Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, or literary
devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes.
The Seasons
Although the narrative of Grendel skips
around chronologically, the novel is patterned after the passage
of one calendar year. Grendel opens in the spring
of Grendel’s final year of life and ends with his death in the winter
of the same year. The seasons are common motifs in literature, with
each season having come to symbolize certain archetypes or ideas.
Spring, for example, the time when cold weather retreats and new
vegetation appears on the earth, has become a traditional symbol
for growth and new beginnings—thus making it an appropriate time
of year to set the beginning of a tale. Winter, in turn, traditionally
has come to symbolize age, maturity, and death. As Grendel moves
into its final chapters and into winter, the glory of Hart is fading,
and the once virile Hrothgar is bowed with age, doubt, and grief.
The period of transition from winter into spring is of
particular importance in Grendel. This time of
year includes aspects of the winter, with its assurance of death,
and the spring, with its promise of an eventual rebirth. In the
song sung at the Shaper’s funeral, we see that this transitional
time between winter and spring is the time of year when the Danes
gained their freedom from the Frisians, but also the time that brought
a tragic queen who ultimately lost her brother and her son. The
winter-spring transition is a moment when the Danes regain a sense
of freedom, but it also necessarily results in the death of our
protagonist, Grendel.
The Zodiac
The seasons are one example of a cycle that takes a year
to complete; the zodiac, or astrological system, is another. Grendel is
split into twelve chapters, each linked with one month of the year
and one astrological sign. Gardner includes at least one allusion
to each sign within its corresponding chapter. Chapter 1,
for example, occurs under the sign of Aries, the Ram, and the ram
is the creature with whom we find Grendel arguing as the novel opens.
Some chapters feature their astrological signs more prominently
than others: the chapters of Aries, Taurus, and Capricorn all feature
significant encounters between Grendel and their representative
animals. Some chapters and signs require a more interpretive reading.
Wealtheow arrives during the month of Libra, the balance; appropriately,
we see that she is indeed a force of balance, first between the
Scyldings and the Helmings and later within Hart. The zodiac motif
appears to have been a late addition to the Grendel manuscript,
and critics are still divided as to how much weight its symbolism
should be given.
Machinery
References to mechanics and machinery abound in Grendel.
Grendel often uses these metaphors as a way of expressing his frustration with
what he sees as pointless, mindless adherence to set patterns of behavior.
Grendel sees this tendency in the ram, which instinctually responds
to the arrival of spring with a rash of ludicrous behavior. Grendel
is especially frustrated when he sees this tendency in himself:
he describes himself as “mechanical as anything else” when the warm
weather causes him to begin attacking men again. When Grendel is
stuck in the tree, both a bull and a band of humans attack him.
Once the bull starts attacking Grendel, it never changes its tactics:
it fights by a “blind mechanism ages old.” Humans, on the other
hand, have the ability to make new patterns, to break out of routine
and mechanism. This ability is the source of Grendel’s lifelong
fascination with the human race.
