Beowulf – its structureThere is a considerable diversity of opinion regarding the structure of the poem Beowulf. This essay hopes to enlighten the reader on some of the opinions expressed by literary scholars on this issue. The Cambridge History of English and American Literature states: It is generally believed that several originally distinct lays were combined in the poem and, although no proof can be obtained, the theory itself is not not improbable. These laymen are generally supposed to be four in number and to have dealt with the following subjects: (1) Beowulf's fight with Grendel, (2) the fight with Grendel's mother, (3) Beowulf's return, (4) the fight with the dragon (v1, ch3, s3, n16). Alvin A. Lee in his essay, "Symbolic Metaphor and the Design of Beowulf", basically agrees that there are four divisions in the structure of the poem: Getting a little closer to the text but still considering it in terms of overall design , we can recognize four major myths or symbolic episodes [emphasis mine], each of which is concentrated at appropriate moments in the narrative but also extends its effect, with varying emphases, throughout the poem as a whole (148) .But Lee's four divisions are not the same as the first one mentioned. Lee's first part culminates with the construction of Heorot; the second part, as Grendel ravages Heorot; the third, the advent of Beowulf and his victories over Grendel and his mother; and fourth, the death of the hero and the return to chaos (148). The three-part, or tripartite, division of Beowulf is more popular than the four-part division. F. P. Magoun, Jr. divided the poem into three separate stories designated as A, A-prime, and A of B. Magoun corresponds to the events up to Beowulf's return to the Geats; B, the dragon fight and its end. But Prime includes a variation or alternative version of the Grendel story that an Anglo-Saxon publisher of the poem wanted to preserve and include in his anthology of Beowulf poems (Clark 22). Magoun would therefore have three divisions in the structure of the poem instead of four. Brian Wilkie and James Hurt, editors of Literature of the Western World, agree: "It is clear that the monster fight sequence provides the structure of the poem. . . In this poem of just over 3,000 lines, around a thousand lines are devoted to each of the three monsters, and it has been suggested that Beowulf was intended to be performed over three evenings, each devoted to a new monster. (1273).