Beowulf
Beowulf poet (1856–1928), 1000
A hall under nightly siege, a stranger who volunteers to face the thing in the dark, and a poet who makes boasting, grief and fate sound like weather. The oldest English epic. A solemn, slow-building voice carries you through boasts, feasts and night terrors, with dread and grief close under the adventure.
Feels like awe, dread and grief. About adventure, death and power.
Who it’s for
You may like it if you enjoy heroic adventure told in formal, alliterative verse and don't mind a poem that dwells on fate and mourning. The old, sometimes knotty diction can make long stretches demanding, so it helps to read patiently.
Why read it
Read it for the stark, memorable scenes and a voice that turns violence, loyalty and mourning into something close to weather.
Pages from the book
What happens to a person when nothing has ever gone wrong.
He often permitteth the mood-thought of man of The illustrious lineage to lean to possessions, 80 Allows him earthly delights at his manor, A high-burg of heroes to hold in his keeping, Maketh portions of earth-folk hear him, And a wide-reaching kingdom so that, wisdom failing him, He himself is unable to reckon its boundaries; 85 He liveth in luxury, little debars him, Nor sickness nor age, no treachery-sorrow Becloudeth his spirit, conflict nowhere, No sword-hate, appeareth, but all of the world doth Wend as he wisheth; the worse he knoweth not, 90 Till arrant arrogance inward pervading, Waxeth and springeth, when the warder is sleeping, The guard of the soul: with sorrows encompassed, Too sound is his slumber, the slayer is near him, Who with bow and arrow aimeth in malice. A guest promises to win or never leave the hall alive.
When I boarded my boat with a band of my liegemen, I would work to the fullest the will of your people Or in foe’s-clutches fastened fall in the battle. Deeds I shall do of daring and prowess, 80 Or the last of my life-days live in this mead-hall." The boasts were loud at night; the morning light told another story.
25 O’er the ale-vessel promised warriors in armor They would willingly wait on the wassailing-benches A grapple with Grendel, with grimmest of edges. Then this mead-hall at morning with murder was reeking, The building was bloody at breaking of daylight, 30 The bench-deals all flooded, dripping and bloodied, The folk-hall was gory: I had fewer retainers, Dear-beloved warriors, whom death had laid hold of. Beowulf poet.The only surviving manuscript, written around 1000, was scorched in a 1731 fire at Ashburnham House. Nobody knows who composed the poem, and the manuscript gives it no title.
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Questions readers ask
- Is Beowulf for me?
- You may like it if you enjoy heroic adventure told in formal, alliterative verse and don't mind a poem that dwells on fate and mourning. The old, sometimes knotty diction can make long stretches demanding, so it helps to read patiently.
- What is Beowulf like?
- A solemn, slow-building voice carries you through boasts, feasts and night terrors, with dread and grief close under the adventure. Feels like awe, dread and grief. About adventure, death and power.
- What should I read after Beowulf?
- If you liked Beowulf, try Divine Comedy, Longfellow's Translation, Hell (Dante Alighieri), The Iliad (Homer) and Dracula (Bram Stoker).
A taste of the feed
A captain's speech to tired sailors about what humans are for.
Consider ye the seed from which ye sprang; Ye were not made to live like unto brutes, But for pursuit of virtue and of knowledge.’ So eager did I render my companions, With this brief exhortation, for the voyage, That then I hardly could have held them back. And having turned our stern unto the morning, We of the oars made wings for our mad flight, Evermore gaining on the larboard side.
Divine Comedy, Longfellow's Translation, Hell · Dante Alighieri
He has no comfort to give her except the shape of what is coming.
So speaking, to the arms of his dear spouse He gave the boy; she on her fragrant breast Received him, weeping as she smiled. The chief Beheld, and, moved with tender pity, smoothed Her forehead gently with his hand and said:— “Sorrow not thus, beloved one, for me. No living man can send me to the shades Before my time; no man of woman born, Coward or brave, can shun his destiny. But go thou home, and tend thy labors there— The web, the distaff—and command thy maids To speed the work: The cares of war pertain To all men born in Troy, and most to me.”
The Iliad · Homer
Watch a man talk himself out of his own remorse.
Manfred, though persuaded, like his wife, that the vision had been no work of fancy, recovered a little from the tempest of mind into which so many strange events had thrown him. Ashamed, too, of his inhuman treatment of a Princess who returned every injury with new marks of tenderness and duty, he felt returning love forcing itself into his eyes; but not less ashamed of feeling remorse towards one against whom he was inwardly meditating a yet more bitter outrage, he curbed the yearnings of his heart, and did not dare to lean even towards pity. The next transition of his soul was to exquisite villainy.
The Castle of Otranto · Horace Walpole
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