Popular Culture Review Vol. 11, No. 1, February 2000 | Page 113
Grendel, Geisel, and the Grinch
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Notes
1. See Satan’s speech in Genesis B, lines 356-441, and the demons’ debate in Paradise
Lost, Book II. One notable difference between the two accounts is that the Satan of
Genesis B remains shackled in hell, sending forth a messenger to bring down creation,
while Satan himself ventures forth in PL, and his envy intensifies as he proceeds into
Paradise and realizes the full extent of his fall. See also the messenger’s speech
concerning the accomplishments of his mission, addressed to Satan, in Genesis B,
lines 726b-62a. The definitive edition of Genesis B is A. N. Doane, ed., The Saxon
Genesis: An Edition o f the West Saxon Genesis B and the Old Saxon Vatican Genesis
(Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 1991). A ready translation appears in S. A. J. Bradley, ed.,
Anglo-Saxon Poetry (London: Dent/Everyman, 1982; reissued 1991, rpt. 1995).
2. The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., prepared by J. A. Simpson and E. S. C. Weiner,
20 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1989), s.v. grinch and grinched. All other OED references
are to this edition.
3. See Fr. Klaeber, ed., Beowulf and the Fight at Finnsburg, 3rd ed., with Supplements
(Boston: Heath, 1950), pp. xxviii-xxix.
4. OED, s.v. grindel.
5. For fuller analysis of the related ideas of sharing, distribution, and exchange, see my
articles “Glced Man at Heorot: Beowulf and the Anglo-Saxon Psalter,” Leeds Studies
in English 27 (1996): 49-68; and “From ‘Whale-Road’ to ‘Gannet’s Bath’: Images of
Foreign Relations and Exchange in Beowulf, ” Mediaevalia 20 (1999): 67-98.
6. Quotations are from Dr. Seuss, How the Grinch Stole Christmas (New York: Random
House, 1957), no page numbers. (ܸ