This version of Beowulf is broken up into three "books," and is based on the 1904 translation by A.J. Church. Most of the story is told through pictures, which makes it is difficult to summarize. In book 1, Beowulf, a great warrior and monster-slayer, sets sail with other warriors and promises to find and kill Grendel, a being of an "accursed race," who is portrayed as a dark and vicious monster. There is an extended fight scene between Grendel and Beowulf in which multiple armed warriors are literally torn apart by Grendel. Beowulf wears no armor, and is able to throw Grendel around and ultimately rip off his arm. In the end of book 1, Beowulf hangs the monster's arm with rope and suspends over a large gateway to show it off. In book 2, the Danes praise Beowulf for his "mighty deed," but there is another danger that yet waits: Grendel's mother, "a loathsome troll-wife who dwelt deep below the waters of moor." Once again, Beowulf sets out with fellow warriors to find and kill this creature. Armed with his special sword, "Hrunting," Beowulf dives deep down into the creature's lair, and fights with her as he did with Grendel. Ultimately Beowulf decapitates her, and brings her head back for everyone to see. In book 3, many years have passed and Beowulf is much older. A dragon now terrorizes the land, and Beowulf decides to slay it alone. He fights with the dragon, but is unable to kill it by himself. One of his men, Wiglaf, courageously joins the battle, and they defeat the dragon together. Tragically, Beowulf is fatally wounded by the dragon and dies. His people build a barrow for him on the cliffs where he is remembered as a worthy ruler.
Some images from the graphic novel:
Book 1: Beowulf's fight with Grendel
I really enjoyed reading this graphic novel even though I have never read any other version of Beowulf before, and it makes me want to read other versions. I think this graphic novel is unique in that it uses very little text to tell a story, which might make some English teachers very nervous about using it in class. In some ways, I think this makes it an incredibly interesting text to study, because it makes the images do all the work that the words do in the original, which means that it had to have been well planned by the author. He must have asked himself, how can I show this part of the story with images only? and, how might I condense this event into a two-page spread? Of course, I'm not willing at this point to say whether I think Gareth Hind's choices were successful or not, because I've never read Beowulf. But I can imagine that even if he did make "bad" decisions about how to tell this or that part of the story, these decisions would nevertheless make for excellent class discussion.
This connects well to something I read in Sarah Wessling's Supporting Students in a Time of Core Standards. In essence, this book was commissioned by NCTE to offer English teachers some aid with lesson and curriculum planning around the new common core state standards. Chapter 4 is called, "Using Viewing to Elicit Complex Thinking," and it discusses using visual texts in the classroom to teach critical reading and writing. Wessling talks about the "layers" visual texts have, and shows how we can get students to "peel back" these layers in order to show them the elements of good composition. This exercise is sort of like a reverse engineering activity where we can uncover the decisions an author made and ask what effect they have (or were supposed to have), which might help us achieve the same kinds of effects with similar decisions in our own compositions or creations.
I think this book would be an excellent basis for this kind of investigation simply because it does rely so heavily on images, colors, and visual organization to tell the story. But I think it should probably be read only after (or along with) an text version of Beowulf, so that there would be some standard against which students could discuss the artistic decisions of Gareth Hinds.
What's nice about Gareth Hinds too is that he has a website devoted to his work where he also offers various teaching materials for teachers. On his page for Beowulf he gives a link to a PDF that has background information, suggested discussion topics and in-class activities. Here's the URL:
http://www.thecomic.com/beowulf.php
I strongly recommend this graphic novel because the art, the drawings, the composition, and the colors are so incredible that there is little need for all the text. In some ways, it forces the reader to fill in parts of the story for him or herself, which has a freeing effect. You feel free to take as long as you want to look at the pictures, and to move around back and forth, just to take it all in. This experience made me want more work from the same artist, so I plan to read his version of the Odyssey next.
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