Burton Raffel (1928–2015)

I once had to learn Anglo Saxon in order to study this in the original. I regret that I didn't apply myself to it. Whatever I learnt I've now forgotten. A shame because it would have helped me get my tongue around many of the names. It would also have helped me fully appreciate Heaney's translation. Such a treat; compelling and alive with lashings of mythic import. Heaney skilfully makes it feel like the oral story that it is, invested with lineage and recapitulations. While I love the murky show more sense of mead-hall there is a spareness to the poem that gives little insight into the humanity that feeds on such epics. The poem feels slightly bastardised as if sections have been omitted and others added. The Christian allusions are so completely out of place and tacked on that surely this must once have been a more ancient story. Re-told or sung in the mead-halls. Unless, it was originally a millennial attempt by Christians to fake an archaic and grounded story. So, unfairly, I've given it merely 4 stars. That said, there is something quite wonderful and enchanting about reading a thousand-year-old poem.

How many wars have been put to rest in a prince’s bed? Few. A bride can bring a little peace, make spears silent for a time, but not long.

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Stunning, subversive, and beautiful. I loved Heaney's version of Beowulf but this was truly lovely and wild, with all the piss taking braggadaxious rollicking humor and bittersweet angry tragedy of the original. In an academic sense this is a brilliant translation. And in a literary sense it's an enormously enjoyable read.

I would LOVE to see this done as a play or performance. I can envision it so easily in my head. Definitely going to read The Mere Wife.

Wow. This is one delightful bit of writing! The language is playful and welcoming. Cleaver and compassionate, the emphasis is on human qualities, good and bad, in all the actors. Grendel and his mother are in some ways less monstrous than Beowulf, whose outrageous strength proves a match and more to theirs, but he is kept from monstrosity because he makes support of his lord and land his limits, his strongest desire being the lasting fame of a good name.

I always enjoy the translator's notes in these, what makes you go and be the umpteenth person to translate a classic, what makes you think you can bring something new to the party? I think this works and the translator does bring something different to this work.
I didn't get Beowulf forced on me at school - I didn't go to that sort of school. I came to Beowulf as an adult, by choice and through the Seamus Heaney translation. I loved it from the first word, as I, too, have a habit of starting show more a conversation with "So". More at work than at home, but I recognised something in it. It opened up the world of alliterative poetry, which I have thoroughly enjoyed exploring with the likes of Simon Armitage. In this, the translator starts with "Bro". I get what she is trying to do, this is a bar room and the story teller is trying to quieten the room, to take the floor, to grab the attention. I reckon someone, somewhere could write an essay on the choice of translation for "Hwaet".
This feels to be a more robust translation than the Heaney (which I am going to have to read again very soon). It uses modern language, there's a couple of gimme and gonna in here as well as shit and fuck used more than I would, but I'm not the subject of this. This is all about a male environment and the men in it. And they almost certainly would use that language. That's not to say that it is dumbed down, or simplified, there are plenty of allusions and illusions at work in here. The whale road being the Old English equivalent of the wine dark sea. It feels immediate and earthy, it doesn't feel distant and ethereal in the way that the tranbslation of an ancient classic could do. There is relevance in here and the language used is of its time. That may mean it will date, but that doesn;t make it any less good in the here and now.
I liked the way that the voice changed as the different people take up the tale, there is a change in language and word usage here that is sophisticated without feeling to be artificial.
The story hasn't changed, it remains the same 3 act play with 50 years vanishing in the middle. And yet it isn't tired and predictable, I still felt the tears pricking as Wiglaf berates his fellow warriors for not coming to Beowulf's aid. If there's any lesson in here that the modern world need to hear it is that doing the right thing is always worth it, no matter how hard or painful. He's the hero for the modern age.
This is well worth adding to your reading list, regardless of if you're familiar with the work or not. show less