Posts filed under 'old english'

From Epic Hero to Modern Bro: On Maria Dahvana Headley’s Beowulf

Modern translations of medieval writings are not only a link to the past, but also a reflection of what our current culture finds important.

Throughout the year and across the world, people have reluctantly adopted and updated a medieval custom: quarantine in times of plague. Other remnants of the era, however, have been much more readily embraced. The Middle Ages continue to capture our fancy (sometimes even frenzy), and the latest version of a classic tale is a perfect case in point. By keenly zooming in on some of the boldest, most innovative aspects of American author Maria Dahvana Headley’s recent translation of Beowulf, our very own Kwan Ann Tan (editor-at-large for Malaysia and medievalist-in-training) reflects on the value of bringing the past into the present.

The modern fascination with medieval language and culture is not particularly new—from the pre-Raphaelites to Hollywood blockbuster depictions of the medieval era, it’s clear that something about the Middle Ages still captivates us. In January 2020, for instance, the Facebook group ‘We Pretend It’s 1453 Internet’ was created, and it has since amassed close to 200,000 members; it’s filled with humorous posts imitating medieval speech and pretending to ask for advice on ‘medieval’ subjects (they’re not always period-accurate, but it’s the spirit that counts). Likewise, a subgenre of ‘medieval TikTok’ is gaining speed, with some genuinely funny skits reimagining what it would be like if knights were Twitch streamers—again, reformulating medieval staples to suit the modern imagination. On a more academic note, the Global Medieval Sourcebook project at Stanford University collects rare, previously untranslated medieval texts in modern English for the adventurous reader. In fact, new translations of medieval writings are being released every day, be they for academic or creative purposes.

As a child, I had vaguely heard of the story of Beowulf, but I always assumed that Beowulf himself was the monster, the antagonist—not the hero. After I memorised huge swathes of the text in the original Old English, the line between monster and hero only became more blurred; in fact, the poem’s elusive complexity has fuelled debate on this dichotomy for decades, if not centuries. There is something about Beowulf that keeps us coming back, and this lasting interest is reflected in the number of translations of the epic published over the past few decades.

When news of American author Maria Dahvana Headley’s translation (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) first broke on Twitter earlier this year, my timeline was quickly filled with messages from disgruntled medievalists complaining that yet another Beowulf translation had been unleashed upon the world. I myself approached it skeptically, but was quite literally hooked from the first word. For those who haven’t had the agonising pleasure of trying to decipher Old English for a year, it’ll teach you one word for sure: ‘Hwæt,’ the famous opening of Beowulf. It has been historically translated to varying degrees of formality, but Headley knocks conservatism aside to give us the earth-shattering ‘Bro.’ This brilliantly sets the tone for the rest of the text, and one thing is clear: it definitely isn’t your grandma’s Beowulf. READ MORE…

Translating Longing : A Novice Translator’s First Transgressions

"In the text the girl sings: This earth cell is old—I am full of longing. She is under the oak. There is ambiguity. "

I’m translating “The Wife’s Lament,” from the Anglo-Saxon (among other poems), and—though I am in the habit of calling my drafts “transgressions”—there is a palpable sense of longing breaking through which I think may be possible to understand. What I mean by “even now,” has to do with the ideas of immediacy prevalent (one could say saturated) in the current collective consciousness.

I just read an article eulogizing the long email. And who even talks on the phone anymore. We interact in quick bursts, with no breaks. Both of these things being, of course, enemies of longing. We do not allow ourselves the luxury of longing. For to long, literally, takes “length.” Long stretches of absence and time—for which nobody has time for anymore.

The girl I’m trying to write (the wife lamenting) gets left to long by herself under an oak tree. This oak tree intrigues me. There is so much symbolism here. Pagans had their sacred groves. Druids had oak knowledge. I have also read about the linguistic link between the Celtic word for oak and the Sanskrit word for door—the connection between knowledge and doors apparently reaches pretty far back, but the other thing has to do with the oak as a portal, a door to another world. In the text the girl sings: This earth cell is oldI am full of longing. She is under the oak. There is ambiguity. Is she even alive?

READ MORE…

Translation Tuesday: “The Seafarer,” from the Book of Exodus

Translated from the Old English by Spenser Santos

The Seafarer 

 

May I utter truth for myself,

to say of trials, how in the times of toil

I often withstood wearisome times,

bitter breastcare, how I have bided,

come to know on a ship, abode of much care,

the terrible seawave’s rolling often held me there,

anxious nightwatch at the boat’s prow,

when it pitched against cliffs. Pinched by cold

were my feet, frostbound

with cold fetters, there the sighs of care

were hot around the heart; hunger tore from within

the mereweary mood. That the man,

to whom the most pleasant on earth befalls, knows not

how I, wretched and sorrowful, on the ice-cold sea

dwelled in winter in the paths of an exile,

bereft of beloved kinsmen and

hung with icicles; hail flew in showers.

There I heard naught but the sea to roar,

the frigid wave. Sometimes the swan’s song

did I take for entertainment, the gannet’s cry

and curlew’s sound for men’s laughter,

the seagull’s singing for mead.

Storms there beat the stony cliffs, where

the tern, the icy-feathered one, answers him,

very often the eagle screamed round about,

the dewy-feathered one; not any protecting kinsmen

could comfort the wretched spirit. READ MORE…