Anglo-saxon poetry. Pagan poetry content Introduction 3

2.1 Opposition between Good and Evil in the poem

The opposition of good and evil plays an important role in dualistic myths, where each of the characters and symbols refers either to the positive series as the bearer of good, or to the negative series as the embodiment of the evil principle . However, much more often good and evil, although they stand out as the main semantic concepts, do not have direct names within the mythological system: in particular, the symbol of the “left side”, usually correlated with evil, is used to denote evil.⁶

Developed religious and philosophical systems characterize the understanding of good and evil as moral categories that determine human behavior, not related to the impact on him of various mythological forces or the state of ritual purity or defilement . But even during this period, the spread of dualistic systems is possible, in which, along with the incarnation of the good principle (God), the presence of a separate incarnation of evil (Satan, Lucifer, etc.) is also assumed. This motif, as a purely literary one, is continued in the epic " Beowulf ", where there are separate characters who embody good and evil. [8, p.71]
The plot of this largest of the Anglo-Saxon epics is simple. Beowulf , a young knight of the Gauth people , upon learning of the calamity that had befallen the King of the Danes Higelaka , - about the attacks of the monster Grendel on his palace Heorot and about the gradual extermination of the king's warriors over the course of twelve years, goes overseas to destroy Grendel . Defeating him, he then kills in a new single combat, this time in an underwater dwelling, another monster - Grendel's mother , who was trying to avenge her son's death. Showered with awards and thanks, Beowulf returns to his homeland. Here he performs new feats, and later becomes the king of the Gauts and safely rules the country for fifty years. After this period, Beowulf enters into battle with the dragon, which devastates the surroundings, being angry at the attempt on the ancient treasure he guards. Beowulf manages to defeat this monster as well, but at the cost of his own life. The song ends with the scene of the solemn burning of the hero's body on the funeral pyre and the construction of a mound over his ashes and the treasure he conquered. [eleven]
Representatives of the "mythological school" in the literary criticism of the last century tried to decipher this epic in this way: monsters personify the storms of the North Sea; Beowulf - a good deity, curbing the elements; his peaceful reign is a blessed summer, and his death is the onset of winter. Thus, the epic symbolically depicts the contrasts of nature, growth and decay, rise and fall, youth and old age. Other scholars understood these contrasts in ethical terms and saw in Beowulf the theme of the struggle between good and evil. Expressed in the confrontation between two warring forces, the conflict divides the images of the poem into two camps, in one of which - the hero, the king and queen of the tribe, their squads, in the other - monsters, opponents of the hero. The world of the poem is divided into two parts: in the center of the first - the hero, in the center of the second - his opponents. All the elements of this world gravitate towards one of the poles; there are no "neutral" details not connected with this or that camp. Images of characters and their characteristics, temporal and spatial features, objects - everything bears the imprint of belonging to the world of heroes or their opponents. The opposition of individual elements is so consistent and comprehensive that the world of monsters appears as an inverted world of heroes. It has the same characteristics, but with a minus sign. This is a kind of absolute opposite of the world of heroes, its reverse side.