Beowulf

By Martin Garrett

Beowulf is the longest surviving poem of Anglo-Saxon England. Beowulf, a young warrior of the Geats, comes to the aid of Hrothgar, king of the Danes, in his time of need. He first fights the hellish Grendel, then struggles with Grendel's no less fearsome mother in her hall beneath the cold waters of the mere. More than fifty years later Beowulf, now king of the Geats, must face his final challenge in the shape of a huge and terrifying dragon.

But Beowulf is not just an adventure story. Other tales of war, feuding, and loss in less mythical worlds are interwoven with the main plot in such a way as to force readers to ask questions about the heroic code; equally thought-provoking are the juxtaposition of virtuous and vicious characters, the presence of some women who are helpless victims and others who exert a strong influence on men, and above all the fact that the characters are pagan while the poet is clearly (though not insistently) Christian.

Marc Hudson's thoughtful modern English version combines readability with detailed attention to both the spirit and the meaning of the original poem.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wordsworth Editions
• Release date: May 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9781848706187

Book preview

Beowulf

Translated, with a Commentary,

by Marc Hudson

with an Introduction and Notes

by Martin Garrett

WORDSWORTH CLASSICS

OF WORLD LITERATURE

This edition of Beowulf first published by Wordsworth Editions Limited in 2007

Translation © Marc Hudson 2007

Introduction and Notes © Martin Garrett 2007

Published as an ePublication 2015

ISBN 978 1 84870 618 7

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Contents

Introduction

Notes to the Introduction

Suggestions for further reading

Beowulf

Translation

Abbreviations used in the Notes

Notes on the text

Appendix: Geats and Swedes

Translator’s Commentary

Acknowledgments

Commentary

Notes to the Commentary

Selected Sources

Introduction

Manuscript and early interpretation

The anonymous, untitled poem later known as Beowulf survived mainly thanks to a clawed, Dane-devouring monster called Grendel, his no less monstrous mother, and an enraged dragon. These – Beowulf’s opponents – presumably constituted the main interest of the work for whoever, some years after the only surviving copy of the manuscript was made in about AD 1000, bound it with several other pieces about weird and wonderful creatures. The monsters might have been sufficient to maintain interest through the middle ages and beyond, but by 1200 few people could, without difficulty, have understood the language of the poem in which they feature. Beowulf is the longest surviving poem in Old English, the Germanic vernacular of the Anglo-Saxons, which was gradually, after the Norman Conquest, infused and blended with Norman-French and other influences to become Middle English. And works like Beo­wulf, written in crafted literary verse, with its sometimes com­plicated syntax, unusual vocabulary and decreasingly familiar field of reference, became wholly or partly unintelligible faster than prose or simpler poems.

Probably the Beowulf manuscript remained forgotten for cen­turies in some monastic library. Our next record is in 1563, when it belonged to Laurence Nowell (1510/20–73), compiler of Voc­abularium Saxonicum, the first (unpublished) dictionary of Old English. By this time Middle English had evolved into Modern English, but scholars like Nowell were pioneering the under­standing of Old English which was a necessary preface to the later career of the poem. (They were encouraged by Archbishop Matt­hew Parker (1504–75), who collected Anglo-Saxon manu­scripts and promoted their dissemination mainly for doctrinal reasons.) How much was understood by Sir Robert Cotton (1571–1631), the early seventeenth-century owner, is, however, uncertain. The manuscript was damaged in a fire in 1731 at Ashburnam House, where Cotton had lived, but survived to reach the relative safety of the British Museum at its foundation in 1753. It is still in the British Library.

In the nineteenth century Beowulf had many more readers, especially in Germany and Scandinavia. Scholarly interest was often philological and, in an age of new national self-awareness, political. There were attempts to trace with its aid the common early Germanic language and attempts to show that it was in fact – given its Scandinavian setting – a translation from Danish or another Germanic tongue. Many other theories about the poem developed on both sides of the North Sea: it was seen, for instance, as a religious allegory, a folk myth, or, for the most part – leaving aside the monsters – history. Many of these ideas remained current well into the twentieth century. The first powerful challenge came, in 1936, from J.R.R. Tolkien – himself creatively interested in fictions of heroes and dragons, but here speaking as Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University. He argued, in his lecture ‘Beowulf: the Monsters and the Critics’, that the poem was, essentially, a poem: ‘itself and not something that the scholar would have liked better’, not an allegory, ‘a heathen heroic lay, a history of Sweden, a manual of Germanic antiquities, or a Nordic Summa Theologica’. [1]

Date and provenance

Through the twentieth century translations of Beowulf into modern English and other languages, re-tellings, and scholarship proliferated. Much about the poem, however, remains mysterious or debatable, including its date and provenance. It has long been agreed that the poem originated, in spite of its setting, in England, and is the work of a Christian poet, quite possibly a monk. It may date from the late seventh or early eighth century, when the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity was well under way.

Some have felt that the poem was probably written before the period of Viking raids and conquests beginning in 835, since an English audience after this date would not have tolerated the generally favourable presentation of the Danes. There are, how­ever, several arguments against this assumption. It is possible that the Danes of the audience’s time are perceived as unworthy successors to their forebears in the glorious days of King Hrothgar. After his time, says the Beowulf-poet, there will be fire and treachery in his hall at Heorot, and such a decline would appear typical of fallen human beings post-Adam. It is clearly misleading, besides, to suggest that there was an absolute hatred between Anglo-Saxons and Danes at all times and in all parts of the country. Danes came increasingly as settlers, were converted to Christ­ianity, and, especially in northern and midland areas, integrated successfully with the inhabitants – themselves descended from earlier waves of Germanic invaders. For several centuries the English not only fought but lived, traded or co-operated with a range of Scandinavians from the ferocious blood-eagle-carving pagan warriors of tradition (as much Grendels as Beowulfs) to merchants, fellow-farmers, fellow-Christians and, in the eleventh century, King Cnut. An English poet might well have regarded Danes and Geats – Beowulf’s tribe – as perfectly reasonable people to write poetry about. But (although the possi­bilities just discussed are only a few among the many advanced by scholars of the poem) there is no conclusive evidence to prove whether Beowulf was originally composed in 680 or 980. The issue is complicated, of course, by the fact that there is no hard evidence of what stages of rewriting, copying and miscopying, cutting, expanding or censor­ship the work might have undergone between its first form and the extant manuscript. One may also wonder whether it was part of a lost tradition or cycle of Beowulf poems – even ‘yet another poem about Beowulf’ to some – or a single masterpiece.

Provenance is only a little more certain than date, and much involved with it. There have been attempts to link Beowulf to particular royal courts deemed promising breeding-grounds for heroic poetry. Did it, for instance, appeal to Offa, powerful and successful ruler of the midland kingdom of Mercia between 757 and 796, and his nobles? (The possibility is strengthened by the mention of his ancestor and namesake in line 1950 of the poem.) The court of Rædwald, King of East Anglia (d. c. 624), is another popular candidate, mainly because of the similarity between many of the artefacts described in Beowulf and the rich contents of what is almost certainly Rædwald’s ship-grave, unearthed at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk in 1939. [2] Certainly the parallels are fascinating. Some students of Beowulf, however, have regarded Sutton Hoo, rather as Heinrich Schliemann regarded his Homeric Troy and Mycenae, as the physical proof of a poem’s veracity; as in the Homeric case, the identification has subsequently been judged misleading or at least problematic. The objects are not so precisely described in the poem as to preclude a later date and could, in any case, have been designedly old-fashioned – ancestral war-gear suited to the heroes of old.

At first sight the language of the poem seems likely to help locate its origin, but again the results are inconclusive. Some scholars feel that, given various Anglian rather than Saxon dialectal features, the poem was probably composed in Mercia or North­umbria, where most of the Angles had settled. But the jury is still out: there are also many West Saxon and some Kentish elements. A scribe from Wessex or Kent could have copied the poem and introduced these elements, but this is not the only Old English poem where different dialectal usages blend – to the puzzlement of investigators.

Culture

As indicated above, it has long been accepted that the Beowulf-poet was a Christian. God created the world (91–8) and ‘oversees all things’ (1727). Grendel and his mother are descendants of Cain, the first killer. The Danes who in their time of trial ‘sacrificed at heathen shrines,/kneeled to idols’ were simply honouring Hell and, ignorant of God and how to praise him, ‘thrust their souls into the harness of fire’ (175–86). But the particular hue of the poet’s Christianity and his (almost certainly his rather than her) attitude to the pagan past and its customs and ideals have continued to provoke debate. The explicitly Christian references are comparatively rare. Traditionally pagan values often seem to be endorsed – vengeance, the primacy of physical prowess, earthly deeds and fame. There are essentially pagan ceremonies: the body of Scyld Scefing, forebear of the Danish kings, is sent ‘far into the flood’s dominion’ (42) on a ship filled (perhaps in a poetic extension of ship-burials like Sutton Hoo) with treasures; in what is probably a combination of two pagan rites, Beowulf is cremated on a splendid pyre and then his ashes are buried amid treasures in a barrow.

Assessing such matters is made more difficult by ignorance; very little is known for sure – rather than by inference from later Norse and other Germanic material – about the beliefs and worship of pre-Christian Anglo-Saxons. Literacy arrived with Christianity and chronicled it rather than the practices it replaced. But a survival from earlier days about which we do know something is what is traditionally called the ‘heroic code’. According to this the members of a comitatus or closely-knit band give their lord unswerving loyalty in battle and are rewarded by him with port­able property (hence he is frequently a ‘ring-giver’ or ‘gold-friend’), food and drink. The warrior who fails his lord loses all these and his honour. When Beowulf’s followers fail him in the battle with the dragon – itself a contrastingly ungenerous ‘hoard’s protector’ (2293, 2302, 2554, 2593) – Wiglaf tells them in no uncertain terms that

the lord who granted you treasure,

gave you the war-dress which you yet wear –

when he bestowed helmet and mail-coat

to his men at arms gathered in the mead-hall –

. . . .

I say that lord threw helmet and sword

away, wasted gold as if it were dirt

(2865–73)

All that is left to them will be ‘a life of disgrace’ (2891). This system of values was deeply ingrained in Germanic culture. Tacitus says that warriors who so much as leave a battle alive after their lord has fallen will be condemned to ‘infamy and shame’. [3] In the Old English elegy ‘The Wanderer’ even a man who appears through no fault of his own to have lost his ‘gold-friend’ and companions, seen halls moulder away, is doomed to wander in sorrowful exile.

There are ways of reconciling the code of the comitatus to Christianity. The same language of loyalty to one’s Lord, of self-sacrifice, applies; ‘Dryhten’ is a word often used in Beowulf both for the Christian Lord and for earthly kings and leaders. If the enemy was Cain’s brood or the diabolical ‘enemy of man’ (a term applied several times to Grendel) then Christian readers no doubt wanted Beowulf to pursue victory with all the vigour and courage of the comitatus-leader. Equally, where the heroic trad­ition founders or is found wanting – Beowulf’s followers flee the dragon, the eponymous Wanderer is left alone in icy places – we may be expected to perceive that secular faith alone is not enough. ‘The Wanderer’, at least, ends with the comfort provided by God, who offers a final home more secure than any mead-hall. Perhaps such comfort is, less explicitly, being offered as the answer to the melancholy sense of the transitoriness of earthly glory often en­countered in Beowulf and memorably charac­ter­ised by Tolkien as ‘a drink dark and bitter: a solemn funeral-ale with the taste of death’. [4]

But why would the Christian point be made so inexplicitly? One attractive possibility is that the poet is undertaking the delicate task of showing – or at least allowing for – what is virtuous in his pagan characters. Too explicit a contrast between Christian and pagan ideals (the attack on idolatry at 175–88 is the obvious exception) would necessitate condemnation of the noble Beowulf and wise Hrothgar almost as unequivocal as that of Grendel. So pagan practices are, on the whole, played down. Loyalty to lord, blood-feud for kin, funeral traditions about ships and pyres and barrows are preserved, but there is no detailed account of Woden-worship, no mention of the human sacrifice which accompanied at least some Germanic funeral rites. The most obvious motivation for this (perhaps unconscious) toning down would be a sensitivity to attitudes to the ancestors, a resistance to the doctrine which damned them for their mere ignorance of Christ. Such sensitivity might be especially strong during the conversion period, arguing an early date for the poem, or in an area evangelised by Irish missionaries, who were more receptive to the idea of the virtuous pagan than their more directly Rome-controlled counterparts. But even in much later times there may still have been a reluctance simply to consign to the flames the esteemed heroes of old, the dwellers in the ancestral homelands who were still vividly present in story. Ancestors, as Patrick Wormald has pointed out, are particularly important to aristocracies, and the Anglo-Saxon church was much dominated by aristocrats. Monasteries were often held as hereditary royal or noble fiefs, bishops went to war, and senior figures witness to – while protesting at – secular features of monastic life including drunkenness and entertainment by harpers. A warrior nobility, Wormald suggests, was prepared to accept a new God but not ‘to jettison the memory or the example of those who had worshipped the old’. In such a context – possibly, for example, in connection with the Mercian court in the eighth century – heroic poetry would flourish naturally. [5]

We are unlikely ever to know for certain how closely Wormald’s model fits the first audience of Beowulf but it is certainly probable that they lived, like people in many times and places, in a culture which mingled ancestral and more recent, secular and spiritual ways of thinking. It is also worth remem­bering that poet and audience were, no doubt, capable of feeling more or less ‘pagan’ or ‘Christian’ as contexts varied. It was easy before the excitement of the fight with Grendel to subscribe calmly to the view that Beowulf’s ‘splendid prowess’ is not his alone but demonstrates that ‘mighty God held sway over men/then as now’ (701–3); it was easy, on the other hand, to be far too caught up in the Grendel narrative or the tale of Finn to consider the correct Christian attitude to revenge. Sutton Hoo yields good evidence of a mixed culture: the king of the East Angles takes with him to the afterlife not only such evidently pagan goods as a sceptre surmounted by a bronze stag, but a pair of christening spoons, perhaps Ræd­wald’s since we know that he was at least temporarily converted to Christianity. Rædwald temporised, according to Bede’s Eccles­iast­ical History: ‘he had, in the same temple, an altar for the Christian sacrifice [Holy Communion] and another small altar for the sacrifice of victims to the devils’. [6] Even if they did not physically maintain two altars, many people must have blended apparently mutually hostile sets of beliefs and customs. Christmas took over elements of the pagan December festival; ‘Easter’ keeps the name of the goddess Eostre. Further visual evidence for this mingling is available at the British Museum in the form of an eighth-century whale-bone box, the Franks Casket (named after its donor, Sir A. Franks). This features scenes from Germanic legend, Romulus and Remus suckled by the wolf, Titus and his Romans sacking Jerusalem, and inscriptions in both runic and Roman script; most importantly, one panel features both Weland (the Germanic hero mentioned in Beowulf 455) and the Ador­ation of the Magi. If pagan gods were out of favour, stories of old heroes, it seems, were not.

It is probable that the poet and his audience – like the makers and users of the whale-bone box – would be puzzled by the modern perception of inconsistency. There is an overlap, at least in popular tradition, between pagan Fate or wyrd, luck, and the will of God. They elide easily when, for instance, ‘the Lord’ gives the Geats ‘good fortune and war-luck’ (696–7), ‘God’s wisdom and the workings of wyrd’ (1056) are coupled, or a man will be safe ‘if death has not marked him,/and he’s faithful to God’ (2291–2). Perhaps more problematically for modern readers, Beowulf is remembered both for his Christian-sounding mildness and for his eagerness for fame (see 3181–2 and notes), and gold treasures are buried in his barrow both in Sutton-Hoo-style tribute to his greatness and because, accursed, they must return to the earth. But there are no easy answers in a world which produces not only wise kings and queens and brave warriors but curses, dragons, monster-filled meres, and Grendel the fearsome ‘walker in darkness’ (704).

Structure

The most obvious structural feature of Beowulf is the division between the hero’s youthful exploits in Denmark and, after fifty years as king of the Geats, his final fight with the dragon on home soil. As Tolkien said, the structure is ‘essentially a balance, an opposition of ends and beginnings’; ‘a contrasted description of two moments in a great life, rising and setting; an elaboration of the ancient and intensely moving contrast between youth and age, first achievement and final death’. [7] Other and smaller structures are also at work in the poem. The Danish section is divided between the two fights with Grendel and his mother – or the whole poem into three fights. Another sort of patterning is provided by the progressive difficulty of these encounters. Beowulf mortally wounds Grendel without the aid of a sword, finally beheads his mother after a difficult struggle, and kills the dragon only at the cost of his own life. Before meeting Grendel, too, he may be said to face progressively harder challenges – not violence but tough scrutiny – from the coastguard and from Unferth.

One of the Beowulf-poet’s favourite structural devices, at the most local level as well as in Tolkien’s ‘opposition of ends and beginnings’, is contrast and comparison. These are used repeatedly to define character or function: Queen Hygd, ‘the model/of prudence’ (1927–8) and generosity, is defined by the excursus on ‘Modthrytho:/famous queen who cowed her people/with her wickedness’ (1931–3); Beowulf’s credentials for overcoming Grendel – his identity, in effect – are established by his victory over Breca, the breakers, and the sea-monsters (533–85). Similarly, people and situations may be measured against those of the past or the future. The Danes have before them the examples of good kings like Scyld Scefing (4f.) and of the notorious Heremod (902–15, 1710–24). The future is an insistent moral presence, a reminder of the transience of earthly glories. Heorot, for instance, is no sooner built but its destruction is announced:

High and horn-gabled,

the hall rose up. Soon it would taste

the treachery of fire. Nor was it long

before knives unsheathed and hatred flared

after hot words between sworn kin.

(81–5)

The beautiful ‘collar of ancient stones’ which the grateful Danes bestow on Beowulf for ridding them of Grendel will, we immed­iately learn, be worn by his king, Higelac, when he dies at the hands of the Franks in Frisia (1195–1216). Again it is at a moment of triumph – the hero has now slain Grendel’s mother – that Hrothgar gravely reminds Beowulf that he too will die, whether from battle, disease, fire, flood, or ‘festering age’ (1762–8). And when Beowulf does eventually die, the messenger foretells ‘the approaching peril’ to the Geats from their old enemies the Franks and the Swedes (2911f.). His account of both past and future feuding contrasts with the more heroic fight between hero and dragon and throws into relief the joys of life under ‘our

Reviews for Beowulf

[tldegray-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A beautiful translation.

[thorold_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The poemBeowulf is a tough sell. Not only has it traditionally been used by English departments around the world to break the spirit of newly-recruited undergraduates (who thought they had signed up for three years of Emily Dickinson and Virginia Woolf, only to find themselves out on the parade-ground practicing their Old English sound-shifts for month after month...), but also, when you get down to it, it turns out to be a poem about a macho muscle-man who spends his time - when not quaffing mead - either ripping monsters limb from limb or swimming long distances in full armour. Told completely straight, without any discernible trace of irony. Well, not exactly my cup of tea...Skimming through the introduction of the Bolton & Wrenn critical text, it turns out that we know surprisingly little about what must be one of the most-studied poems in the canon. It has survived in only one manuscript, the famous "British Museum Cotton Vitellius A XV" (bizarrely, the emperor Vitellius comes into it because it's his bust that stands on top of that particular bookcase). In fact, there are very few Old English texts that survive as multiple copies, so this uniqueness isn't unusual in itself. The manuscript seems to have been written around the year 1000, and textual evidence suggests that it's at least the third generation of copies since the poem was first written down. When and where that was is hotly disputed, but Mercia in the second half of the 8th century is a strong possibility. The action of the poem is set in a pre-Christian past in Denmark and Southern Sweden (with some mention of actual historical figures from the time), whilst the poet is obviously from a Christian background and refers quite freely to the Old Testament. What I found most surprising was to discover that the poem was not conspicuously a "classic" in its own time: we don't have any other contemporary references to it (apart from the "Finnesburg fragment", a single page of MS that seems to come from a different version of part of the same story), and as far as anyone can tell it fell completely off the radar of English literature between the end of the Old English period and the time around 650 years later when the first modern scholars became interested in Old English manuscripts and discovered this poem, bound in with a prose translation of St Augustine. So Beowulf is only part of the history of English literature with hindsight.The Heaney translationSeamus Heaney, of course, saw it as rather more than a philological crossword puzzle or a Boys' Own adventure story, otherwise he wouldn't have bothered with it. He points us in particular at the last part of the poem, where the elderly (70+) hero decides that he owes it to his people to take on one last dragon, even though it will certainly cost him his life. And indeed, the anonymous poet deals with the complex emotions involved here a little less brusquely than he does elsewhere - but this isn't Shakespearean drama, and we shouldn't expect it to be.What Heaney is really interested in, I think, is the poetical challenge of finding something in modern English that has the same magically seductive sound quality as Old English alliterative verse (which always sounds magnificent, even if you haven't a clue what it means...). And, of course, being Seamus Heaney, he decides to imagine the voices of the poem as if they came from the Northern Ireland farmers of his own sound-world, puts these into a slightly looser form of the Old English two-stress half-lines, and succeeds brilliantly. This translation is a poem that you just have to read aloud, even if there's no way that you can find any sympathy for Beowulf as a character.

[terpsichoreus · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

There are different ways to translate, and it comes down to what you want to get across. Most creative authors have such a strong voice and sense of story that they will overwhelm the original author. As Bentley wrote of Pope's Iliad: "It is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not call it Homer".Sometimes this sort of indirect translation is useful in itself, such as during the transition of the Renaissance from Italy to Britain. Many of the British poets rewrote Italian ...more There are different ways to translate, and it comes down to what you want to get across. Most creative authors have such a strong voice and sense of story that they will overwhelm the original author. As Bentley wrote of Pope's Iliad: "It is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not call it Homer".Sometimes this sort of indirect translation is useful in itself, such as during the transition of the Renaissance from Italy to Britain. Many of the British poets rewrote Italian sonnets into English, and though the line of descent was unquestionable, the progeny was it's own work. Another example might be the digestion of Wuxia and Anime into films such as Tarantino's or The Matrix (though Tarantino's sense of propriety is often suspect).However, in these cases, we can hardly call the new work a translation of the old. You are not experiencing the old work but the inspiration it has wrought. Beowulf is just this sort of translation, capturing the excitement and passion of the story, but obliterating the details which make the work interesting to students of history or literary theory.Heaney's translation is a fun, rollicking epic, able to draw in even uninitiated students, which is no doubt why it is now included in Norton. Unfortunately, it is not a particularly useful tool for teaching the importance of the original work. Heaney severs many connections to the unique world of Beowulf.As the only surviving epic from its time, place, and tradition, Beowulf is a unique vision into a pre-Christian culture outside of the Mediterranean. Though the poem shows Christian revisions, these stand out in stark contrast to the rest of the work, and can usually be easily excised, unlike many pervasive Christian impositions on the 'pagan' cultures.Heaney is not a philologist nor a historian, but a popular poet. He doesn't have the background for conscientious translation, and the clearest sign that his translation is haphazard is the fact that there are no footnotes explaining the difficult decisions that most translators have to make in every line. Heaney also loses much of the alliteration and appositives that marked the artistry of the original.A Beowulf that can exist without context is a Beowulf that has well and truly been separated from its past. Perhaps his translation is suitable for an introduction to the work, but a good professor should be able to teach the original without much difficulty.Then again, perhaps the inclusion of this version in college classes has to do with the fact that college is no longer the path for scholars, but has been given the same equality treatment as art and poetry. College is now meant for your average, half-literate frat boy who only wants a BA so he can be a mid-level retail manager.Heaney's translation certainly suits for them, since it is the easiest version of the story this side of a digital Angelina. It's fun and exciting, certainly worth a read, but doesn't stand up as a translation.

[eoin-311239 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

So, Heaney wins the Nobel, leaves Harvard, and decides to do this. Best seller, agreed new standard, best translation. Why? He’s not an Old English scholar, not a philologist as such. He was already rich and famous.

I have two guesses:
1. He had already written so much of his own work, he was looking into new sources, translation being a good one. Fine, probably true.
2. Revenge. England conquered Ireland, crushing out the native culture and language as best they could for hundreds of years. Early 20th century, Ireland attempts to reclaim language and culture, including political independence. Except where Heaney is from in the North. So, how do you conquer the conqueror hundreds of years later? You take their language and use it against them. Like Joyce, but instead of moving further ahead, he goes back to the beginning. Translates the oldest English there is into 20th century Irish dialect English.

[qatarjj · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This poem has been around for about 1200 years so you know it's got to be good.

I can't help wonder how much the original oral version changed with the telling and retelling until some anonymous monk committed the story to paper, or at least vellum. I suspect he added his own touches, converting the pagan Northmen to Christians! Also how many stories did Beowulf influence? JRR Tolkien was something of a subject matter expert on Beowulf so it probably shaped the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

[maowangvater · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The mighty young hero of the Geats rescues the Danes from two hellish monsters that are slaughtering their warriors as they sleep in the royal banquet hall. Then heaped in glory and treasure he returns home to become, in his old age, king and dragon-slayer: the final glorious deed that ends his life. Raffel's translation into vivid alliterative modern English is vivid and exciting. The new afterword lauds how well this translation has stood the test of time, and how many recent adaptations of the poem have been published since then (including the icky 2007 movie). Frank also writes that this earliest epic did not enter the canon of English literature until the late nineteenth century.

[kurt.rocourt · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Good story.

[cecrow · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I'm a bit shamed to rate this below average, perceiving its value as a historical artifact, but as literature in terms of content it doesn't amount to much more than a curiosity piece. Such perfectly crafted heroes are now denigrated so the model doesn't serve, and the story reads like the tale of a hubris bubble that never gets popped. That said, I'm glad to have taken the few minutes required to breeze through a modern translation for discussion purposes. I suspect a less wooden ear than mine for poetry, and wearing more patience, may perceive greater magic in its original form.

[josephtate_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Excellent, excellent translation.

[liz1564 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Beowulf translated by Stephen Mitchell was sent to me by Yale University Press via NetGalley. Thank you.This Beowulf by Stephen Mitchell is an very entertaining translation, The adjective that comes to my mind is "robust." The narrative is straightforward and the flashbacks and foreshadowing are not awkward and do not stop the forward movement of the story. I taught Beowulf for many years to high school students and I wish I had this version. The literature anthology I used had the Kennedy translation which I personally love for it lyric imagery. In Kennedy, the lines about Grendel approaching Heorot (lines 678-680) are "From the stretching moors, from the misty hollows, Grendel came creeping, accursed of God." The Mitchell translation renders the same lines as " Then up from the moor, in a veil of mist, Grendel came slouching. He bore God's wrath." I like the former, but I know my students would have preferred the latter.In the end, whether it be Mitchell, Seamus Heaney, Charles Kennedy or E. Donaldson, all translations of Beowulf are a good thing. I am sure the scops who entertained their listeners during the black nights in the cold north would each have put his own spin on the story. Make it beautiful or make it bloody. One thing is for sure. Beowulf can never be boring.Some very nice addition sto the Mitchell translation are the addition of maps, genealogical charts and a list of characters and place names with pronunciations.

[antao-3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

(Original Review, 2001-02-20)If you are familiar with the Hindu myth-kitty though, you may also find parallels between “Beowulf” and the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. When Jambavan spends a lot of time telling Hanuman about how great he is, to induce him to jump to Lanka in search of Sita, or Arjun surveys the array of warriors against him, described in some detail, leading to the Bhagavad Gita, or the Pandavas' "advisor" at Draupadi's swayamvar asks the unknown Karna to declare his lineage and rank.In Beowulf, where the eponymous protagonist has to be introduced by his history in order to be considered worthy of being received in Hrothgar's halls, and able to, perhaps, take his chances against Grendel. Thorsten Verblen's, in his model of conspicuous consumption, suggested that in societies, or social conditions, that were not stable a man could only gain status by his reputation and by what he carried with him: his arms, his abilities and his history. It is a theory that applies to the bling culture of hip-hop, where alas, lives can be dramatically shortened, as much as to the Bronze Age and Iron Age world's of chiefdoms and agriculturists versus nomads. Women were acquired by raids, but there was enough spare, or surplus, labour available for ancillary crafts to develop: goldsmithery, ironmongery and the like. In such conditions, a man meeting a stranger or a putative enemy, would be likely to show off his armour and then show off further by talking about who he was, both his history and his lineage. Like Buffaloes sizing each other up before fighting, it may have been a way of reducing the number of fights that had to occur.Let us not forget the fate of Patroclus, who deliberately rode around in Achilles' bling and therefore got caught in a drive-by assassination. Had he been in a Prius instead of his black, silver-wheeled, borrowed SUV, he might have lived...It reminds me of the peaceful moment of the Bhagavad Gita from the Mahabharata just before the great battle of Kurukshetra, though of course Arjuna and Krishna are on the same side.Celtic kingdoms, Saxon kingdoms, Anglo-Norman kingdoms, were ALL European kingdoms. There was no hard border between mainland Britain and the rest of Europe. Kings ruled territories on both sides of the channel in joint jurisdictions. Laws and customs, language, arts and religion were common, in overlapping webs. The Celtic (that is British, or Welsh) and the Saes/Saxon peoples were not 'barbaric'. They were civilised, literate cultures, with highly organised governments, law codes, religion and arts.The group which was 'barbaric' was the 'Normans'. These were a rabble of raiders, adventurers, thieves and pirates, drawn together to loot other peoples. They were illiterate, depending on the monks of those they conquered to keep their records. Their law codes were truly barbaric, vastly inferior to the British and the Saxons, who operated on a system of compensation payments (fines). It was the Normans who imposed amputation, tortures, and increased executions. They were supreme in violence only, inheriting the worst of Viking culture without its balancing qualities, as the Normans were the misfits and rejects. What they were also good at was propaganda. Their bards sang wholly fabricated histories claiming an honourable ancestry for a united people that didn't exist. There were no 'Normans' until the bards constructed the myth of them as the raiders conquests grew successful.This is the 'people' who spawned the British ruling class. The British ruling class keeps books that trace their genealogy proudly 'back to the Conquest'. They were violent thugs, the vermin of Europe, who grabbed and stole, then dressed it all up in myths of propaganda. They haven't changed. Just like the rest of Europe, namely in Portugal...I wonder what the Britons thought about the invading Anglo-Saxons. Were they any better? The difference is, we have very few records to tell us what they thought. The invaders came in sufficient numbers that over a period of centuries their language replaced the native language, and so over time the Brits ended up with a weird sense that the Anglo-Saxon invaders were "Britons", but later Norman invaders were "them", because there weren't enough of them to replace the language of the Anglo-Saxon invaders (although enough to give us 1/3 of the English vocabulary).What did the Britons think about the Saxons (who didn't invade, but simply switch roles from mercenaries to usurpers...)? Actually we know exactly what the British thought of the Saes - they loathed them. See “Armes Prydain” and other works of the time. There was no worse insult than to be called a Saes - Saxon. The native British were culturally superior if only because settlers come as younger sons, or people who are unsuccessful at home, less educated, less cultured. You don't invade and crush natives by singing pretty songs. Compare “Beowulf” with the “Mabinogi” and the gulf is huge - like comparing drinking songs with Shakespeare.It's also inaccurate that the Saes replaced the British. Genetics say otherwise and the story is mixed. In some places it was violent takeover. In others it was trade, marriage, settlement. Coexistence is now the new historical understanding. Brits were mainly herders so held to the high ground and you can still see their place names across 'England' today in higher areas. The Saes were grain farmers who lived on lowland clays so their names survive there. The Saes were not as educated as the Brits. Alfred imported monks from the Cymru (Wales) led by Asser, to teach his people to read and write. Alfred was a visionary, like the later Guillaum le Batard of Normandy. But their peoples were less savoury, especially the Normans who practised genocide to terrify the natives. The whole of Yorkshire was depopulated, half of Pembrokeshire, and a large area of the Scots border. Massacres, or else driven out into destitution. On the second the British ruling class has not changed, still driving people into poverty and homelessness, just like the rest of Europe, namely in Portugal...The English called themselves English from at least the sixth or seventh century on. It was the Normans and their successors who coined the term Anglo Saxon to describe them. All part of the attempt to legitimise their conquest and pretend that they were the rightful rulers of the kingdom and its confiscated estates; and that English history started with them. That's why they promoted the Arthurian myth and tried to pretend they were its heirs - in order to try to write the English out of the story. And why they immediately knocked down the English Abbeys and cathedrals and rebuilt them in their own style.

[sweetbriarpoet · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A beautiful poem. I have been meaning to read this for years- and thought it would require a deeper understanding of Old English to really capture the essence of the poem. If you are worried about this, I suggest reading Seamus Heaney's translation. He is such an amazing poet (my absolute favorite) and his knowledge of Old English means you get a meaningful translation which really allows you to just enjoy the story.

[bryndahlquis · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I was very surprised at the ease with which I read this great epic poem. I expected it to be very hard to get through and keep focused on, but it's actually a very straightforward story. Lots of action, and lots and lots of random little stories thrown in.This is the only version of Beowulf I've read, but from the snippets I've seen of other versions, this would probably be my favorite.

[lisamaria_c · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was a surprisingly speedy, easy and enjoyable read--for which Heaney, the translator, deserves a lot of credit. Especially given this is a verse translation. I've found that I have preferred prose translations of Homer and Dante because those trying to be true to alliteration, meter and rhyme often feel forced, awkward and occlude the meaning. It probably helped that Heaney is a distinguished poet in his own right; his translation was fluid, with a rhythm and tone somewhere between Homer and Tolkien in feel. And the story is fun, a Pagan tale set mostly in Dark Ages Denmark with Christian interjections by the original poet who probably was a monk writing anywhere between the mid-seventh to the end of the tenth century. There are monsters, notably Grendel and a dragon with his horde. What's not to love?And a translation is needed. I read a bilingual edition, with the original Old English (Anglo-Saxon) and modern English translation side by side. Knowing Spanish I often can make out the gist of passages in Portuguese, Italian or even French. And though it's not easy, I can get Chaucer, in Middle English, even if I prefer a translation there too. I was surprised really at how indecipherable I found the Anglo-Saxon of Beowulf. All the more reason to appreciate Heaney's achievement.

[bezoar44 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This translation (by Seamus Heaney) of Beowulf has a plain-spoken elegance. The layout - original Anglo-Saxon on the left page, Heaney translation on the right -- makes it possible to read the original poem aloud for its gorgeous alliteration and rolling rhythm. Still, the world of the poem is dismal. Life is hard; death is fated. Men kill one another, or monsters kill them. Everyone is so poor (by modern standards) that an individual shirt of ring-mail is a family heirloom, handed down for generations, or given by a king to a follower as a major mark of favor. In such a world, listening to good poetry might be one of the few lasting pleasures. The story of Beowulf is tedious; the poetry, transcendent.

[thedivineoomba · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

So, I found this version of Beowulf in the clearance bin of a used book store. I picked it up thinking this is a book I should read - and, it surpassed all expectation.I read the initial part of Beowulf in highschool - wear he fights Grendel and his mother. At the time, I wasn't interested. It was hard going, and it didn't really stick with me. But this new translation maintained the verse form while keeping mostly true to the original translation (this is my non-expert opinion. I don't read old English, so can't really say). It totally opened my eyes into the world of England in the year 1000 or so, with knights and armour, and chivalry and all that. Its fun, its exciting, and totally a different age and values than what I am used to.Highly recommended.

[pferdina · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

If you are like me, you haven't read Beowulf since high school and your memory of the story is probably pretty bad. I found reading this translation very enjoyable, and I loved having the "original" version printed opposite the translation (even though I couldn't read it).

[benuathanasia · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I read this the first time in college. Then, I enjoyed the incredible rush of the adventure. This time around reading it, I ignored the forest to focus on the trees; I inhaled the beautiful poetry of the language. A wonderful, timeless adventure.

[sasham-1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I would have loved to have a glossary with in this book with a few explanations of some words and maybe a summary because the poetical form can make the story hard to follow

[helenliz_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Another re-read prompted by the desert island books conversation. this is just fabulous. I know the original derives from a oral tradition, and I feel that this is designed to be read aloud, not to oneself. the meter is unlike the iambic rhythm we're so used to now, but the alliteration works and the lines sort of trip of the tongue. It's never a dull "te tum te tum te tum" thing - the words almost have a life of their own.
Add to that it's a swashbuckling story from the heroic to the unbearably sad and it just sweeps you away. Takes a bit of concentration, but that's no bad thing in a book.

[indreamsawake · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Read this in two different college classes, the first with a terrible professor and I hated it, the second time with a wonderful professor and I loved it! There is something to be said for teaching style.

[lhlogan1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Classically good and classically fun.

[lovinglit · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This translated version has the Olde English verse written on the left page, and the modern English verse on the right page. As Heaney states in the introduction, he has tried with this translation to keep the language simple and as the original intended the meaning to be. He favoured meaning over rhyme, and as a consequence there is little rhyme. But the rhythm is certainly there and it reads very well. I was surprised at how accessible the story was, and how drawn in I was. There seemed to be some glaringly obvious similarities in storyline to The Hobbit...I am unsure as to whether this has been stated before I came to the conclusion, but is seemed so to me. The parts of the story that did get complicated were the family lineages and connections. But that didn't detract from the legend of Beowulf being as grand and fearsome as ever

[multifaceted_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

So. Beowulf. I have absolutely no knowledge of Old English--so I can't even begin to understand the original text on the even numbers of the pages--but I will say that it was fun to look over every now and then, sound out some of the real Old English words, and see where some of our words eventually evolved from. Heaney's translation, on the other hand, was pretty great, although I don't have any other versions to compare to. It was a fast paced read; after all, the original poet managed to pack 50 years and some royal feuds into 3000+ lines. Sometimes the reading goes so fast that I find myself stopping, looking back and trying to take in the complex poetic elements that Heaney managed to keep within the work, such as alliteration of one or two words within the two separate sections of a line; something that is very much in line with some of the elements Viking poets originally employed in their own language, as well. I kind of wished Heaney would have kept more of the kennings, though. Even though it can make reading more obtuse, I find it says just as much about the author and the times as it does about the person or thing the kenning is describing.The story itself is pretty simple; it's a fast paced tale of lords and changing kings, great deeds, and the eventual inevitability of death--it kind of makes me think of Gilgamesh, in a way. The "moral" I took from it was not only the unavoidable, eventual decline and death of life, but also of countries. The only slightly confusing thing for me was the descriptions of long-standing feuds between peoples, since I haven't had much of any experience with that part of history or the geography of the feuds outside of this story. I found the story a really interesting combination of Christian and Pagan beliefs. There's the beliefs in giants and monsters, only they're attributed to something such as a pre-flood like sinful, heathen time (in the case of the giants) or as the demonic offspring of Cain, the man cast out by God as the killer of his brother. There's mentions of things that have their roots in Norse myths, such as the "Brosinga" necklace around line 1197 (originally the Brisingamen, the necklace of the goddess Freyja once stolen by the god Loki), the story of Sigmund beginning at 884 (very similar to the Norse story of Sigurd, Sigmund's son, where the gold guarded by the dragon was begotten by a few of the Aesir gods from the dwarves, and cursed by the latter), or the mention of weapons engraved with "worm-loops" at 1532 (this recalls to mind Jormungand, the Midgard serpent who encircles the world, biting on his own tail). In Beowulf, most of these side stories are attributed to kings and queens alone, with no mention of gods. Then there's the mark of the Shieldings--the boar on their banners and helmets recalls the animal the Vanir god Freyr is often associated with keeping by his side or as the object of his sacrifices. Of course, Freyr was the god called upon for prosperity and protection in battle. And the most prominent thing of all; one of the most common "kennings" used for God in Beowulf is also one of the names for Odin--All-father.Oh! One more thing that stuck out to me was the women in Beowulf. I was intrigued by how often women figured in the Eddas--as goddesses, as Norns who wove fates, as Valkyries who chose the battle-slain, as the prophetic Volvas, and they were even pivotal characters in quite a few of the heroic lays. Beowulf, sadly, feels more like a reality. The women dole out the mead and maybe one or two of the smaller gifts to the heroes, and daughters are passed along as prizes to heroic lords or as a peace-treaty to kings of nearby nations. This obviously works out very well, right? And by "very well" I mean "hardly at all". Thanks, dad.

[malarchy_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Penguin Epics edition of Beowulf is a 117 page translation in verse form by Michael Alexander. It is the same translation as the Penguin Classics edition but does not contain the additional contextual information.Beowulf is of course the legendary Old English epic written probably over a thousand years ago. It is a Scandic tale rather than an English one, the action taking place in the lands of various Scandic and Germanic factions. What makes it special is its existence as such a great early Old English work. What makes it epic is that Beowulf tells a series of outstanding adventures captured in the literary style of the Germanic peoples who populated northern Europe including Eastern Britain.There are various translations of Beowulf. This translation makes a very interesting judgement call. It retains a lot of the Germanic sentence structure rather than aiming for a more readable style to modern English users. This makes for a tough read at times in English but a more natural fit in terms of sub-clause use and verb positioning for those familiar with German and its most closely related languages. After a while the more complex composition becomes increasingly readable to the point where a reader can find ease in the word order patterns.There are occasional points to criticise in the translation. In particular the translation of the word Wyrd. It is hard to skip over the translation of Wyrd as Weird because it makes no sense in modern English. Fate would have been a better translation. It is particularly difficult to skip over when used around the adventure with the dragon give the proximity of Old English Wyrm and Wyrd. Why one has the modern English translation and not the other is hard to follow.Still, the translation by Michael Alexander is rich and evocative. It is hard to describe the times and places of Beowulf but the Epics edition does a decent enough job.The story itself is of course outstanding. It is the 15th book in the Penguin Epics collection and comes much later than some of the earlier works in the series. The later nature makes it a much more advanced work than those which have come before except perhaps Cupid & Psyche. What makes it so distinct is the crossover of symbolism, heroic deed, and societal structure. The bonds between people are much more organic than in more ancient literature.It helps that Beowulf is not just fiction but the elements that may be fictitious are still gripping. The battles against Grendel is surprisingly short, Beowulf defeating Grendel in their first combat. Grendel's mother offers another foe for Beowulf but he is able to defeat both of them. He does so in different circumstances. The battle with Grendel taking place in the familiar surroundings of a great hall. The battle with Grendel's mother however is more fantastic. This battle is much more of an adventure into legend with the fight itself taking place underwater, where Beowulf would in reality have stood no chance.That there is a distinction between a more real environment for the battle with Grendel and a fabulous one in combat with Grendel's mother could suggest slightly different traditions. Was Grendel real?The possibility of reality exists because of the non-fiction elements of the work. The battles against Frisians and the Battle on the Ice being parts of the sequence of wars in northern Europe.That Beowulf himself is a Geat is fascinating. It is thrilling to have a work of this quality preserve a tale from a defeated people. As a people now culturally assimilated into Swedes, it is really exciting to hear their voice from an elder time.Beowulf's ultimate demise comes in battle with a dragon. His men are not brave enough to take on the great wyrm but Beowulf and the dragon are each other's match. It is a terrific fight and a great way for a hero to go.Beowulf's Christian nature is a little odd. He initially is presented as a Christian hero which does not fit with the Christianisation of the region. There is only limited reference to Christianity as the work progresses. It seems as though the religious element was a later addition. It certainly is not enough of an addition to erode the references to traditional Scandic society and culture.The influence of this great work on more modern literature is entirely obvious. Tolkien lifted not just ideas and themes from Beowulf even character names. The most famous author in the fantasy genre turns out to have written tales that could almost be sequels to this old epic.The Penguin Epics edition does not contain any additional information other than the work itself. It fits within the Penguin Epics Collection. The Penguin Classics version apparently contains a bit more. This absence does no real harm to the work at all for those familiar with north European mythology or history, or indeed for those able to do a bit of follow-up research themselves.Beowulf is a must read for everyone. Which edition to choose is a matter of choice. This offering was a good choice for this reader.

[janemarieprice · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This translation of Beowulf is excellent. It captures the spirit of the poetry without becoming too dense to read. I had read excerpts of the story for various classes and never enjoyed it. It is definitely something that you have to read the entire thing to find interesting.

[hermit_9_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

McNamara makes no bones about it. He is more interested in an accurate translation than in conveying the poetic feel of Beowulf. The poem offers a glimpse into pre-Christian European life, but it is so infused with Christian commentary (by the monks who transcribed and preserved the oral tradition) that it is difficult for a layman to separate what is real and what is overlay. Because McNamara focuses on pure translation, this version is fairly easy to read, given how and when it was originally written.

[dinadansfriend · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I can't give it five stars because it is a translation, and I can't tell how good the original in Old English is. But it does move along very nicely, and I'm not rooting for Grendel, his mother, or the dragon.It is set in southern Scandinavia, not in Northern England, but It is the start of written English. Another point is that we have only one copy, so, it wasn't a best seller in its time. But we have loved it since its first printing in 1815, and thus, I got to read it. It has no overt Christianity, and so is a window into the pagan mind, as it probably was, like the Iliad, a crystallization of a number of shorter orally transmitted poems into a coherent work. Scholars think that it was probably found in its longer form about 776 CE, and is written in the dialect of Northern England, not the Wessex speech. Everyone should read it, preferably aloud, as one reads "the Song of Roland".

[gbill_7 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It seems a bit petty to rate Beowulf as 3.5 stars, I mean, who am I to say that about a landmark work in English literature, one that’s 10-12 centuries old and of such importance? It is an epic tale, recounting Beowulf’s battles with three monsters – Grendel, Grendel’s mother, and a dragon. Beowulf, a warrior from a part of Sweden called Geatland, comes to the aid of the king of the Danes to fight the first two, and then fifty years later as King of the Geats, fights the third. I’m no scholar and cannot compare different translations, but Rebsamen’s translation, done here in verse, with each line composed of two half-lines separated with a pause, is meant to be true to the original, and while reading it I could imagine it being intoned by a deep baritone voice around a fire while quaffing some mead. The names of the Danes, Swedes, and Geats/Waegmundings take some getting used to, though while many are mentioned, only a handful are of importance, and it is a relatively quick read. Perhaps that’s why I have it as 3.5 stars; while historically important, it’s somewhat one-dimensional. Maybe Beowulf should have had a love interest. :PQuotes:On Old Age:“There was song and laughter – the Spear Danes’ kingstretched his memory for stories of childhood.At times the old one touched his harpstringsstrummed the songwood sang of the pastmoments of heartgrief high victoriesremnants of his youth from reaches of his mind.At times he brooded bound by his yearsan old sword-warrior sorrowing for friendsworn with winter welling with memoriesyearning for dead ones young hearth-fellows.”On the transience of life:“The last of splendor slips into darknessthat loaned king-body cracks upon the pyreswirls away in smoke – soon another onesteps to the gift-throne shares his goldhoardturns that treachery to trust and reward.Guard against life-bale beloved Beowulfbest of warriors and win for your souleternal counsel – do not care for pridegreat shield-champion! The glory of your strengthlasts for a while but not long aftersickness or spear-point will sever you from life...”

[csayban · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Sigh. I know, I know. This is the oldest English language story and the inspiration for The Lord of the Rings and Chuck Norris Beowulf is such a monster killing machine and… That’s great. Unfortunately, if you take all that away and someone wrote it now it would be a painfully predictable, plodding bore filled with WAY too much expository dialog and a list of characters that are neigh impossible to follow – except for Chuck Beowulf who bench-press mountains and sneezes lightning. This was arduous to try and get through – Shakespeare on Ritalin kind of arduous – because there was never a single doubt about what was going to happen or any emotional stake in the characters. I do enjoy reading difficult pieces of fiction. However, difficult and boring is a really bad combination. I know I’m supposed to like things like this, but I missed the boat on this one.