thecolourblue 's review for:

Beowulf by Unknown

5.0

adventurous challenging dark emotional tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

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I'm kinda obsessed with Beowulf - as a historical artefact, as a story, as a study of visions of masculinity... and I think Seamus Heaney's version is my favourite translation, sooo, honestly it's gotta be five stars.

I hereby renounce sword and the shelter of the broad shield, the heavy war-board: hand-to-hand is how it will be, a life-and-death fight with the fiend. Whichever one death fells must deem it a just judgement by God. If Grendel wins, it will be a gruesome day; he will glut himself on the Geats in the war-hall, swoop without fear on that flower of manhood as on others before. Then my face won’t be there to be covered in death: he will carry me away as he goes to ground, gorged and bloodied; he will run gloating with my raw corpse and feed on it alone, in a cruel frenzy, fouling his moor-nest

But death is not easily escaped from by anyone: all of us with souls, earth-dwellers and children of men, must make our way to a destination already ordained where the body, after the banqueting, sleeps on its deathbed.

Wise sir, do not grieve. It is always better to avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning. For every one of us, living in this world means waiting for our end. Let whoever can win glory before death. When a warrior is gone, that will be his best and only bulwark.

He wished good luck to the Geats who had shared his hearth and his gold. He was sad at heart, unsettled yet ready, sensing his death. His fate hovered near, unknowable but certain: it would soon claim his coffered soul, part life from limb. Before long the prince’s spirit would spin free from his body.