1992. Lexically, she tackles the terms aglæcwif, wælgæst, ellorgæstas, grundwyrgenne, and brimwylf and finds evidence of monstrosity lacking warrant in each of them (4-8). Some of the blame for the continued monstrosity of Grendel’s Mother even in feminist readings of the text, in Alfano’s estimation, comes from an uncritical reliance on the “woman-as-monster” trope developed in feminist scholarship of 19th-century literature and the monstrous imagery attached to women, pioneered by scholars like Gilbert, Gubar, and Auerbach (11). The uncritical acceptance of this trope, however, leads to reading monstrous imagery as monstrosity itself. One thing I find additionally compelling, and I may consider keeping track of this as I work on the project, is Alfano’s assessment of the status of the field. She evaluates several translations and also offers good evidence of the continued figuring of Grendel’s Mother as monstrous even by feminist critics and women writing on her. I believe that it would make a compelling portion of an introduction to trace the monstrosity of Grendel’s Mother in the criticism over time, especially using Carlson (1967), Alfano (the present article), and Hennequin (2008) as signposts. By appearances, three women have attempted to make the case for Grendel’s Mother’s humanity as opposed to monstrosity, but has the scholarship taken them up on the potential revolution?