What was the name of Tolkien’s first academic publication on the poem Beowulf?

Tolkien’s landmark lecture and essay was titled Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics.

Tolkien first delivered the work as the 1936 Sir Israel Gollancz Memorial Lecture at the British Academy. It was published in 1937. The essay argued that Beowulf should be appreciated as a poem rather than treated mainly as a historical document containing information about Anglo-Saxon life.

Tolkien defended the artistic importance of the poem’s monsters, especially Grendel and the dragon. His argument had a major influence on modern Beowulf scholarship and helped shift critical attention toward the poem’s structure, themes, and imagination. The essay is separate from Tolkien’s fiction, although its treatment of monsters is often discussed alongside his creative work.