New This Month - O'Donoghue on Beowulf

Out now from Bloomsbury Academic:

Beowulf: Poem, Poet and Hero

Heather O'Donoghue (Author)

Full details and ordering information at https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/beowulf-9781788312882/,

Product details

Published Jun 13 2024

Format Hardback

Edition 1st

Extent 192

ISBN 9781788312882

Imprint Bloomsbury Academic

Dimensions 9 x 6 inches

Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing

Description

The Old English epic poem Beowulf has an established reputation as a canonical text. And yet the original poem has remained inaccessible to all but experienced scholars of Old English. This book aims to present the poem to readers who want to know what makes it such a remarkable work of art, and why it is of such cultural significance.

Most readers will only have encountered Beowulf through one of its many translations or adaptations; others have had to take on this unique survivor from a past era as a challenging translation exercise, part of their academic study of the poem. This book sidesteps scholarly debates about the poem's unknowns – its date, provenance or author – and focusses instead on its poetic artistry, its interleaving of heroic pasts and Christian present, and its poet's extraordinary breadth of reference, from biblical history to Old Norse myth. But the strange intricacies of Old English metre and poetic language are explained, and the poet's evocation of the ethics and material world of an imagined pre-Viking Scandinavia is explored.

Beowulf: Poem, Poet and Hero follows the story of the poem through its many interwoven voices from different times and places, and the poem emerges as a work of reflective beauty, its human characters full of touching pathos and wisdom, its notorious monsters still speaking to our own societies' abiding insecurities. The final section, on post-medieval responses to Beowulf, shows how the poem has been taken up as a European cultural icon. This book restores its status as a literary masterpiece.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part One: The Storyworld

1. The Setting

2. The Human Characters

3. The Monsters

Part Two: Poet, Narrator and Scop

4. A Christian Poet

5. An Old Norse Scholar

6. The Narrator

7. The Scop

Part Three: Post-Medieval Meanings

8. Earliest Audiences

9. Early Modern Audiences

10. Translations

11. Contemporary Meanings

Further Reading

Index

Recently Published -Old English Medievalism

Old English Medievalism: Reception and Recreation in the 20th and 21st Centuries

Edited by Rachel A. Fletcher, Thijs Porck and Oliver M. Traxel

Full details, preview, and ordering information at: https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781843846505/old-english-medievalism/.

TITLE DETAILS

312 Pages

23.4 x 15.6 cm

1 b/w illus

Series: Medievalism

Series Vol. Number: 21

Imprint: D.S.Brewer

9781843846505

November 2022

$125.00 / £85.00

(also available as an ebook)

DESCRIPTION

An exploration across thirteen essays by critics, translators and creative writers on the modern-day afterlives of Old English, delving into how it has been transplanted and recreated in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

Old English language and literary style have long been a source of artistic inspiration and fascination, providing modern writers and scholars with the opportunity not only to explore the past but, in doing so, to find new perspectives on the present. This volume brings together thirteen essays on the modern-day afterlives of Old English, exploring how it has been transplanted and recreated in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries by translators, novelists, poets and teachers. These afterlives include the composition of neo-Old English, the evocation in a modern literary context of elements of early medieval English language and style, the fictional depiction of Old English-speaking worlds and world views, and the adaptation and recontextualisation of works of early medieval English literature. The sources covered include W. H. Auden, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Seamus Heaney, alongside more recent writers such as Christopher Patton, Hamish Clayton and Paul Kingsnorth, as well as other media, from museum displays to television. The volume also features the first-hand perspectives of those who are authors and translators themselves in the field of Old English medievalism.

CONTENTS

List of Illustrations

List of Contributors

Acknowledgements

List of Abbreviations

Early Medieval English in the Modern Age: An Introduction to Old English Medievalism - Rachel A. Fletcher, Thijs Porck and Oliver M. Traxel

1 Reinventing, Reimagining and Recontextualizing Old English Poetry

1 Old English as a Playground for Poets? W. H. Auden, Christopher Patton and Jeramy Dodds - M. J. Toswell

2 'Abroad in One's Own Tradition': Old English Poetry and Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows (1908) - Victoria Condie

3 Wulf and Eadwacer in 1830 New Zealand: Anglo-Saxonism and Postcolonialism in Hamish Clayton's Wulf (2011) - Martina Marzullo

4 Old English Poetry and Sutton Hoo on Display: Creating 'the Anglo-Saxon' in Museums - Fran Allfrey

II Invoking Early Medieval England and Its Language in Historical Fiction

5 Creating a 'Shadow Tongue': The Merging of Two Language Stages - Oliver M. Traxel

6 At the Threshold of the Inarticulate: The Reception of 'Made-up' English in Paul Kingsnorth's The Wake (2014) - Judy Kendall

7 Reimagining Early Medieval Britain: The Language of Spirituality - Karen Louise Jolly

8 Historical Friction: Constructing Pastness in Fiction Set in Eleventh-Century England - James Aitcheson

III Translating and Composing in Neo-Old English

9 Ge wordful, ge wordig: Translating Modern Texts into Old English - Fritz Kemmler

10 Fruit, Fat and Fermentation: Food and Drink in Peter Baker's (Neo-) Old English Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - Denis Ferhatović

11 The Fall of the King and the Composition of Neo-Old English Verse - Rafael J. Pascual

IV Approaching Old English and Neo-Old English in the Classroom

12 Mitchell & Robinson's Medievalism: Echoes of Empire in the History of Old English Pedagogy - Joana Blanquer, Donna Beth Ellard, Emma Hitchcock and Erin E. Sweany

13 The Magic of Telecinematic Neo-Old English in University Teaching - Gabriele Knappe

Bibliography

Index

EDITORS

Rachel A. Fletcher holds a Ph.D. in English Language and Linguistics from the University of Glasgow. She has published on the history of Old English lexicography, Old English scholarship in the Early Modern period, and J. R. R. Tolkien's work on the Oxford English Dictionary.

Thijs Porck is University Lecturer in Medieval English at Leiden University. He has published on Old English textual criticism, Beowulf, old age, medievalism, and J. R. R. Tolkien.

Oliver M. Traxel is Professor of English Language and Linguistics at the University of Stavanger. He has a Ph.D. in Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Celtic from the University of Cambridge and habilitated in English Philology at the University of Münster. He has published widely on the representation of past language stages in the modern world.

Recent Book - Beowulf in Contemporary Culture

Bit old now, but still very useful.

Beowulf in Contemporary Culture

Edited by David Clark

Full details, preview, and ordering information at the publisher's website: https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-4306-5.

Cambridge Scholars 

ISBN: 1-5275-4306-4

ISBN13: 978-1-5275-4306-5

Release Date: 10th December 2019

Pages: 263

Price: £61.99

Description

This collection explores Beowulf’s extensive impact on contemporary culture across a wide range of forms. The last 15 years have seen an intensification of scholarly interest in medievalism and reimaginings of the Middle Ages. However, in spite of the growing prominence of medievalism both in academic discourse and popular culture—and in spite of the position Beowulf itself holds in both areas—no study such as this has yet been undertaken. Beowulf in Contemporary Culture therefore makes a significant contribution both to early medieval studies and to our understanding of Beowulf’s continuing cultural impact. It should inspire further research into this topic and medievalist responses to other aspects of early medieval culture. Topics covered here range from film and television to video games, graphic novels, children’s literature, translations, and versions, along with original responses published here for the first time. The collection not only provides an overview of the positions Beowulf holds in the contemporary imagination, but also demonstrates the range of avenues yet to be explored, or even fully acknowledged, in the study of medievalism.

Contents (from WorldCat)

Introduction / David Clark

Beowulf on Film: Gender, Sexuality, Hyperreality / David Clark

Race/Ethnicity and the Other in Beowulf: Return to the Shieldlands / David Clark

'I braved in my youth-days battles unnumbered': Beowulf, Video Games, and Hack-and-Slash Medievalism / Victoria E. Cooper and Andrew B.R. Elliott

Manly Fantasy: Medieval and Modern Masculinities in Two Juvenile Versions of Beowulf / Janice Hawes

Thomas Meyer's Beowulf: The Visual Text / Claire Pascolini Campbell

The Monsters, the Translators, and the Artists: iofgeornost and the Challenges of Translating Beowulf / Jorge Luis Bueno Alonso

From Scop to Subversive: Beowulf as a Force for Inclusivity / Meghan Purvis

Playful Storytelling in Beowulf / S.C. Thomson

'The Whale Road': A Musical Response to the World of Beowulf / Mark Atherton

A Conversation between Maria Dahvana Headley and Carolyne Larrington

Editor Bio

David Clark specializes in Old English, Middle English, and Old Norse literatures, and contemporary medievalism. He is the author of Between Medieval Men: Male Friendship and Desire in Early Medieval English Literature (2009) and Gender, Violence, and the Past in Edda and Saga (2012), the translator of The Saga of Bishop Thorlak (2013), and the editor of three edited collections.

CFP Beowulf at Rocky Mountain MLA (6/30/2024; Las Vegas 10/10-12/2024)

Call for Papers: The Pagan Beowulf: Alternatives to the Usual Beowulf

Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) 77th Annual Convention

October 10-12 (Thur.-Sat.) at the Westgate Resort, Las Vegas, Nevada



Deadline for Submissions: June 30, 2024



For centuries, the “usual” Beowulf translation has been full of Christian references and very little Pagan references. Yet, Christianity did not arrive in Scandinavia until around 710, well after the time of the events in Beowulf, which is around 550 AD. In contrast, the first Christian missionary to Anglo-Saxon England was with St. Augustine in 597. While there are some definite Christian references in Beowulf, there are actually far fewer than the far greater pagan references in the poem. Your abstract should address this theme specifically.



Send your 350-word abstract, with a short 50-word bio, to Jim Buckingham, Old English Session Chair, at wibuck50@gmail.com by June 30, 2024.

Odin asked, “Can you Read the Runes?”: How to Read the Runic Letters in Part I of Beowulf.

Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) 77th Annual Convention

October 10-12 (Thur.-Sat.) at the Westgate Resort, Las Vegas, Nevada



Join us in Las Vegas this October, where we will defy the odds and time, and you can learn how to read some of the 419 (and counting) letter runes found in the first third of Beowulf.



This groundbreaking, ninety-minute session is the first of its kind in teaching how one can detect and decipher between two alphabets that use the same letters, with one being just a letter and the other being a letter that represents a word. Unlike Odin, you will not have to give up an eye.




All attendees will receive a letter rune chart.



Contact Jim Buckingham, Old English Session Chair, at wibuck50@gmail.com by June 30, 2024 to express your interest in attending. Limit per Session is 100 attendees.

Update - Grendel Grendel Grendel: Animating Beowulf

Grendel Grendel Grendel: Animating Beowulf

Dan Torre (Author) , Lienors Torre (Author)

This book is available in hardcover (2021), paperback (2023), and open-access. 

Extent 216

ISBN 9781501381119

Imprint Bloomsbury Academic

Illustrations 65 bw illus

Dimensions 9 x 6 inches

Series Animation: Key Films/Filmmakers

Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing

Description

This open access study of the film Grendel Grendel Grendel, directed by Alexander Stitt, presents it as a masterpiece of animation and design which has attained a national and international cult status since its release in 1981. The film, based on the novel, Grendel, by John Gardner, is a loose adaptation of the Beowulf legend, but told from the point of view of the monster, Grendel. Grendel Grendel Grendel is a mature, intelligent, irreverent and quite unique animated film - it is a movie, both in terms of content and of an aesthetic that was well ahead of its time. Along with a brief overview of Australian animation and a contextualization of where this animated feature fits within the broader continuum of Australian (and global) film history, Dan Torre and Lienors Torre provide an intriguing analysis of this significant Australian animated feature.

The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgements

Introducing Grendel

Chapter One: The Genealogy of Grendel

Chapter Two: Scenes of Grendel Grendel Grendel

Chapter Three: Themes of Grendel Grendel Grendel

Chapter Four: Making of Grendel Grendel Grendel

Chapter Five: Aesthetics of Grendel Grendel Grendel

Chapter Six: Grendel'll Get You

Concluding Grendel

A Guide to Further Research

Bibliography

Filmography

Index

About the authors

Dan Torreis a lecturer in the School of Media and Communication at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia. He has written widely on animation, media and popular culture.

Lienors Torre is a senior lecturer in the School of Communication and Creative Arts at Deakin University, Australia. She writes on animation and related areas and is co-author of the book, Australian Animation - An International History (2018). She is also a practicing animator and artist.

Beowulf at NeMLA 2024

Beowulfs Beyond Beowulf: Transformations of Beowulf in Popular Culture

Sponsored by the Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture and the Monsters & the Monstrous Area of the Northeast Popular Culture Association 

Organized by Michael A. Torregrossa, Carl Sell, Benjamin Hoover, and Richard Fahey

55th NeMLA Convention, Boston, MA, 7-10 March 2024

Updated 3/8/2024

Saturday

Mar 9 Track 16

01:15-02:45

16.29 Beowulfs Beyond Beowulf: Transformations of Beowulf in Popular Culture (Part 1)

Chair: Michael Torregrossa, Bristol Community College

Chair: Richard Fahey, University of Notre Dame

Location: Dalton B (Media Equipped)

British & Cultural Studies and Media Studies

"Performing Beowulf" Chris Vinsonhaler, City University of New York (BMCC) [WITHDRAWN]

"A 'Thorn and Steel Grendel': Attacking the Mead Hall in The Hyperion Cantos" Benjamin Yusen, Indiana University-Bloomington

"Beowulf Transformed is Beowulf Preserved What’s Old is New Again The Recovery of its Lost Story" James the Howard of Buckingham, Independent Scholar

Saturday

Mar 9 Track 17

03:00-04:30

17.29 Beowulfs Beyond Beowulf: Transformations of Beowulf in Popular Culture (Part 2)

Chair: Michael Torregrossa, Bristol Community College

Location: Dalton B (Media Equipped)

British & Cultural Studies and Media Studies

"Authenticity and the Genre of Historical Fiction in Beowulf Adaptations for Young Readers" Melissa Filbeck, Texas A&M University

"Beowulf, Exile, and Endless Sword Fights" Maureen Gokey, Russell Sage College

"Beowulf after Beowulf: Continuations of the Old English Epic in Popular Culture" Michael Torregrossa, Bristol Community College

"Contemporary Beowulfs: Translation and Representation" Richard Fahey, University of Notre Dame

CFP Beowulfs Beyond Beowulf: Transformations of Beowulf in Popular Culture (Panel) (9/30/2023; NeMLA Boston 3/7-10/2024)

Beowulfs Beyond Beowulf: Transformations of Beowulf in Popular Culture (Panel)


Sponsored by the Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture and the Monsters & the Monstrous Area of the Northeast Popular Culture Association

Organized by Michael A. Torregrossa, Richard Fahey, Carl Sell, and Benjamin Hoover


Call for Papers - Please Submit Proposals by 30 September 2023

55th Annual Convention of Northeast Modern Language Association

Sheraton Boston Hotel (Boston, MA)

On-site event: 7-10 March 2024



Beowulfs Beyond Beowulf: Transformations of Beowulf in Popular Culture (Panel)


The Old English epic Beowulf remains an important touchstone for connecting us to the medieval past, yet it also has continued relevance today through its various transformations in cultural texts (especially works of popular culture). Our hope with this session is to expand our knowledge of these works and assess their potential for research and teaching.


Please visit our website Beowulf Transformed: Adaptations and Appropriations of the Beowulf Story (available at https://beowulf-transformed.blogspot.com/) for resources and ideas.


The full call for papers (with complete session and submission information) can be accessed at https://tinyurl.com/Beowulf-Transformed-NeMLA-2024.

Session Information

Over a millennium old, the story of Beowulf is disseminated primarily through its editions and translations and its transformations. These three types of Beowulfiana represent a massive corpus of over 1000 works according to the Beowulf’s Afterlives Bibliographic Database; though, as medievalists, we tend to focus on the first two categories rather than the last concentrating on scholastic pursuits rather than entertainments. Consequently, many are often surprised by the variety and vitality of this corpus and its vast potential for research and teaching.


New versions of the Beowulf story feature in all forms of modern mediævalisms, yet (as is true with most medieval texts) research continues to focus primarily on depictions of Beowulf on screen (about 100 examples according to the Internet Movie Database). We hope in this session to expand our view of Beowulf’s reception by creators and look more deeply at the text’s wider use.


We are particularly interested in explorations of the adaptation and/or appropriation of the text, its characters, and its themes in works of fiction (at least 250 examples according to the Internet Speculative Fiction Database and much more recorded by the Beowulf’s Afterlives Bibliographic Database) and comics (at least 380 examples according to the Grand Comics Database), as well as their representations in new and neglected works on screen (including film, television, entertainment consoles, and the Internet). Additional versions of the Beowulf can be found in works of creative, performative, and visual arts that also need more attention.


We hope to make our conversation productive. Therefore, we request that submissions highlight the ways the new text transforms the old (for example as interpretations or appropriations of the poem or as an intertext for another work) as well as its value in furthering the Beowulf tradition rather than focusing solely on any perceived defects.


Please see our website Beowulf Transformed: Adaptations and Appropriations of the Beowulf Story (at https://beowulf-transformed.blogspot.com/) for a growing list of ideas, resources and support.


All proposals will also be considered for a themed issue of the open-access journal The Heroic Age: A Journal of Early Medieval Northwestern Europe.


Please address questions and/or concerns to the organizers at popular.preternaturaliana@gmail.com. .

Submission Information

All proposals must be submitted into the CFPList system at https://cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/20596 by 30 September 2023. You will be prompted to create an account with NeMLA (if you do not already have one) and, then, to complete sections on Title, Abstract, and Media Needs.


Notification on the fate of your submission will be made prior to 16 October 2023. If favorable, please confirm your participation with chairs by accepting their invitations and by registering for the event. The deadline for Registration/Membership is 9 December 2023.


Be advised of the following policies of the Convention: All participants must be members of NeMLA for the year of the conference. Participants may present on up to two sessions of different types (panels/seminars are considered of the same type). Submitters to the CFP site cannot upload the same abstract twice.(See the NeMLA Presenter Policies page, at https://www.buffalo.edu/nemla/convention/policies.html, for further details,)



Thank you for your interest in our session.


Again, please address questions and/or concerns to the organizers at popular.preternaturaliana@gmail.com. .


For more information on the Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture, please visit our website at https://MedievalinPopularCulture.blogspot.com/.


For more information on the Monsters & the Monstrous Area of the Northeast Popular Culture Association, please visit our website at https://popularpreternaturaliana.blogspot.com/.

New Comic Bea Wulf

Bea Wulf is the title of a new graphic novel written by Zach Weinersmith and illustrated by Boulet. The first volume of what looks to be a trilogy, it's an interesting take on the Beowulf story. Weinersmith and Boulet recast the tale in modern-day suburbia, alter the conflict from humans and monsters to one between children and adults, and transform Beowulf into a young girl. 

More details, a preview, and ordering information from Weinersmith's website at this link. 

For teachers, the book includes a detailed appendix with information on the making of the comic. There is also a sketchbook with some of Boulet's early art for the book.

From the Macmillan site: 

Book Details

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250776297/bea-wolf

A modern middle-grade graphic novel retelling of Beowulf, featuring a gang of troublemaking kids who must defend their tree house from a fun-hating adult who can instantly turn children into grown-ups.

Listen! Hear a tale of mallow-munchers and warriors who answer candy’s clarion call!

Somewhere in a generic suburb stands Treeheart, a kid-forged sanctuary where generations of tireless tykes have spent their youths making merry, spilling soda, and staving off the shadow of adulthood. One day, these brave warriors find their fun cut short by their nefarious neighbor Grindle, who can no longer tolerate the sounds of mirth seeping into his joyless adult life.

As the guardian of gloom lays siege to Treeheart, scores of kids suddenly find themselves transformed into pimply teenagers and sullen adults! The survivors of the onslaught cry out for a savior—a warrior whose will is unbreakable and whose appetite for mischief is unbounded.

They call for Bea Wolf.

Imprint Publisher: First Second

ISBN: 9781250776297

Page Count: 208

Genre: Children’s Literature

On Sale: 03/21/2023

Age Range: 8-12

Now on video: Bae Wolf

Missed this initially. It's now available as a streaming video on Tubi (at this link) and for purchase as a streaming video or on disc:

Out Now: Nokes on Beowulf in Comic Books and Graphic Novels

Just released this week. Congratulations to Scott Nokes:

Beowulf in Comic Books and Graphic Novels

Richard Scott Nokes

(Full details and ordering information from the publisher are available from this link.)

Bibliographic Details

Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 209
Bibliographic Info: 25 photos, notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2023
pISBN: 978-1-4766-8778-0 ($49.95)
eISBN: 978-1-4766-4842-2
Imprint: McFarland

About the Book

The legendary story of Beowulf comes to us in only one medieval manuscript with no illustrations. Modern comic book and graphic novel artists have created visual interpretations of Beowulf for decades, both illustrating and altering the classic story to pull out new themes.
This book examines the growing canon of Beowulf comic books and graphic novels since the 1940s, and shows the remarkable emergence of new traditions—from re-envisioning the medieval look, to creating new plotlines, and even to transforming his identity. While placing Beowulf in a fantastical medieval setting, a techno-dystopia of the future, or modern-day America, artists have appropriated the tale to comment on social issues such as war, environmental issues, masculinity, and consumerism. Whether Beowulf is fighting new monsters or allying with popular comic book superheroes, these artists are creating a new canon of illustration that redefines Beowulf’s place in our culture.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vi
Timeline of Beowulf Comic Books and Graphic Novels ix
Note on Citations xi
Preface 1
Introduction 5
1. The Artist as Manuscript Illustrator 13
2. The Further Adventures of Beowulf 74
3. Beowulf as Storyteller 96
4. Beowulf Transformed 107
5. Beowulf for Younger Readers 129
Conclusion 172
Chapter Notes 177
Bibliography 189
Index 193

About the Author(s)

Richard Scott Nokes is a professor of medieval literature at Troy University in Troy, Alabama. His previous published research has focused on popular medievalism and manuscript culture.