Why Read Anglo-Saxon Poetry?

The Robert Zemeckis film of Beowulf, while highly entertaining (for many of the wrong reasons), is sufficient cause, I believe, to lead one to an appreciation of the ancient poem itself. As Michael Alexander rightly stated, this work is a portal into a pre-Christian past, in which the oral tradition of poetic composition prospered. Fruitless attempts to identify Beowulf as an ancient vegetation god, a-la Frazer, or as an early concoction of a Germanic hero with a Christ-centered ethos have shown (at least to me) to be pointless exercises in scholarly virtuosity. Tolkien correctly identified this poem as an elegy, a lament for a lost or dying heroic past, written at a time when the weakness of humanity found solace in humility and suffering, as the pathway to heaven, and had abandoned the ancient heroic code of personal excellence and striving for glory. In our own time, we have the outstanding example of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, an epic in an age when epics have been thought gone forever. Harold Bloom, usually an astute critic, made a ridiculous remark when he stated that he had "serious aesthetic reservations" about LOTR. A tale, nay, an epic, in which the unlikeliest of persons become grand heroes; a tale in which good and evil are unabashedly balanced on a razor's edge (to paraphrase Galadriel); a prose poem of striking emotional power ... Such is LOTR. And such is Beowulf. To read either work -- Beowulf or LOTR -- expecting magnificent character development and psychological insight (which is what Bloom apparently expected from the latter) is to miss the point of epic poetry (or prose) entirely. This is not to say that LOTR does not display subtle developments in the characters' personalities. The immature Merry and Pippin, for example, grow into splendid, selfless warriors, while the inward-looking Frodo does not so much develop as blossom, from inward-looking, almost poetical young Hobbit into a quiet moral force. Beowulf, in the great poem, maintains his persona as the archetypal Germanic hero until the very end: such is his moral contribution to the poem. Emotional impact comes from the interaction of characters and events, not from quiet personal development. A moral center is necessary to every great work. In LOTR it is Samwise Gamgee; in Beowulf it is the hero himself, the one who places his entire life at the service of personal glory. While this might be an ethic with which us moderns cannot identify, it is an ethic nonetheless; and to appreciate the poem, one must orient him or herself to this ancient and outmoded ethic.

I am not one to promote literature as a vehicle for personal moral growth, nor for life lessons, etc. Rather, I consider art for art's sake to be the ONLY justification for poetry, literary prose, visual art, music, and any mode of aesthetic expression that the individual sees fit to execute. While I encounter few references to Walter Pater in contemporary literary criticism, I feel that such a lack of pure ENJOYMENT (gasp!) is stifling creativity. Instead of shocking (or attempting, like juveniles, to shock) people, with ever more elaborate torture scenes, or with an homage to a cunt, rather let us strive for beauty: and in Anglo-Saxon poetry the beauty of the person against the world is paramount.

The final stand of Byrtnoth in The Battle of Maldon is an example of an ancient concept of honor that would fit well in our modern world of self-centered, and SELFISH people: such as wives who abandon husbands struggling with addiction, or friends who walk away when one has nothing left to offer ... Byrtnoth gave ground to the invading Danish Vikings, not because he felt sorry for them, but because he knew that his glory would be enhanced by such an heroic, noble gesture. Of course, he lost the batle, but the victory was still his. We read the poem today. Who knows anything about those invading Vikings?

Perhaps a personal note is in order here. I was left alone, in a cruel and unforgiving world by a woman with whom I spent ten years of my life, loving, striving, sharing, bearing joys and sorrows ... only because I love the bottle. Would an Anglo-Saxon hero do such a thing? No. Woman or man, the ancient hero would stick with his or her friend to the bitter end. There is nothing worse than leaving a friend in their direst time of need.

... Bold-tempered chieftain, famed for your deeds, you must defend your life now with all your strength. I shall help you.

(Beowulf, 2665-67, tr. Alexander, my emphasis)

Never have I heard anyone -- ex-wife especially! -- say "I shall help you." No. It was always, "help yourself," "get better," "stop putting us through this." Heroic words those (note bitter sarcasm). The moral weakness of puling moderns is placed in no better contrast when placed along side Anglo-Saxon heroic poetry, or LOTR, in which love for one's fellow knows no bounds, and devotion is an attainment, not a sacrifice. One need only read those works attentively to realize that the love is not erotic, nor romantic, but HEROIC. So what do I mean by heroic?

Many times one will qualify the term 'heroic' with 'ideal.' The heroic life is not an ideal; it is a moral choice. When Beowulf decided to travel to the hall of Hrothgar to slay Grendel, it was a choice, not a demand: which made it all the more glorious. When my ex-wife decided to abandon me to prison and homelessness -- that was also a choice, but it was not glorious. It was a mean-spirited, low-minded, hateful SIN against another human being. Those late nights when I read to her passages from Maldon, Beowulf, Wulf and Eadwacer, Deor, and others (a few of which I have translated) the words passed away like fireflies on a summer's eve. Nothing 'sunk in', as it were. And as I have stated, while I do not consider literature a method of moral development, I DO consider it a force for internal change, for CONTEMPLATION. The Greek philosophers called it THEORIA, and it implied a quiet and relaxed mode of thinking, a manner of engaging with one's emotions devoid of the passions that taint our responses and cause us to do things like abandon those we profess to love.

Never with words would I chide you, my friend, For disgrace was never yours. No retreat Have I ever witnessed.

(Waldere, fragment I., my translation)

Somwhere Lord Byron stated that there is nothing more precious in the world than the unconditional love of a woman. He was speaking of his half sister Augusta, to whom he wrote some glorious stanzas, deservedly so (in my opinion). This passage above, from a very ancient Anglo-Saxom poem -- which I took the unrewardable trouble to translate -- are the words of a woman comforting her battle-weary man. How often have I longed for such words! Weary, beaten, sorrowful ... Nothing but the kind words of a woman could possibly drag me from my 'funk.' Such women exist no more. Yet men who suffer and die alone are plentiful. There are far too many of us.

Something about the so-called Age of Chivalry gives us pause; adoration of women is all well and good, but the neuroses that develop from such a 'preoccupation' often outweigh the benefits. The glory of Woman has been the cause, the bane, and the tiresome topic of poetry for centuries. Petrarch immortalized it, Byron made it intensely personal ... But the immense impact of private endeavor -- loss, longing, despair, TRIUMPH! -- held no place in the Germanic epic tradition. Rather, as Tacitus drily observed, the ancient Teutons cared more for gold than the pleasures of sex.

But there is addiction, and it takes many forms. Desire for alcohol is akin to the desire for a female embrace; and if one has a fetish, she need only remove her shoes to make one forget about anything else. This type of desperate adoration of Woman marks the end of the heroic age (of which Anglo-Saxon poetry stands as a final bulwark) and the beginning of the so-called Age of Chivalry. Now I did not feel particularly chivalrous when I groveled at my wife's feet, begging for sweet release. I DID, however, feel a surge of panicky sexuality that is rare; it is the desire for another ... the hope for a pleasure so powerful that it will overtake you. Yes. The weakness that follows -- indeed, the HELPLESSNESS -- is a testimony to the power of the Goddess. So while it is easy to travesty Anglo-Saxon poetry as masculine dominated, testosterone driven expulsion, one would do well to recall one's first sexual experience (and I am speaking to men). Will you ever forget the time you called out her name, and begged her with all your being: PLEASE DON'T STOP!? I remember it well. And so did the Anglo-Saxon poets.