What I'm Reading: Beowulf, the one translated by Seamus Heaney. So far, I've read to page 87 and it's not QUITE as horrendous as I'd anticipated. (Although if you're the kind of person that's into epic poems from the early 11th century, you'll love this stuff.) It's rather hard to understand... thankfully, this translation conveniently has little notes on the side that summarize the passages, like "Beowulf confronts Uredarth" (or whatever his name is). It's extremely helpful to those of us who have a hard time understand old English. When I say old, I'm not talking Shakespeare thee-thou-thy stuff. It's older than that, if you can believe it. (The original translation in Anglo-Saxon is closer to German than English.)
Well, anyway, as a summary: There's this super duper hero named Beowulf. He kills a monster named Grendel, saving the people in a kingdom run by a very nice king. Then Grendel's mother is inexplicably ticked that her son has been killed, so she sets off to find Beowulf and kill him. From what I remember of my friend's very brief summary, Beowulf is killed in the fight and then everyone in the kingdom is sad. The End.
Oops, almost forgot an excerpt... good luck trying to understand it. A hint: This passage is from Beowulf's fight with Grendel. The fight part of the poem is actually kind of cool. (Emphasis on kind of.)
Before then, no Shielding elder would believe
there was any power or person upon earth
capable of wrecking their horn-rigged hall
unless the burning embrace of a fire
engulf it in flame. Then an extraordinary
wail arose, and bewildering fear
came over the Danes. Everyone felt it
who heard that cry as it echoed off the wall,
a God-cursed scream and strain of catastrophe,
the howl of the loser, the lament of the hell-serf
keening his wound. He was overwhelmed,
manacled tight by the man who of all men
was foremost and strongest in the days of this life.
