The Shaper Timeline and Summary

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• We first see the Shaper as Grendel enters his final year of raiding, which is where the book starts.  
• The Shaper is blind and clutching at his harp in the chaos and carnage of one of Grendel's visits. 
• The first songs the Shaper sings are of the wars raging all around them. 
• Grendel remembers when the Shaper entered Hrothgar's service, right around the time the king figured out how to make other, lesser kings pay tribute to him. 
• The Shaper had arrived with a young assistant (the Shaper-to-be) and began to tell the tale of the Scyldings' founder (the song that starts Beowulf). 
• The people were stunned by the Shaper's tunes. They loved his vision of glory for their people. 
• The Shaper was far superior to the king's old Harper, who was immediately displaced by the Shaper's arrival. 
• Grendel recognizes right away the power of the Shaper's words: he's literally shaping history. 
• The monster suffers a lot after the coming of the Shaper. Has his experience of mankind been wrong and the Shaper's version of history right? 
• We learn that eventually, Grendel will get his revenge on the Shaper. By the end of his twelve years of terror, the Shaper has been schooled in the art of tragedy. 
• But still, the Shaper's version of history prevails. Grendel can't get the Shaper's songs out of his head. 
• And then it happens: the Shaper sings of the murder of Abel and how Cain and all his kindred have been cursed because of it. Grendel, he says, is one of the cursed. 
• It's more than Grendel can bear, and he falls into despair and anger—right into the clutches of the dragon. 
• When he returns from the dragon, Grendel hears the Shaper's song again. He suddenly can't stand the privileged role the Danes play in all the songs, and he becomes enraged. 
• It's at that moment that Grendel is attacked by a guard for the first time and realizes that he's been charmed by the dragon. After this, the raids start. 
• After singing well for many years, the Shaper falls ill with a fever. Grendel is out of sorts about it, because, hey, it's a love-hate relationship. 
• As the Shaper lies dying, Hrothgar, Wealtheow and the children come for a visit. Grendel watches through the window. 
• Wealtheow assures the Shaper that he looks healthier, but everyone knows it's a lie. 
• The Shaper starts to prophesy about the Danes' future—and pops off to the great hereafter mid-sentence. 
• Grendel is devastated in his own monstrous way. He visits the house of the woman the Shaper admired to see how she receives the news. He even considers eating her to put her out of her misery. (He doesn't.) 
• At the Shaper's funeral, the new Shaper (the former assistant) sings of Hildeburh and Finn. Not exactly uplifting. 
• Grendel, like everyone else, feels lost and abandoned by the Shaper's death.