Beowulf: An Anglo-Saxon Epic Poem

by Anonymous

Beowulf is the longest poem to survive in Old English, composed by an unknown poet and preserved in a single manuscript. A young warrior from the land of the Geats crosses the sea to help the Danish king Hrothgar, whose hall is raided each night by the monster Grendel. Beowulf kills Grendel, then follows the creature's mother to her lair beneath a lake. Fifty years later, as an old king, he faces a dragon that is burning his own country. Around these three fights the poet sets feasts, boasts, songs and digressions on the feuds of the northern peoples, and a steady meditation on fame, loyalty and death. J. Lesslie Hall's translation of 1892 reproduces the alliterative meter of the original. The full text is available to read online in your browser on Vinteuil, and the opening sections are free.