Thank you for this. I didn’t know I needed it. But as I began to read about the literary details it felt like sitting down to a gourmet meal. Suddenly it became clear that I’ve been used to a diet of Cheetos by comparison.
Enjoyed reading Tolkien's translation of Beowulf with a friend. Tolkien translated the work in 1926 and taught it at Oxford. It was Tolkien's son, Christopher, who, in 2014, finished sorting, compiling and editing his father's notes on the book. Christopher Tolkien was almost 90 years old when the work was published. Here is a quote from an article in the New York Times in the column What To Read, about the book:
Beowulf had a tremendously positive impact on me when I first read it as a teenager. This was also the time when I was entering the world of Tolkien, and the echoes of Beowulf are everywhere. I am currently writing a series of three essays centered on the Nibelungenlied which compare it to more explicitly pagan narratives (Poetic Edda, Volsunga Saga) that came before and the more explicitly Christian narrative (Tolkien's mythology) that came later. I would include Beowulf as well, but I'm already positively swimming in material. But it's fun to link what you're saying here with what I've been coming across in those other works. It seems that there is a renewed interest in these great works in our day, which is amazing, because learning about another historical era is in itself learning a new language. You have to get inside the mind of people very different from yourself. The study of language, literature, and history all lead us into greater empathy with our fellow human beings when done rightly.
It’s very interesting. We are probably a few decades apart in age (?). Beowulf and Tolkien’s role were very formative in my academic life. But (as you know) the fantasy angle was a totally different stream that I didn’t encounter until later through my students. I love Beowulf as history and literature. Still haven’t crossed the bridge it is to fantasy lit.
But the adjacent epics/poems/etc of that period do interest me!
Of all Tolkien’s fantasy lit, The Simarillion is the most heavily influenced by North European mythology. Many have complained that it doesn’t feel like a novel, and that’s because it is conscientiously supposed to be like those old sagas. You might enjoy that more than the famous works.
Another writer who was strongly influenced by North European mythology is Sigrid Undset, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1926. Her masterwork is "Kristin Lavransdatter," a beautiful and profoundly Christian look at 14th Century Norway.
Thank you for doing this...and for the link to Tolkien's essay. I read Heaney's debt to Tolkien in the intro to Heaney's translation ("Tolkien's brilliant literary treatment changed the way the poem was valued and initiated a new era–and new terms–of appreciation.") Looking forward to following along with you!
I mourn the loss of deep reading in my life. I used to take on one big book every season for slow, ponderous word chewing, and somehow, that necessity became a luxury I couldn’t afford. Thanks for this nudge. Several classics I poorly skimmed as a young man have been scowling at me from my bookshelf for a while now. I’m going to light a pipe and make my apologoes.
Even if it takes a long time (life is busy!) I think reading a good work slowly is so good for us in so many ways. Quality over quantity! Would love to know what you do read when you do.
Most of my brain cells these days go to Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age, along with his commentators including Andy Root, James Smith and your dear self.
Fascinating! I’m going to watch and listen for the poetry techniques as I continue. I’m 30% through Beowulf and already learned more than when I was assigned it back in college. I’m catching so much humor this time through. Thank you for this intro. 🙂
Wonderful! You have taken me back to my own grad school days. I, too, took a semester of Old English, though the professor alternated semesters between translating Beowulf and translating other works, and I was in an off semester. Really rewarding work. I took Middle Welsh, too, which has stuck with me more. I'm finishing writing a novel that incorporates that Celtic language and culture. A hearty Yes! to your encouragement about learning other languages to understand our own better. And now I'm searching out my Heaney translation of Beowulf. It's around here somewhere . . . I think it may actually be on my poetry shelf! :)
Wow! That sounds like amazing and interesting work that you are doing now.
I actually learned OE one semester (and translated shorter poems) then spent the next semester entirely on Beowulf. Apparently, UK college students studying English always had to learn OE, until recently, as I understand it. Makes sense to me!
Thank you for renewing my memory of why I love words/language so much. Loving words/language is to love all forms of language. My late-teenage love of language was first aroused by Frederick Bodmer's book The Loom of Language: An Approach to the Mastery of Many Languages. I lost the book along the way to adulthood and only rediscovered it as an available reprint today. I promptly ordered an actual paper edition. That is saying something for someone like me who loves to carry his entire collection in Kindle editions. They may all take the plane with me and never add weight to my carry-on.
Back in '81 I took an A level in English Literature (US diploma?). One of the 8 set texts was The Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale, in its original untranslated Middle English. Not quite as challenging as Old English perhaps but it was still a nightmare! We weren't taught Middle English, simply given clues to its meaning by our teacher - ho loved to sound it out in class. I was hopelessly lost and opted not to attempt an essay on it in the final exam. So I'm very grateful indeed to have some good translations of Beowulf to enjoy! Thanks for the intro, Karen, much appreciated.
Middle English is very hard without translation! English has changed so much. It’s truly fascinating. I will cover a bit of Chaucer in later posts. Should be fun!
Will definitely look forward to that. As a treat to myself I've been re-reading my eight A level texts this year and recently read Gerald J. Davis' prose translation of the Wife of Bath - finally I have some idea of what it's all about!
Breaking Beowulf news: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/jeff-bridges-dave-bautista-beowulf-grendel-movie-1235896022/amp/
Thank you for this. I didn’t know I needed it. But as I began to read about the literary details it felt like sitting down to a gourmet meal. Suddenly it became clear that I’ve been used to a diet of Cheetos by comparison.
Oh, I love the discovery of things we didn’t know we needed! Honored to offer that to you. ☺️
Me too!
The Tolkien translation has been gathering dust on my shelf. Would it be a good one for this read-along?
It would certainly work. It’s prose not poetry but a lot of the sense of the poetry still comes through.
Enjoyed reading Tolkien's translation of Beowulf with a friend. Tolkien translated the work in 1926 and taught it at Oxford. It was Tolkien's son, Christopher, who, in 2014, finished sorting, compiling and editing his father's notes on the book. Christopher Tolkien was almost 90 years old when the work was published. Here is a quote from an article in the New York Times in the column What To Read, about the book:
"Not all Tolkien scholars know “Beowulf,” but all “Beowulf” scholars know of Tolkien, whose influential 1936 paper “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics” has been credited with restoring the poem’s value as a work of art." (Gilsdorf, Ian. 'Waving His Wand at Beowulf.' newyorktimes.com 05-18-2014 https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/19/books/jrr-tolkiens-translation-of-beowulf-is-published.html Accessed 09-06-2023)
It's strange for me to think about a time when Beowulf was not part of the canon. Thanks to Tolkien, it is!
Beowulf had a tremendously positive impact on me when I first read it as a teenager. This was also the time when I was entering the world of Tolkien, and the echoes of Beowulf are everywhere. I am currently writing a series of three essays centered on the Nibelungenlied which compare it to more explicitly pagan narratives (Poetic Edda, Volsunga Saga) that came before and the more explicitly Christian narrative (Tolkien's mythology) that came later. I would include Beowulf as well, but I'm already positively swimming in material. But it's fun to link what you're saying here with what I've been coming across in those other works. It seems that there is a renewed interest in these great works in our day, which is amazing, because learning about another historical era is in itself learning a new language. You have to get inside the mind of people very different from yourself. The study of language, literature, and history all lead us into greater empathy with our fellow human beings when done rightly.
It’s very interesting. We are probably a few decades apart in age (?). Beowulf and Tolkien’s role were very formative in my academic life. But (as you know) the fantasy angle was a totally different stream that I didn’t encounter until later through my students. I love Beowulf as history and literature. Still haven’t crossed the bridge it is to fantasy lit.
But the adjacent epics/poems/etc of that period do interest me!
Of all Tolkien’s fantasy lit, The Simarillion is the most heavily influenced by North European mythology. Many have complained that it doesn’t feel like a novel, and that’s because it is conscientiously supposed to be like those old sagas. You might enjoy that more than the famous works.
Thanks for that tip! I have heard things about that work that made me think that might be the case.
Another writer who was strongly influenced by North European mythology is Sigrid Undset, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1926. Her masterwork is "Kristin Lavransdatter," a beautiful and profoundly Christian look at 14th Century Norway.
I just ordered the trilogy on Audible (I have the book, too, but haven't gotten to it yet.)
Thank you for doing this...and for the link to Tolkien's essay. I read Heaney's debt to Tolkien in the intro to Heaney's translation ("Tolkien's brilliant literary treatment changed the way the poem was valued and initiated a new era–and new terms–of appreciation.") Looking forward to following along with you!
Yes! It's strange to think that Beowulf was ignored in the canon for so long. Tolkien changed that!
I mourn the loss of deep reading in my life. I used to take on one big book every season for slow, ponderous word chewing, and somehow, that necessity became a luxury I couldn’t afford. Thanks for this nudge. Several classics I poorly skimmed as a young man have been scowling at me from my bookshelf for a while now. I’m going to light a pipe and make my apologoes.
Even if it takes a long time (life is busy!) I think reading a good work slowly is so good for us in so many ways. Quality over quantity! Would love to know what you do read when you do.
Most of my brain cells these days go to Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age, along with his commentators including Andy Root, James Smith and your dear self.
Fascinating! I’m going to watch and listen for the poetry techniques as I continue. I’m 30% through Beowulf and already learned more than when I was assigned it back in college. I’m catching so much humor this time through. Thank you for this intro. 🙂
I’m so encouraged by that! So glad! Thanks for reading this..and for reading Beowulf again!
Wonderful! You have taken me back to my own grad school days. I, too, took a semester of Old English, though the professor alternated semesters between translating Beowulf and translating other works, and I was in an off semester. Really rewarding work. I took Middle Welsh, too, which has stuck with me more. I'm finishing writing a novel that incorporates that Celtic language and culture. A hearty Yes! to your encouragement about learning other languages to understand our own better. And now I'm searching out my Heaney translation of Beowulf. It's around here somewhere . . . I think it may actually be on my poetry shelf! :)
Wow! That sounds like amazing and interesting work that you are doing now.
I actually learned OE one semester (and translated shorter poems) then spent the next semester entirely on Beowulf. Apparently, UK college students studying English always had to learn OE, until recently, as I understand it. Makes sense to me!
Thank you for renewing my memory of why I love words/language so much. Loving words/language is to love all forms of language. My late-teenage love of language was first aroused by Frederick Bodmer's book The Loom of Language: An Approach to the Mastery of Many Languages. I lost the book along the way to adulthood and only rediscovered it as an available reprint today. I promptly ordered an actual paper edition. That is saying something for someone like me who loves to carry his entire collection in Kindle editions. They may all take the plane with me and never add weight to my carry-on.
So grateful to have offered that reminder. And I am not familiar with that book! I’m going to check it out. Thank you for pointing it out!
Very helpful information about the poetry! I'm eager to learn more about the Christian references.
Looking forward to hopefully shedding light on that!
Back in '81 I took an A level in English Literature (US diploma?). One of the 8 set texts was The Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale, in its original untranslated Middle English. Not quite as challenging as Old English perhaps but it was still a nightmare! We weren't taught Middle English, simply given clues to its meaning by our teacher - ho loved to sound it out in class. I was hopelessly lost and opted not to attempt an essay on it in the final exam. So I'm very grateful indeed to have some good translations of Beowulf to enjoy! Thanks for the intro, Karen, much appreciated.
Middle English is very hard without translation! English has changed so much. It’s truly fascinating. I will cover a bit of Chaucer in later posts. Should be fun!
Will definitely look forward to that. As a treat to myself I've been re-reading my eight A level texts this year and recently read Gerald J. Davis' prose translation of the Wife of Bath - finally I have some idea of what it's all about!
I will definitely cover the Wife of Bath!
Yay!