Beowulf as Hero of Empire

Abstract

In one study of novels set in the Middle Ages and aimed at a young Edwardian audience, Velma Bourgeois Richmond argues that they share the following characteristics: “racial definition, heroic behavior, [and] chivalric idealism.”¹ Although not a historical novel, H. E. Marshall’s 1908 Stories of Beowulf: Told to the Children reflects these characteristics.² Her Edwardian version of the early medieval epic was meant in part to support the imperialistic cause of Great Britain by emphasizing the chivalric code as rendered through a British imperial lens. Her text anachronistically transforms the Old English hero into a knight of the High Middle Ages struggling against the enemies of chivalric values.³ The struggle on the human scale between the values of Edwardian chivalry (as represented by Beowulf and his knights) and those who would defy it (monstrous beings, including humans who oppose order) becomes a cosmic battle between good and evil. The same dichotomy is employed in Marshall’s Our Empire Story, also written for a young audience and published the same year as her translation of Beowulf.⁴ In Marshall’s version of history, those trusted with the role of securing British India follow the ancient chivalric code associated with heroes such as Beowulf, while those who challenge the order that the British wish to establish in this part of “Greater Britain” are both human heathens opposing knightly virtues and demons attempting to bring chaos to the land.

This article has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: Exploring the human endeavor. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this article do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.