Notes :
In the poem, as well as the movie, the two major female characters are Wealthow and Grendel's mother. Unlike the movie, neither of these characters have large roles in the poem. Both play their part but are described very little. Wealthow is often only called the "gold-ringed queen" and only exists to play "a noble woman who knew what was right" (Raffel, 31). Despite her noble status, Wealthow holds her tongue and is only mentioned when she serves Beowulf and his soldiers mead from a jeweled cup. Grendel's mother, on the other hand, plays a slightly bigger role, but only as an evil idenity. Her name is never revealed and she is only known as Grendel's mother, signifying that the male defines the female. Additionally, Grendel's mother is the only female character that poses a threat to Beowulf and his men. Unfortunately, she is portrayed as a "mighty water witch", insinuating that any woman who defied an man was evil and wicked (Raffel, 41). These two female characters demonstrate the Anglo-Saxon ideas that women should be figures rather than hold any real power.
Notes
how women have become stronger forces in the world, yet are still held back by men. In the movie, Grendel's mother is shown to be little more than a sex object in the eyes of men, which actual allows her to hold power over them. She is able to seduce Hrothgar and Beowulf, creating sons for her evil to live on through. These monsters eventually attack the men as the repercussions of the "sins of the fathers" (Zemeckis). Grendel's mother demonstrates everything the Anglo-Saxon's thought women should not be: a woman who held power of the men. Grendel's mother shows the weaknesses of men, while simultaneously saying that strong, beautiful women are to be feared by men.
Grendel’s mother is in the opposite situation of Hildeburh; she is a bereaved woman with no men to take action for her and so she must act herself. But this too puts her identity as a woman into question. Grendel must be avenged, and she is the only person left to exact it for him, but she is a woman and so should not be doing so. Interestingly, before Grendel’s death his mother has an existence that is not as active as Grendel’s, Hrothgar describes the reports of these two monsters that he has received from his country peasants, “One of these things, / as far as anyone ever can discern, / looks like a woman.” Although he goes into a bit of detail about the form of Grendel, it does not seem as though anyone has gotten a good look at Grendel’s mother. They have at least had enough contact with Grendel to assign him name, as they don’t know his true name, but they have vaguely glimpsed a woman and so don’t even have a name for her besides ‘Grendel’s mother’ (1345-54). While Grendel is alive his mother does not go out hunting or marauding through the countryside, just as while her kin are alive Hildeburh resigns herself to waiting for them to act. Thus when Grendel’s mother suddenly becomes ‘unfeminine’ by taking direct action, the contradiction between male and female roles makes her seem all the more monstrous
Eve, feeling the lack of gender equality, asserts her individuality by separating from Adam and eating the apple for her own benefit. Though she is 'wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best' according to Adam, Adam later tells her that she is unable or unsafe without his protection further pushes her to exert her independence anyway that she can, even if it is misguided or rash. When Eve suggests that she and Adam work separately, Adam immediately rejects the idea by saying: 'The wife where danger or dishonor lurks / Safest and seemliest be her husband stays / Who guards her or with her the worst endures' (Milton 9.267-269). Adam, exerting his position as a protector, tells her that she would be safest nearest him. This not only denies Eve her independence, but also tells Eve that she is in need of protecting. Jeanie Grant Liebert says, 'She was not privileged with an opportunity for self-exploration or prompted to identify and express the 'spirit within' her' (Liebert 161). Moreover, triggered by the dichotomy of ruler and ruled, Eve displays her agency by rebelling against her ruler: Adam. Likewise, Adam tells Eve in Book 9 when arguing about the separation, 'for nothing lovelier can be found / in woman than to study household good / And good works in her husband to promote' (Milton 9.232-234). Using guilt as a persuasive tool, Adam tries to convince Eve that 'good works in her husband to promote' is of high importance for a woman as well as 'to study household good.' He wants to make her adhere to Robert Crowley's guide for women entitled, 'The Womans Lesson' in which he says: 'Now when thou arte become a wife / And hast an housbande to thy minde / Se thou provoke him not to stryfe' (qtd. in Hull 54). Both the 'household good' and the 'good works' to promote' and the 'se thou provoke him not to stryfe' make Eve into an introverted woman in her relationship with Adam. Continuing to argue her point, though, readers see that she does not want to be passive; she instead would like to be active by doing things for herself.
Though a decision with devastating effects, Eve's choice to eat the apple is strictly her own, an independent decision not influenced by Adam. Confirming her reasoning and rationale, Eve tells Satan: 'The rest we live / Law to ourselves: our reason is our law' (Milton 9.653-654). Eve's firm belief that 'our reason is our law' justifies her actions as uniquely hers, not deemed correct by Adam, God, or even Satan. In the Bible, Genesis describes the seduction of Eve as, 'And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat' (Gen 3.6). Milton, however, shows Eve's seduction as a fight between two intelligent minds. Therefore, Eve is much more than a foolish, vane woman who resisted quickly to temptation. Her vanity, though alluded to in the text, is not an accurate cause for why she ate the apple. Indeed, Mandy Green, author of the essay, "The Virgin in the Garden: Milton's Ovidian Eve," says, 'Satan plays upon Eve's desire for individual distinction by presenting the eating of the apple as a heroic deed by which she will snatch a great destiny for herself and for mankind' (918). As Green concludes, Satan actually appeals to Eve's personal quest to make her own decisions; he does not appeal to how 'pleasant to the eyes' the fruit is like in the Bible, it is the desire to find knowledge that drives her. Her reasoning for eating the apple is that, '[God] Forbids us then to taste, but His forbidding/ Commends thee more while it infers the good/ By thee communicated and our want' (Milton 9.753-755). As Eve rationalizes her decision in Paradise Lost, she wishes to acquire knowledge and it is her 'want' that drives her to believe that she was making the right decision. Indeed, Jeanie Grant Liebert says, 'She was not privileged with an opportunity for self-exploration or prompted to identify and express the 'spririt within' her' (Liebert 161). Moreover, triggered by the desire to know or self-explore, as Liebert asserts, Eve rationalizes her actions to be based on what she says earlier, 'our reason is our law