Linguistic facts and the interpretation of Old English poetry

In their admirable edition ofThe WandererDunning and Bliss give the meaning ‘as when’ forswain line 43bpinceð him on mode pæt he his mondryhtenclyppe ond cysse, ond on cneo lecgehonda ond heafod, swa he hwilum ærin geardagum giefstolas breac (41–4)and defend their gloss in the following words: ‘Here literary considerations must outweigh linguistic arguments.’ And in his latest book, Stanley B. Greenfield approves: ‘Thus Bliss–Dunning…can properly say that though usage ofswameaning “as when” here “would be unique”, but [sic] “literary considerations must outweigh linguistic arguments”.’ I do not approve. I would say that Dunning and Bliss have let literary considerations outweigh not linguisticarguments, but linguisticfacts. Hence my title.

The thematic significance of enta geweorc and related imagery in The Wanderer

Anglo-Saxon England ◽

10.1017/s0263675100000466 ◽

1973 ◽

Vol 2 ◽

pp. 253-269 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

P. J. Frankis

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

Final Section ◽

English Poetry ◽

Anglo Saxon ◽

Old English Poetry ◽

The Impact ◽

Our uncertainty about the full implications for poet and audience of particular words and phrases is a serious obstacle to our understanding of Old English poetry. With regard to the final section of The Wanderer (73–115) some advances in our knowledge and understanding have already been made, notably by Professor J. E. Cross in his studies of the Latin antecedents of two passages: he shows that lines 80–4 use the motif of the Fates of Men, with the Old English sum … sum … structure translating the Latin alius … alius …, and that lines 92–6 are based on the ubi sunt topos of the transience of life. This information gives us a better grasp of the impact these lines may have had on an informed Anglo-Saxon audience and helps us to evaluate the poem; but many details still remain unclear. The present study is concerned with the context of these two passages (73–105), and in particular with the puzzling image of ‘the work of giants’ that has been destroyed by God (85–7).

The maritime imagination and the paradoxical mind in Old English poetry

Anglo-Saxon England ◽

10.1017/s0263675110000049 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 39 ◽

pp. 21-42 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Antonina Harbus

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

The Body ◽

Suitable Model ◽

English Poetry ◽

Human Consciousness ◽

Anglo Saxon ◽

Old English Poetry ◽

Mental Experience ◽

The Mind ◽

AbstractThe specifically maritime imagination of Anglo-Saxon poets resolves the potentially incongruous metaphorical models of the mind in this culture as both an enclosure and a wandering entity. The dual containing and travelling aspects of the ship provide a suitable model for the embodied yet metaphysical mind, and act in conjunction with the widespread metaphor of life as a sea voyage to produce a coherent means of imagining how the mind operates in relation to the body. The Wanderer and The Seafarer illustrate how acutely this conventionalized way of representing physical and mental experience relies on the sea voyage as both the setting for and metaphorical representation of a human consciousness that is both enclosed in the body and also able to transcend the physical.

Varieties of repetition in old english poetry. Especially in The Wanderer and The Seafarer

Neophilologus ◽

10.1007/bf01512812 ◽

1981 ◽

Vol 65 (2) ◽

pp. 292-307 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Muriel Cornell

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

English Poetry ◽

Old English Poetry ◽

Old English Poetry into Modern English Verse

Translation and Literature ◽

10.3366/tal.1994.3.3.69 ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 3 (3) ◽

pp. 69-75

Author(s):

M. J. Alexander

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

English Poetry ◽

Old English Poetry ◽

English Verse

Nei1 D. Isaacs, Structural Principles in Old English Poetry. Knoxville : The University of Tennessee Press, 1968. 8°. XIIl-197 S.

POETICA ◽

10.30965/25890530-0030304019 ◽

1970 ◽

Vol 3 (3-4) ◽

pp. 629-632

Author(s):

Götz Wienold

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

English Poetry ◽

Old English Poetry ◽

University Of Tennessee ◽

Structural Principles ◽

The University

The Literary Use of Formulas in Guthlac II and their Relation to Felix’s Vita Sancti Guthlaci ◽

1. THE PLACING OF GUTHLACII IN OLD ENGLISH POETRY

10.1515/9783112329146-003 ◽

1977 ◽

pp. 15-25

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

English Poetry ◽

Maxims in Old English Poetry (review)

Parergon ◽

10.1353/pgn.2000.0047 ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 17 (2) ◽

pp. 190-192

Author(s):

Antonina Harbus

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

English Poetry ◽

The Concessive Relation in Old English Poetry

The Modern Language Review ◽

10.2307/3719296 ◽

1955 ◽

Vol 50 (4) ◽

pp. 518

Author(s):

K. R. Brooks ◽

Randolph Quirk

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

English Poetry ◽

Expanded lines in Old English poetry

Neophilologus ◽

10.1007/bf01513182 ◽

1951 ◽

Vol 35 (1) ◽

pp. 226-230 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

B. J. Timmer

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

English Poetry ◽

XVII.—Recent Translations of Old English Poetry.

PMLA ◽

10.2307/456505 ◽

1903 ◽

Vol 18 (3) ◽

pp. 445-458

Author(s):

James M. Garnett

Keyword(s):

Old English ◽

Subject Matter ◽

The Other ◽

English Poetry ◽

William Morris ◽

Anglo Saxon ◽

Old English Poetry ◽

The Past

The desire was expressed some years ago that we might soon have in English a collection of translations of Old English poetry that might fill the place so well filled in German by Grein's Dichtungen der Angelsachsen. This desire is now in a fair way of accomplishment, and much has been done during the past ten years, the period embraced in this paper. As was naturally to be expected from the work previously done in criticism of both text and subject-matter, Beowulf has attracted more than ever the thoughts and efforts of translators, for we had in 1892 the rhythmical translation of Professor J. Lesslie Hall and the prose version of Professor Earle; in 1895 (reprinted in cheaper form in 1898) the poetical translation of William Morris and A. J. Wyatt, the editor of Beowulf; in 1901 the prose version of Dr. J. R. Clark Hall, author of A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary; and only the other day, in 1902, the handy prose version of Professor C. B. Tinker.