|
CELTIC
MYTHOLOGY/BEOWULF
"There
is nothing else quite like Beowulf": it is the only
surviving epic poem in Old English, yet, arguably, some of the
finest lyric writing is embedded within it; its narrative is
comprised of three great fights against monsters and dragons, yet
this is woven about with the fall of two great dynasties; it is
moved by, impressed with, and celebrates a pagan heroic world of
Scandinavia, yet it is written by a Christian Anglo-Saxon poet all
too conscious of worldly mutability. It is indisputably worth
reading in the original Old English.
Nevill
Coghill |