Category Archives: Beowulf

How should Beowulf be translated?

Posted on May 6, 2025 by Ruth

Most people today have heard of Irish poet Seamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf, since it won an award when it was published in 1999, four years after he won the Nobel Prize for Literature. By the time Heaney attempted the … Continue reading →

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Early interpretations of Beowulf

Posted on May 6, 2025 by Ruth

The first early attempts to make sense of the poem that Thorkelin published were made by Thorkelin himself and an Englishman, Sharon Turner. At this time, very little was known of the Old English (Anglo-Saxon) language. These early interpretations were … Continue reading →

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Beowulf: the discovery, 1786

Posted on May 5, 2025 by Ruth

Copenhagen, Court of King Christian VII, 1786: The royal archivist Grim Johnson Thorkelin goes to London on a research expedition. Thorkelin is an Icelander whose native tongue is closer to the language of the Vikings than is Copenhagen’s “modern” Danish. … Continue reading →

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“Beowulf” in Time

Posted on April 27, 2025 by Ruth

In our libraries, you can find over 200 translations of Beowulf. Most college-educated people have met the poem in their last year of high school or their first two years of college; it is typically the first item in a … Continue reading →

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