Beowulf sucks. Next?

[cantdog]

And there is something irrestible about the alliterative BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM of Saxon verse.

"Junk" (Strong Measures 399):

An axe angles
from my neighbor's ashcan;
It is hell's handiwork,
the wood not hickory.
The flow of the grain
not faithfully followed.
The shivered shaft
rises from a shellheap
Of plastic playthings,
paper plates...

Richard Wilbur's poem. But you get the BOOM BOOM in Wham bam thank you ma'am, too. It just sings to you.

 

[neonlyte]

Hallo, ishtat

Since we're talking about classics that suck, Great Ex springs immediately to mind.

Dickens, ick.

It's the title that disappoints.

 

[yui]

It's the title that disappoints.

Yes, the title just raises your expectations, doesn't it?

 

[AH Thread Archiver]

Bumping to bring it back to the first page, ahead of the archive threads.

 

[BlackShanglan]

At the risk of getting slapped about:

Why spoil a good story by reading it?

I'm not sure we, living in the 21C, have the eyes or ability to read and understand a story written in the 10C, or 11C depending upon whose history you believe, which to best knowledge seems to be the written down version of a tale passed from mouth to ear dating from some three centuries before; a translation at that, and penned by scribes who'd wore the armour of Christianity.

Admire it. Wonder at the uniqueness of its existence. Pour lyrically across its stanzas, but don't expect or demand meaning.

Beowulf is eulogized in English speaking lands, no harm in that, as long as proportion is maintained.

.............Wealth dies,......kinsmen die
.........A man himself......must likewise die;
But one thing I know......which never dies -
.........The verdict on each man dead.
Havamal's Saga


Damn this banning of  

While actually quite enjoying your defense of pure sound and rhythmn, I think that the meaning is there and is accessible. Is it accessible in the way that the editorial column in the Sun is accessible? There, I will agree, no. But I think that the best things all take work. It's more accessible to most people, I would argue, than Eliot's "The Wasteland" - yet each repays immensely and many-fold the effort required to develop a stronger understanding. I love the music and poetry of Beowulf quite passionately - but I also love the story, the characters, and the world that it evokes. That it takes some time and some effort to know them - although not, I would argue, all that much - is not a detriment. It's a very worthwhile entrance fee.

Shanglan

 

[neonlyte]

While actually quite enjoying your defense of pure sound and rhythmn, I think that the meaning is there and is accessible. Is it accessible in the way that the editorial column in the Sun is accessible? There, I will agree, no. But I think that the best things all take work. It's more accessible to most people, I would argue, than Eliot's "The Wasteland" - yet each repays immensely and many-fold the effort required to develop a stronger understanding. I love the music and poetry of Beowulf quite passionately - but I also love the story, the characters, and the world that it evokes. That it takes some time and some effort to know them - although not, I would argue, all that much - is not a detriment. It's a very worthwhile entrance fee.

Shanglan

I only mean not to read Beowulf in search of an answer or as a comparative account life in those times. It's best viewed alongside the other Saga's, as a narrative, an ideology of courage and valor and passion. Lord knows there was little enough to inspire except inspiration itself.

I spent a happy day over Christmas in the Icelandic National Museum admiring displayed extracts of the Saga's, gleaning anecdotal wisdom. One need only move outside of Rekjavik to be aware of the awesome majesty of an untamed world and have a glimpse of need to invent 'giants of tales' in explanation.

My friends recounted a tale of how walking near the North West coast, a now uninhabited land, they crested a hill range some 500 metres above the sea, a gully nipped in the ridge, and how the wind caught them, lifted the four of them off the ground and dropped them again a few metres away. Of such tales legends are built.

 

[Kassiana]

I disliked most of the bilge I was required to read in my English classes. Shakespeare is a dreadful read. Honest. Every Shakespearean play I've seen has been at the very least tolerable; reading them is torture.

I didn't like Silas Marner, Old Man and the Sea was just boring, and don't get me started on Steinbeck's ruddy "The Black Pearl." Melville's shortest works were okay, but the longer stuff could drive Gandhi to violence IMO.

In fact, the only things I remember LIKING in my English classes in school were the Wordsworth poems and acting out Pyramus and Thisby with my English teacher (his Shakespeare class sucked, but he was a wonderful, funny, creative person). Oh, and I also liked that he read Chaucer to us in the original Middle English because in college, an Anthro prof of mine tried to tell us that aliens had taught him some new language and when he spoke, I recognized the Canterbury Tales passage my high school English teacher had quoted to me.

 

[BlackShanglan]

I only mean not to read Beowulf in search of an answer or as a comparative account life in those times. It's best viewed alongside the other Saga's, as a narrative, an ideology of courage and valor and passion. Lord knows there was little enough to inspire except inspiration itself.

I spent a happy day over Christmas in the Icelandic National Museum admiring displayed extracts of the Saga's, gleaning anecdotal wisdom. One need only move outside of Rekjavik to be aware of the awesome majesty of an untamed world and have a glimpse of need to invent 'giants of tales' in explanation.

My friends recounted a tale of how walking near the North West coast, a now uninhabited land, they crested a hill range some 500 metres above the sea, a gully nipped in the ridge, and how the wind caught them, lifted the four of them off the ground and dropped them again a few metres away. Of such tales legends are built.

Ah, with you now, Neon. We are in agreement. I love the story of the wind there; it makes me want to go and feel it.

Shanglan

 

[shereads]

It's been a long time, but wasn't there a bit with Grendel's Mom too?

I seem to remember that Beowulf had to take her on too, and that was a real anti-climax. Did the poem just end there or something?

And doesn't anyone want to stand up for the ending of Hamlet? Or do we all agree that it's just silly?

The end of Hamlet is just like the second half of the movie, Gone With the Wind.

"Mother died nursing that white-trash slattery woman?!" (sob)

"Watch out for that fence, Pa!" (crunch; splat)

"My boring second husband was shot to death while avenging my honor?" (yawn)

"Little Bonnie loves to ride but she's as stubborn as Pa...Uh-oh." (crunch;splat;sob)

"Melanie is dying?" (Gaak; sob.)

Same idea minus the Danes.

(If Perdita is lurking, this will flush her out.)

 

[BlackShanglan]

(If Perdita is lurking, this will flush her out.)

Indeed it will. You're a master baiter, shereads.

 

[oggbashan]

Helene Hanff, she of 84 Charing Cross Road, reports that one of her friends was studying Anglo-Saxon. The friend was required to write a 1000 word essay in Anglo-Saxon and complained 'All I can write about is - How I Slew One Thousand Men In A Mead Hall'.

Anglo-Saxon has many words for warfare, weapons, injury and death and few for cultural aspirations. Given the times in which they lived it is not surprising that war was a major theme. I think Helene Hanff and her friend were too harsh. Consider this, a modern (1926) translation from Anglo-Saxon:

What is the sun? The splendour of the world, the beauty of the sky, the grace of nature, the honour of the day, the distributor of the hours.
What is the sea? The path of boldness, the earth's bourne, the divider of regions, the receiver of streams, the spring of showers...


That is by Alcuin 730?-804

Then think what 'honour', 'distributor', 'boldness' and 'divider' meant to the Anglo-Saxons. All those were attributes of lordship, kingship or successful warriors. 'Honour' had to be fought for and maintained. A 'distributor' or a 'divider' was a lord or king who rewarded his followers. 'Boldness' was admirable. Alcuin has used words with a significant and limited meaning to give a totally different sense. That is poetry.

Og

 

[shereads]

What is the sun? The splendour of the world, the beauty of the sky, the grace of nature, the honour of the day, the distributor of the hours.
What is the sea? The path of boldness, the earth's bourne, the divider of regions, the receiver of streams, the spring of showers...


That is by Alcuin 730?-804

That doesn't suck at all. Thank you, Og.

Also:

Does living at Charing Cross Road and having a friend who studies Anglo Saxon sound as impressive over there as it does over here? I feel compelled to knit a tea cozy for my butler.

 

[ABSTRUSE]

Sher!!!!!

 

[Guest]

Stinky and Fatty.

Match made in Heaven.

 

[ChilledVodkaIV]

Don't know about Beowulf but this is interesting. If you like your kings sneaky and vicious.

 

[oggbashan]

That doesn't suck at all. Thank you, Og.

Also:

Does living at Charing Cross Road and having a friend who studies Anglo Saxon sound as impressive over there as it does over here? I feel compelled to knit a tea cozy for my butler.

Oops. My fault. I should have made it clearer. Helene Hanff wrote a book called '84 Charing Cross Road' about her correspondence with a London secondhand bookdealer. Helene lived in New York as did her Anglo-Saxon studying friend. The book has been made into a play, a TV play and a film.

Og

 

[dr_mabeuse]

I've got to confess that the whole of Norse mythology just strkes me as bizarre. The idea of doomed Gods who already know their inescapable fate... What does that say about your view of the world? How does that help explain the universe and your place in it? I mean, why not just jump on your sword and the hell with it?

It's not just the apocolyptic gloom. Their pantheon seems weirdly out of whack too. Odin's a tragic figure who doesn't really do anything (although I do like the way he crucified himself to bring man Runes), Thor's a bullying oaf, Baldur doesn't do anything but get killed, Loki's a traitor, and Tyr doesn't do squat.

I guess anyone's mythology is going to look weak compared the the Greeks and Egyptians, but Norse mythology always felt so essentially wrong.

Somewhere I read that Norse mythology was developed at a time when the Germanic tribes were on the march, pretty much fleeing the Huns, and so it reflects the confusion and pessimism of that age. It was also a hunter/warrior's mythology rather than a farmer's mythology, Farmer's mythologies always feel more cyclical and satisfying (and more female) than hunting mythologies, so maybe there's something to that.

 

[shereads]

Oops. My fault. I should have made it clearer. Helene Hanff wrote a book called '84 Charing Cross Road' about her correspondence with a London secondhand bookdealer. Helene lived in New York as did her Anglo-Saxon studying friend. The book has been made into a play, a TV play and a film.

Og

I liked the story better when her address sounded famous.

 

[neonlyte]

I've got to confess that the whole of Norse mythology just strkes me as bizarre. The idea of doomed Gods who already know their inescapable fate... What does that say about your view of the world? How does that help explain the universe and your place in it? I mean, why not just jump on your sword and the hell with it?

It's not just the apocolyptic gloom. Their pantheon seems weirdly out of whack too. Odin's a tragic figure who doesn't really do anything (although I do like the way he crucified himself to bring man Runes), Thor's a bullying oaf, Baldur doesn't do anything but get killed, Loki's a traitor, and Tyr doesn't do squat.

I guess anyone's mythology is going to look weak compared the the Greeks and Egyptians, but Norse mythology always felt so essentially wrong.

Somewhere I read that Norse mythology was developed at a time when the Germanic tribes were on the march, pretty much fleeing the Huns, and so it reflects the confusion and pessimism of that age. It was also a hunter/warrior's mythology rather than a farmer's mythology, Farmer's mythologies always feel more cyclical and satisfying (and more female) than hunting mythologies, so maybe there's something to that.

mab

It's a mythology out of kilter with Christian mythology and bears the brunt of largely being scribed by Christian's, impossible to know how much distortion was placed on the stories and legends through their translation and writing down.

Many of the minor Sagas, mostly Icelandic, read like a hand book for survival - 'Praise no day until ended, no wife until buried, no sword until tested, no maid until bedded, no ice until crossed, no ale until drunk' - Havamal's Saga

I'm guessing there is a tendency to focus on the 'sensational', they depict everything bad about a Pagan world. Even Thor is often miscast, a warrier, yes, but the patron God of Seamen and Farmers - Lord Protector of the Universe is his title. We look at Thor's hammer as a weapon of war and ignore it's use as a fertility emblem. By far the largest finds of 'Thor's Hammer' are in the form of good-luck charms and amulets.

Odin is the supreme God, who hung himself from a tree to 'discover' the runes. The third of the pantheon is Freyr - God of Fertility, usually depicted with a giant phallas. It is his twin sister Freyja (often called Freya) who provides a lavacious image in Norsk mythology - 'the most lascivious of goddesses, wanton and fecund'.

Most misinterpretations of Nosk mythology derive from the "Romantic' period in English culture when a gloss seemed preferable to fact, and later taken up further distorted by Wagnerian influences.

The Valkyries - 'Choosers of the Slain', romatically penned by Wagner as Odins handmaidens, were demons of 'carnage and death', more akin to the Greek Furies with their manic thirst for retribution and blood-revenge.

The poem below, from Njals Saga, casts them in their true light, of all the evils in the Norsk world, it was the Valkyries who extracted revenge.

Blood rains
From the cloudy web
On the broad loom of slaughter.
The web of man,
Grey as armour,
Is now being woven;
The Valkyries
Will cross it
With a crimson weft.

The warp is made
Of human entrails;
Human heads
Are used as weights;
The heddle-rods
Are blood-wet spears;
The shafts are iron-bound,
And arrows are the shuttles.
With swords we shall weave
This web of battle.

It is terrible now
To look around,
As a blood-red cloud
Darkens the sky.
The heavens are stained
With the blood of men,
As the Valkyries
Sing their song.

Darradarljod - Njals Saga - written to to commemorate The Battle of Clontarf in Ireland 1014.

 

[shereads]

Odin's a tragic figure who doesn't really do anything (although I do like the way he crucified himself to bring man Runes)

Now, that's impressive. Neil on "The Young Ones" tried to crucify himself but he could never get the last nail in. How did Odin do it? An opposable thumb on Odin Junior?

 

[neonlyte]

Now, that's impressive. Neil on "The Young Ones" tried to crucify himself but he could never get the last nail in. How did Odin do it? An opposable thumb on Odin Junior?

Dear Shereads,

Please see above, (it took long enough to write) he hung himself from a tree, the idea of crucifiction is a Christian interpretation of Havamals Saga - Words of The High One. Though I confess, it's is easy to see how Neil became confused. (You notice any similarity between The High One and The Young Ones?)

 

[Boota]

I think Beowulf just needs a modern revamping. We can change it to a tale of lycanthropy and love, set in the 1950's. Instead of Joanie Loves Chachi we'll call it Scott Baio Wolf. It'll be huge, and I'm sure we can get him cheap.

(Wow! What a long way to go for such a bad joke! Fuck it, I'm leaving it!. )

 

[sweetnpetite]

Yeah. Years ago. I liked it so much that I actually got up in the middle of the night after I'd finished it and mailed it to a friend, all excited.

He thought it was so-so.

Don't you just hate that!

 

[shereads]

Dear Shereads,

Please see above, (it took long enough to write) he hung himself from a tree, the idea of crucifiction is a Christian interpretation of Havamals Saga - Words of The High One. Though I confess, it's is easy to see how Neil became confused. (You notice any similarity between The High One and The Young Ones?)

I'm glad he didn't crucify himself. (Odin. Neil, too.)

 

[sweetnpetite]

It's been a long time, but wasn't there a bit with Grendel's Mom too?

I seem to remember that Beowulf had to take her on too, and that was a real anti-climax. Did the poem just end there or something?

And doesn't anyone want to stand up for the ending of Hamlet? Or do we all agree that it's just silly?

Every see "Last Action Hero"? IN the begining the teacher explains that Hamlet was "the first action hero." I think the reason lies thereisn. Shakespear wrote for his audience, and just like audiences of today [or should I say the 80's?] body count was what they wanted. I always look on it as a given for a shakespear that a lot of people are gonna die at the end. (although I suppose that's not true of his comedies) It was probably a form of 'fan service'

I don't know- does that make sence?