“As I Once Did with Grendel”: Boasting and Nostalgia in Beowulf

Kim examines Beowulf's presentation of both what threatens and what establishes human language and thus human identity. She locates the poem's representations of linguistic performance in the context of early medieval linguistic theory and, within this context, treats the engagements with linguistic performance as negotiations of concepts of personal identity. She also examines how these negotiations are treated in the poem's modern reception and in light of contemporary fascinations with the monstrous other and with nostalgia.