This thesis reaffirms the Celtic influence on Beowulf. The first chapter reevaluates past attempts to demonstrate a Celtic connection with particular emphasis on the work of Martin Puhvel and R. Mark Scowcroft. The second chapter compares Grendel’s Mother to the Lady of the Lake, from the Prose Lancelot, using the Celtic water hag motif. The third chapter analyzes how Grendel exemplifies the Celtic motifs of the violent child and the wild man by comparing him with Cu Chulainn, from the Táin Bó Cúailnge, Lancelot, from the Prose Lancelot, and the Celtic wild man tales surrounding Suibhne, Myrddin, and Lailoken. The final chapter uses Michael D. C. Drout’s Lexomic analysis and a network analysis by Pádraig Mac Carron and Ralph Kenna to problematize the assumed unity of the text. Therefore, this thesis provides both narrative and textual evidence to validate the Celtic influence on Beowulf.

My dissertation applies narrative theory and ordinary language philosophy to two major works bookending medieval English literature: Beowulf and Le Morte Darthur. Capitalizing on the descriptive power of narrative theory's lexicon, I outline the aesthetics, rhetoric, and other effects on the reader when these medieval writers depict transgressive movements--theoretically termed metalepsis--across borders in the story world, and over boundaries separating that world from our own. I often find that spatial transgressions, as they are visualized in narrative terms, entail or simultaneously occur with a breakdown of the fourth wall separating fiction from its audience. Malory's Sir Lancelot crosses into a spiritual world in pursuit of the Holy Grail only to arrive at an awareness of his existence as narrated fiction. My dissertation argues that moments like this, first analyzed through narrative theory, challenge the reader to recognize the fictional character's force of life, and in so doing expand the imagination to reconsider those metaphysical distinctions that have long rendered the nonhuman inferior. Those distinctions are unnecessary and often senseless, I argue. The ethics of reading fiction that I propose seeks the acknowledgment of limits to knowledge, to what we can claim to know about literature, its characters, and, indeed, our fellow human beings. Given that they are constructed by our ordinary language use, fictional characters are the essence of the other. Fictions, then, and as Stanley Cavell would agree, serve as testing grounds for our capacities of acknowledgment. I argue that both the Beowulf poet and Malory fashioned fictional worlds that preserve a secular heroism from potentially hostile contexts. In the process, these medieval narratives show us that fictional characters move us as a matter of ordinary language--our ordinary interactions with narrative: they play a significant role in our lives that cannot be reduced to any particular theory. There is no need for recourse to ontological, or theological, frameworks to invest them with some unutterable or mysterious meaning. They matter as a matter of course.

Beowulf's contest with Grendel has universally been read as an assertion of heroic agency. Yet as I demonstrate, this purportedly neutral convention derives from the misreading of a riddle design that invites and then disrupts expectation in the accidental denouement of Grendel's self-destruction. As an alternative to heroic misprision, I locate Beowulf's salient analogues in the poetic hagiographies, Andreas and Juliana. Within these poems I demonstrate a distinctive Christian critique, which defines heroic order through its assertion of loyalty to insiders and enmity to outsiders, and aligns with René Girard's anthropology in marking enmity both as a source of social cohesion and instability. I also demonstrate a distinctive "crossover poetics" that switches godly and demonic attributes between the opposed communities. As this crossover design gives rise to tropes of heroic-hagiographic hybridity, it exposes a biblical prophetic distinction between the physical realm of objects, actions, and words, and the metaphysical realm of emotional, ethical, and relational principles--a distinction by which the poem locates the origin of enmity in the idolatrous gestalt of egoistic materialism and the origin of loyalty in the covenant ethos of transcendent affiliation. This crossover design, moreover, functions in rapprochement with heroic culture, to affirm the godliness of loyalty and reject demonic enmity, while also interrogating the idolatrous potentiality of Christian discourse. As an alternative to the instabilities marked within heroic social order, the hagiographies offer a new social order based in a two-fold conception: a Christological model that entails compassion for enemies and self-sacrificing obedience to the covenant ethos, and a prophetic model that resists violent contagion through egoistic effacement, entailed in acts of divine praise and benevolent prayer. Lacking these redemptive disciplines, Beowulf's pagan fictive world nevertheless incorporates the same hagiographic critique, but through dystopian patterns of demonic inversion. Thus, Beowulf synthesizes the cardinal hagiographic elements--the same narrative arcs, lexical patterns, and crossover poetics--in a drama that schools its audience in prophetic discernment: to see the essential, defining reality beneath the surface of human events and to recognize patterns of divine retribution as paradoxical enactments of demonic self- destruction.

Beowulf presents a literary starting point in the discussion of peace weaving, reflecting the primary focus of Anglo Saxon epic poetry on the male hero rather than the peace weaver. Scholarship on peace weaving figures in the poem tend to negatively perceive the lack of female presence, and determine the tradition as one set up for failure. Adding historical peace weavers like Queen Emma to the discourse encourages scholars to view smaller successes, like temporary peace, as building on each other to ultimately cause the peace weaver to be successful at her task. From studying the life of Queen Emma, the continuous struggle of such a figure to be an influential presence in her nation is more evident. Combining the images of peace weaving set down by literature and then history prove that figures participating in the tradition are as vital to the heroic world as the warrior himself.

In 7 scenens I describe differenses between the book and the film Beowuf. I use the scene when he arrrives in the boat, the watchman at the score, Beowulf´s arrive at the hall, a fighting scene, the moster´s mother, Finn the Frisian and the dragon

This thesis aims to discuss the heroic and the monstrous aspects of Beowulf. In the heroic part, I will discuss Beowulf as a culture hero and a mythological hero; in the monstrous part, I will discuss Beowulf as a monster-man and monsters as man-monsters. Beowulf is about a hero who intends to prove himself by killing malicious monsters. The victory over the villains further brings Beowulf the character to the Geatish throne, though Beowulf¡¦s obsession with glory finally results in the fall of his kingdom. Beowulf¡¦s rise represents the rise of the Geatish kingdom and meritocracy; and his fall also triggers the fall of the kingdom. Beowulf¡¦s journey to the Danish kingdom also resembles Joseph Campbell¡¦s theories of mythological heroes. Beowulf has been regarded as a hero for decades, but however heroic, Beowulf embodies some monstrous tendencies. His rationale to kill repugnant monsters and gain glory in return does not work on the combat with Grendel¡¦s mother and the fire dragon, since the ogress kills Aeschere in order to avenge her only son¡¦s death; and the dragon causes strife because of the theft. The monsters, on the other hand, are somewhat heroic since they know the ethics of vengeance.

Beowulf is preserved in a single manuscript written out around the year 1000, but there are many reasons to believe that the poem was composed several centuries before this particular act of manual reproduction. Most significantly, the meter of Beowulf reveals that the poet regularly observed distinctions of etymological length that became phonologically indistinct before 725 in Mercia. This dissertation gauges the explanatory power of the hypothesis that Beowulf was composed about three centuries before the production of the extant manuscript. The following studies test the hypothesis of archaic composition by determining whether it is able to accommodate independent forms of evidence drawn from the fields of linguistics, textual criticism, and literary history.

Thesis--Aarhus. / Summary in Danish. Includes bibliographical references (p. 321-335) and index.

In this thesis I attempt to trace the development of the criticism of Old English poetic diction and figuration from the earliest general comments to the present detailed analyses. To do so, I have examined as many statements as possible on these two specific areas as well as many on Old English poetic style in general. Because diction and figuration were among the last aspects of Old English poetry to receive serious critical attention, it has not been easy to locate comments made prior to the mid-nineteenth century. Chapter I covers most of these earliest comments, none of which is particularly valuable today. The Anglo-Saxon period left a few vague hints; the Middle English period left virtually none; and although the Renaissance was responsible for the preservation of most of the Old English poetic manuscripts, it was more concerned with the religion and history of the period than with the literature. The late seventeenth century and early eighteenth century witnessed a flurry of important general scholarship, but the rest of the eighteenth century made little significant comment. Chapter II shows how the study of philology, engendered largely by Continental scholars, was the single most important development in nineteenth century Old English poetic criticism and was responsible for the first adequately edited texts. However, most nineteenth century critics either did not go beyond philology to poetic language or devoted their attention to the historical and mythological background of the poetry, trends which were in keeping with the neo-classical and historical criticism of the nineteenth century. Chapter III shows how the study of Old English poetic style gained momentum as soon as English-speaking scholars approached the subject and isolated it from the general study of Old Germanic literatures. However, it was hampered somewhat by the lack of consistent and effective critical terms and methods. Perhaps the most useful accomplishments of this period (1881-1921) are the source lists and catalogues, which supply solid background material, and the noticeable improvement in attitude toward the poetry. Chapter IV shows how the interest in poetic language after the first was eventually was felt in a number of important studies of Old English poetic diction during the 1920's. On the assumption that Old English poems were conscious literary creations, critics began to study them for their literay merits and to pass some sort of judgment on their artistic achievement. In addition, the work of J. R. R. Tolkien was largely responsible for redeeming the literary reputation of Beowulf, and, by extension, much other Old English poetry. Chapter V shows how much was learned during the 1950's about the nature of Old English poetic diction. The oral-formulaic theory, once it was modified, provided a reasonable explanation for the development of many identical and similar lines in Old English poetry. Other diction studies, especially that of Brodeur, showed that in spite of traditional language, originality was more than possible, as witnessed in the compounds and variations of Beowulf. Other studies showed that much of the poetic diction which was earlier called metaphorical is really either literal or, if figurative, metonymical. Yet other studies found in Beowulf the figuration and symbolism of religious poetry. Thus by the 1960's critics were able to approach Old English poetry almost as confidently as they would approach any other period of English poetry. The two appendices to the thesis concern the development of attitude and comment about two important Old English poetic devices: the kenning and variation. Appendix A shows the growth of precision in the application of Old Norse poetic appellations, and appendix B shows the importance of variation as a key to Old English poetic style. Both these appendices support the general conclusion that methods and information in Old English studies are adequate enough now that the job of full poetic criticism is possible. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

This thesis summarizes our project in building and setting up a Beowulf cluster. The idea of the project was brought forward by the company CGI in Karlstad, Sweden. CGI’s wish is that the project will serve as a starting point for future research and development of a larger Beowulf cluster. The future work can be made by both employees at CGI and student exam projects from universities. The projects main purpose was to construct a cluster by using several credit card sized single board computers, in our case the Raspberry Pi 3. The process of installing, compiling and con- figuring software for the cluster is explained. The MPICH and TensorFlow software platforms are reviewed. A performance evaluation of the cluster with TensorFlow is given. A single Raspberry Pi 3 can perform neural network training at a rate of seven times slower than an Intel system (i5-5250U at 2.7 GHz and 8 GB RAM at 1600 MHz). The performance degraded significantly when the entire cluster was training. The precise cause of the performance degradation was not found, but is ruled out to be in software, either a programming error or a bug in TensorFlow.