Beowulf's popular afterlife in literature, comic books, and film - 9

Beowulf's presence on the popular cultural radar has increased in the past two decades, coincident with cultural crisis and change.

Why? By way of a fusion of cultural studies, adaptation theory, and monster theory, this book examines a wide range of Anglo-American retellings and appropriations found in literary texts, comic books, and film.

The most remarkable feature of popular adaptations of the poem is that its monsters, frequently victims of organised militarism, male aggression, or social injustice, are provided with strong motives for their retaliatory brutality.