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‘Beowulf’ is bloody, canonical, and long — and one person wrote it, scholars say
Boston Globe ^ | April 11, 2019 | Travis Andersen

Posted on 04/18/2019 6:48:28 AM PDT by C19fan

Only one person created the monster.

That’s according to a team of researchers at Harvard, Dartmouth, and elsewhere, who determined the epic poem “Beowulf,” a staple of literature classes the world over, was written by a sole author more than a millennium ago.

The findings of the team, led by Madison Krieger, a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard’s Program for Evolutionary Dynamics, and Joseph Dexter, a Harvard PhD who’s now a Neukom fellow at Dartmouth College, were published April 8 in the journal Nature Human Behaviour, Harvard said in a statement.

(Excerpt) Read more at bostonglobe.com ...


TOPICS: Books/Literature; History
KEYWORDS: beowulf; godsgravesglyphs; grendel
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To: C19fan

I remember having to read Beowulf in college. I put off reading it until the night before the test since it was a poem and was unaware that a poem could be novel length. I was up until 4:00 a.m. reading and to take the test at 8:30 a.m. I did pass though with a B if I remember correctly. I may one day reread it to see what it was really about.


21 posted on 04/18/2019 9:18:04 AM PDT by Smittie (Just like an alien I'm a stranger in a strange land)
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To: Bookshelf

Really? Without Homer would there have been a Virgil? Without Virgil would there have been a Dante? There would have been others, but not them. Same in English literature.


22 posted on 04/18/2019 9:28:46 AM PDT by allendale (.)
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To: Smittie

This was a LONG time ago. She was an old curmudgeon who probably went to college in the 1930’s. Today she’d probably be an A-list academic, doctor, lawyer, or whatever. Back then things were different. She taught school and probably thought she was lucky to have a good job during the Depression. Very impressive lady. She was a crusty old battle ax by the time I had her — she was into at least the second and in a few cases third generation of her students’ families — but we all knew she carried more academic weight than the rest of the faculty combined. A rarity in any era.


23 posted on 04/18/2019 9:59:06 AM PDT by sphinx
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To: C19fan

I hated it. Junior year in high school we had that and the dreadful Canterbury tales. We had others but those two sucked!


24 posted on 04/18/2019 10:03:31 AM PDT by napscoordinator (Trump/Hunter, jr for President/Vice President 2016)
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To: allendale

Homer to Virgil..., what 2,000 years?
Who knows, without Homer to fall back on Virgil might have written a classic on Etruscan history.
As for Homer himself, we have lost Homer’s great comedic epic, Margites (c. 700 BC). It influenced Plato and Aristotle but then gradually faded from history; yet, Comedy has done quite well in its absence.
In literature it seems that given the myriad of critics (of whom I’m one), the study of cause and effect in literature are subjects that elicit interminable debate.


25 posted on 04/18/2019 10:13:37 AM PDT by Bookshelf
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To: DUMBGRUNT

I always liked the movie treatment “Eaters of the Dead” Crichton’s interpretation.


26 posted on 04/18/2019 10:26:42 AM PDT by Jimmy Valentine (DemocRATS - when they speak, they lie; when they are silent, they are stealing the American Dream)
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To: C19fan; StayAt HomeMother; Ernest_at_the_Beach; 1ofmanyfree; 21twelve; 24Karet; 2ndDivisionVet; ...
Thanks C19fan.

27 posted on 04/18/2019 11:44:57 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (Imagine an imaginary menagerie manager imagining managing an imaginary menagerie.)
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To: C19fan

I prefer the Star Trek version

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroes_and_Demons


28 posted on 04/18/2019 11:55:12 AM PDT by ElkGroveDan (My tagline is in the shop.)
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To: teeman8r; SunkenCiv

While I’m not a fan of Angelina Jolie, I am a fan of Sir Anthony Hopkins. I watched “Beowulf” because he was in it, but once I began to notice it was a pixelated movie, I was amazed by the complexity of the art.

And of course, I read Michael Chrichton’s version, and that helped, but I don’t know if I could read the original...

Still, if I could get it free, hard or soft cover....

;o]

‘Face


29 posted on 04/18/2019 12:05:55 PM PDT by Monkey Face (Do you ever feel bugs on you when there are no bugs?They're the ghosts of bugs you've killed.Kara W.)
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To: Monkey Face

Go to Project Gutenberg
https://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/

and search Beowulf and you’ll find a few translations to select from. You can download for free and read on your computer, kindle or epub device.


30 posted on 04/18/2019 12:11:19 PM PDT by Grimmy (equivocation is but the first step along the road to capitulation)
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To: ctdonath2
I love Beowulf! I have several different translations and collect different novelizations as well.
31 posted on 04/18/2019 12:15:49 PM PDT by yuleeyahoo (The nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master and deserves one. Hamilton)
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To: bgill

Well. I’m glad that’s settled.

Now I can sleep well....................


32 posted on 04/18/2019 12:20:16 PM PDT by Red Badger (We are headed for a Civil War. It won't be nice like the last one....................)
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To: Grimmy

“You can download for free and read on your computer, kindle or epub device.”

I read where the author of Beowolf lamented that it had to be written by hand to be reproduced. “If only there was a better way to copy it - I would make it TWICE as long!”

Pretty amazing.


33 posted on 04/18/2019 12:20:30 PM PDT by 21twelve (!)
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To: C19fan

Like Bye Bye Miss American Pie?


34 posted on 04/18/2019 12:35:39 PM PDT by a fool in paradise (Denounce DUAC - The Democrats Un-American Activists Committee)
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To: allendale

Eould those same audiences even watch HBOGOT without the nudity ang shagging?


35 posted on 04/18/2019 12:37:25 PM PDT by a fool in paradise (Denounce DUAC - The Democrats Un-American Activists Committee)
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To: sphinx
I had a high school English teacher who could read Beowulf in the original Old English, and recite chunks of it from memory in Old English as well. She was of the old school.

So, did I! And we couldn't avoid it - you couldn't take a class on comic books and pass English in those days. There was Senior English and that was it!

She did, mercifully, allow us to read it in translation, however.

36 posted on 04/18/2019 1:32:19 PM PDT by colorado tanker
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To: Monkey Face

http://ebeowulf.uky.edu/ebeo4.0/start.html

free digital version...


37 posted on 04/18/2019 1:40:36 PM PDT by teeman8r (Armageddon won't be pretty, but it's not like it's the end of the world.)
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To: Roccus
One of the characters in Beowulf is named Grendel. When I was a student there was a professor who had a dog named Grendel (about half the size of a chihuahua) which liked to run up and down the hall.

I read part of Caesar's Gallic War in high school. Latin. Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres and all that. Lots of indirect discourse and for some reason he wouldn't let the Helvetii move to a more attractive piece of Gaul.

38 posted on 04/18/2019 2:36:18 PM PDT by Verginius Rufus
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To: yuleeyahoo

There’s an interesting interpretation: graphic novel, no words. Intriguing companion material.


39 posted on 04/18/2019 3:50:29 PM PDT by ctdonath2 (The Red Queen wasn't kidding.)
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To: DUMBGRUNT

Oh yes, “Grendel”. There’s a good sub-genre of books from other character’s point of view.


40 posted on 04/18/2019 3:55:05 PM PDT by ctdonath2 (The Red Queen wasn't kidding.)
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