Beowulf

Author: Unknown

Written: Unknown

Translator: E. Talbot Donaldson

Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company (2002 Edition)

Bought from: Book Depository

Introduction

Beowulf is the longest and one of the oldest extant poems written in Old English. No one knows exactly who wrote it, when or where. The poem survives in a single manuscript, now housed in the British Library. Experts think the manuscript was written between the 8th and early 11th century.

What is it about?

Beowulf is set in Scandinavia around 500 AD. The story can be divided into 2 parts. In the first half, the protagonist Beowulf travels from his native Geatland in modern Sweden to Denmark to defeat the monster Grendel and later Grendel's mother. The second half takes place 50 winters later when Beowulf is king of Geatland. Beowulf kills a dragon that is burning Geatland but he is mortally wounded.

It is interesting that all the antagonists appear to have been provoked by some human action. Grendel attacks the Danes in the great hall of Heorot only after enduring painful hardship due to the sound of merry-making coming from those people. Later, Grendel's mother attacks the same building to avenge her son's killing. The dragon, in turn, is provoked out of 300 hundred years of co-existence with the humans by the theft of a plated cup from its hoard. Modern readers may read this as mother nature hitting back at humans who have abused it.

The poem is not a long, only about 3,100 lines (cf the Iliad which contains over 15,000 lines). As such, the characters including Beowulf himself are not well developed. It is also hard to find a theme for the poem. Maybe the writer was just interested in composing an entertaining poem.

What about the book?

Donaldson's prose translation is written in modern English but it does contain the odd sentence construction that will seem peculiar to the casual reader. This translation is part of the Norton Critical Edition series so it comes with a wide range of additional materials, grouped under "Background and Contexts" and "Criticism". In fact, the total number of pages of additional materials is more than twice that of the text itself. In general, the essays in the Criticism section is too much for the casual reader.

Finally ...

The story is recommended. One day, I will try a different translation, maybe Seamus Heaney's.

The Iliad

Attributed to: Homer

Written: unknown

Translator: Robert Fagles

Publisher: Penguin Books (1998 Edition)

Bought from: Book Depository

Introduction

The Iliad (or Song of Troy) is an epic poem set during the Trojan War. The poem is likely to have had an oral tradition. Scholars believe the poem was first written down in the 8th century BC. The Iliad, along with The Odyssey, are two of western literature’s oldest extant work. Both poems are traditionally attributed to Homer. While Homer is regarded as ancient Greece’s greatest poet, no one knows for sure when he lived.

The oldest surviving manuscript of the Iliad is called the Venutus A. It is the primary source of all modern editions of the poem. It dates back to the 10th century AD. It is kept in the ancient public library of St Mark in Venice.

There is much debate about whether the Trojan War actually happened. Those who believe the war to be a historical event believe it took place in the 13th or 12th century BC. Regardless of whether or not it did happen, the Trojan War is generally considered the dividing line between the mythical and historical ages of Greece.


What is it about?

The poem covers a very short period near the end of the 10-year Trojan War. The poem makes references the Judgement of Paris and the abduction of Helen by Paris and events that take place since then.

The Iliad proper begins with a dispute between the two leaders of the Greek forces surrounding Troy, Agamemnon and Achilles, over a slave girl. Achilles turns his back on the Greeks in anger. However, after Hector kills his close friend Patroclus, Achilles returns to action. He kills Hector and then desecrates his body. The poem ends with the burial of Hector. The sack of Troy (no Wooden Horse though!) and Achille’s own death are foreshadowed.

The main characters are Achilles, swift runner and commander of the Myrmidons, and Hector, prince of Troy and breaker of horses. Agamemnon, Menalaus, Odysseus, Ajax and Diomedes are the other major characters on the Greeks’ side. As for the Trojans, old King Priam sees his sons and countrymen die before his eyes. He has to supplicate himself before Achilles and beg for Hector’s body. To do so, he has to endure something no one on earth has ever done before - he put to his lips the hands of the man who killed his son. Interestingly, Paris and Helen - the cause of the war - do not contribute much. Look out also for Aeneas who will, much later, be the protagonist of Virgil’s Aeneid.

The Olympian gods participate directly and take sides in the war. Hera and Athena, losers in the Judgment of Paris, side with the Greeks as do Hades, Hermes, Poseidon and Hephaestus. Aphrodite, Paris’s pick in the Judgment of Paris, is the Trojans’ main divine ally. Artemis, Apollo, Ares and the river god Xanthus also side with the Trojans. The gods fight mortals (eg. Aphrodite and Ares v Diomedes in Book 5). Gods fight gods (eg. Hephaestus v Xanthus in Book 21). The gods take mortal forms and fight beside their heroes. They spirit their heroes away from the jaws of death. Zeus stays neutral most of the time but in the climatic battle, he chooses not to help Hector and even allows Athena to entrap Hector for Achilles.

Stories about, and around, the Trojan War mythology have inspired culture down the centuries, from Classical Greek tragedians to Renaissance painters to Middle Ages poets to Elizabethan playwrights to modern day movie makers and authors.


Themes

The main theme of the poem is rage, specifically the rage of Achilles. Books 1-16 deal with the rage of Achilles against Agamemnon and its implications. When Agamemnon sends an embassy to Achilles, he brushes them off and tells them he was sailing home the next day with his troops:

If I hold out here and I lay siege to Troy,
my journey home is gone, but my glory never dies.
If I voyage back to the fatherland I love,
my pride, my glory dies ...
true, but the life that's left me will be long,
the stroke of death will not come on quickly.
(9.500 – 505)

Then, after Hector kills Patroclus in Book 16, Achilles directs his rage against his cousin’s killer:

Enough.
Let bygones be bygones. Done is done.
Despite my anguish I will beat it down,
the fury mounting inside me, down by force.
But now I’ll go and meet the murderer head-on,
that Hector who destroyed the dearest life I know.
For my own death, I’ll meet it freely – whenever Zeus
and the other deathless gods would like to bring it on!
Not even Heracles fled his death, for all his power,
favorite son as he was to father Zeus the King.
Fate crushed him, and Hera’s savage anger.
And I too, if the same fate awaits me ...
I’ll lie in peace, once I’ve gone down to death.
But now, for the moment, let me seize great glory! –
and drive some woman of Troy or deep-breasted Dardan
to claw with both hands at her tender cheeks and wipe away
her burning tears as the sobs come chocking from her throat –
they’ll learn that I refrained from war a good long time!
(18.131 – 148)

Achilles’ rage seems to abate only in the last book of the epic, Book 24, after he hears Priam beg for the return of Hector’s body.


What about the book?

This is a Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition. It is a deckle edge book and comes in a beautiful wrap-around cover. Even better, the book comes with Homer’s The Odyssey and Virgil’s The Aeneid (both also translated by Robert Fagles) in a gorgeous boxed set.

Robert Fagles’ verse translation is widely acclaimed. It has been said that his translation is not literal and he has taken certain liberties. Be that as it may, his language is easy to follow and the verse flows smoothly and dramatically. Bernard Knox provides the introduction and notes. The introduction is useful and not unduly academic. The footnotes are adequate. It is a little annoying that they are not referenced to the text in the poem itself.

Finally ...

Forget the Brad Pitt movie. This is the real thing and it is much better.

Hamlet

Author: William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

Written: c 1600
Editors: Jonathan Bate and Eric Rasmussen
Publisher: Modern Library (2008 Edition)
Bought from: Book Depository

Introduction

To many, this is the Bard’s greatest tragedy, maybe even his greatest play. A tale of treachery, revenge, love and, above all, madness (real or feigned). It is Shakespeare’s longest play (more than 4,000 lines). There is no sub-plot to distract the reader. Hamlet has more than a third of the lines and he reveals his thoughts to the reader in five famous soliloquies.

What is it about?

The story is a straight forward one. Hamlet, the prince of Denmark, encounters his dead father’s ghost who accuses Claudius, Hamlet’s uncle of murder. Claudius has since married Hamlet’s mother Getrude and ascended to the throne. Hamlet is driven mad (or feigns madness) and sets up a play-within-the-play to determine Claudius’ guilt.

Hamlet is a wonderful story filled with well-fleshed out characters from Hamlet himself to Getrude, Claudius and Polonius. These and the other characters in the play speak some of the most unforgettable words ever written in English.

Shakespeare wrote magnificent soliloquies for the Prince of Denmark. Early in the play, Hamlet laments the fact that Gertrude has married Claudius less than 2 months after the King’s death: “frailty, thy name is woman!” (1.2.146). Then, there is the ‘to be or not to be’ passage, possibly the most famous soliloquy ever written. Finally, in a soliloquy that appears in Quatro but not in Folio, Hamlet finally stops his dithering and resolves to avenge his father’s foul and most unnatural death: “O, from this time forth / My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!” (4.3.105-139)

Besides the soliloquies, Hamlet also has some snappy wordplay. When Claudius calls him “my cousin Hamlet, and my son”, Hamlet says as an aside (his very first line): “A little more than kin and less than kind” (1.2.64). Hamlet agrees that Claudius has become more closely related to him after marrying his mother (ie. kin) but he does not think of Claudius as kindred or affectionate (ie. kind). Later, after he kills Polonius and (apparently) hides the body, Hamlet is asked where he has hidden the body. Hamlet replies, “The body is with the king, but the king is not with the body” (4.2.25). This line is capable of various interpretations, eg. Claudius has a physical body but not true kingship, or Polonius is with the late true king instead of the usurper king Claudius, or Polonius is with God (ie. “King”) instead of Claudius.

The play contains a smattering of the bawdy language that Shakespeare is famous for. Hamlet the character gets to say most of them (eg. 3.2.106-119).

Shakespeare also put some memorable lines in Polonius’ mouth. I especially love the bombastic advice he gives his son Laertes, which includes the admonition “Neither a borrower nor a lender be” (1.3.78) and “This above all: to thine own self be true” (1.3.81).

And in Ophelia, Shakespeare has crafted one of his most wretched and pitiful characters. She is young and impressionable and is doomed after Hamlet (whether he does so consciously or in madness) plays with her feelings.


Themes

One of the major talking points of the play is Hamlet's dithering. For a big part of the play, he thinks about killing Claudius but does not act. After he watches a troupe of actors rehearsing, he comments that the actor, who is merely acting, expresses more emotion than himself, who is supposed to be actually suffering:

“O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
Is it not monstrous that this player here,
But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his soul so to his own conceit
That from her working all his visage wanned,
Tears in his eyes, distraction in’s aspect,
A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
With forms to his conceit? And all for nothing!
For Hecuba!
What’s Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,
That he should weep for her? What would he do,
Had he the motive and the cue for passion
That I have? He would drown the stage with tears
And cleave the general ear with horrid speech,
Make mad the guilty and appal the free,
Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed
The very faculties of eyes and ears. Yet I
A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak
Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause,
And can say nothing! No, not for a king
Upon whose property and most dear life
A damned defeat was made. Am I a coward?
Who calls me villain? Breaks my pate across?
Plucks off my beard and blows it in my face?
Tweaks me by th’ nose? Gives me the lie i’ th’ throat
As deep as to the lungs? Who does me this?
Ha!
Why, I should take it, for it cannot be
But I am pigeon-livered and lack gall
To make oppression bitter, or ere this
I should have fatted all the region kites
With this slave’s offal: bloody, bawdy villain!
Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain!
O, vengeance!
Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave,
That I, the son of a dear murdered,
Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,
Must like a whore unpack my heart with words
And fall a-cursing like a very drab, a scullion!
Fie upon’t, foh!”
          (2.2.535-574)

In the next scene, the famous ‘to be or not to be’ passage shows Hamlet was still thinking of doing instead of doing:

“To be, or not to be, that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them: to die, to sleep -
No more - and by a sleep, to say we end
The heartache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to: ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep,
To sleep, perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub,
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there’s the respect
That makes calamity of so long life,
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of disprized love, the law’s delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? Who would these fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscovered country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have,
Than fly to others that we know not of.
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn away,
And lose the name of action.”

          (3.1.62-94)

Even more dramatically, at the midpoint of the play, Hamlet has the chance to kill Claudius while the latter was kneeling (apparently) in prayer. Hamlet declares in another soliloquy: “And now I’ll do’t .... And so am I revenged” (3.3.77-78). Then almost immediately, he lapses into indecisiveness yet again. He reasons that if he kills Claudius during his prayer, he will only be sending Claudius to heaven (a courtesy Claudius did not afford Hamlet’s father). Hamlet convinces himself he should kill Claudius at another time when Claudius is committing some act “That has no relish of salvation in’t” (3.395).

What about the book?

Each of the books in the RSC Shakespeare series published by The Modern Library comes with very informative footnotes, helpful scene-by-scene analysis and, best of all, commentary on past and current productions that comes with interviews with leading directors and actor. The books are also very reasonably priced. Best of all, the introductions are not overly long and focus on a few talking points for each play. The paper quality is not particularly good though. Also, the covers are not very attractive.


Finally ...

My top 5 Shakespeare tragedies:

1. Hamlet
2. Romeo and Juliet
3. Macbeth
4. Othello
5. King Lear

The Tale of The Heike

Author: Unknown

Written: Unknown

Translated by: Helen Craig McCullough

Publisher: Stanford University Press (1988 Edition)

Bought from: Book Depository

Introduction

The Tale of the Heike or Heike Monogatari is set in the Genpei War which took place in Japan in the 12th century AD. It chronicles the power struggle between 2 samurai families, the Taira (or Heike) and Minamoto (or Genji) clans. The Tale of the Heike is considered one of the great classics of medieval Japanese literature.

Scholars believe The Tale of the Heike is a collection of oral stories originally recited by travelling monks (or laymen in monk’s robes) accompanied by an instrument called a biwa. It is not known who first compiled the stories into written form or when. There are various extant versions of The Tale of the Heike but the most widely read version was compiled by a blind monk named Kakuichi in 1371.

So what is it about?

The main character in the first third of the story is Taira no Kiyomori. His clan helps Emperor Go-Shirakawa suppress two separate rebellions. The Taira clan eventually come to dominate the imperial court in Kyoto to such an extent that Kiyomori installs his grandson as the Emperor and exiles Cloistered Emperor Go-Shirakawa.

In Chapter 5, the next major character emerges. He is Minamoto no Yoritomo, based in Kamakura. He is persuaded to lead the uprising against the Taira clan on behalf of Cloistered Emperor Go-Shirakawa. He is assisted by his cousin Minamoto no Yoshinaka. Yoshinaka drives the Taira out of Kyoto and returns Cloistered Emperor Go-Shirakawa to Kyoto. However, Yoshinaka turns on the imperial court.

Tomb of Yoritomo in Kamakura

Yoritomo’s half-brother Minamoto Yoshitsune takes center stage from Chapter 8. He is arguably the major character in the last third of the story. He leads Yoritomo’s soldiers against Yoshinaka and the what is left of the Taira forces. Yoshinaka is killed in 1184 (Chapter 9) and the Taira clan is finally vanquished in the decisive naval battle of Dan-no-ura in 1185 (Chapter 11). A jealous Minamoto commander convinces Yoritomo to turn against Yoshitsune who eventually flees north to save his own life. The story ends with the Minamoto clan led by Yoritomo firmly in power with the execution of the last male heir of the Taira clan. Yoritomo is officially awarded the title of Shogun in 1192 and this marks the start of the Kamukara shogunate.

It is interesting to note that the shogunate system, under which political power rests in the samurai caste, was to last for some 700 years.


Themes

The main theme is signaled in the opening paragraph: “The sound of he Gion Shoja bells echoes the impermanence of all things; the color of the sala flowers reveals the truth that the prosperous must decline. The proud do not endure, they are like dreams on a spring night; the mighty fall at last, they are as dust before the wind.”

The idea of impermanence is considered in Buddhism as one of the three marks of existence (along with suffering and non-self). The Tale of the Heike is a narrative of the rise and the inevitable fall of Taira no Kiyomori and his clan.


What about the book?

There are several unabridged English translations. I found the McCullough translation easy to read. There is a list of the principal characters in the front and family trees at the end of the book. There are also several illustrations of key episodes of the story.

Finally ...

Recommended.

Paradise Lost

Author: John Milton (1608-1674)
Written: c 1658-1664
Editor: William Kerrigan, John Rumrich and Stephen M. Fallon
Publisher: Modern Library (2008 Edition)
Bought: Book Depository


Introduction

Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse composed by John Milton. It was first published in 1667 in 10 books. A second edition, in 12 books and with small but significant revisions, was published in 1674. John Milton and William Shakespeare are generally considered England’s greatest poets.


What is it about?

This is a story about the fall of Satan and the fall of man. It starts, like the Homeric poems, in medias res and with an invocation to the “Heav’nly Muse”. Satan and his followers have already been cast out of heaven. Initially, he appears to accept his lot. He says it is “Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav’n” (I.263). But before long, he embarks on a quest to destroy God’s latest creation, mankind. The poem then switches to Adam and Eve in Eden. They hear of how Satan rebelled and was ultimately defeated by the Son of God. They hear of their own creation. Finally, they hear of God’s explicit command not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge. Well, as we all know, Satan succeeds in tempting Eve to disobey that command resulting in the expulsion of both Adam and Eve from paradise (hence, the title of the poem).

Who is the protagonist of the poem? Is it God, the Son of God, Adam or Satan? Some say Satan is the true hero of the tale. Certainly, Milton’s Satan is very different from (say) the one in Dante’s Inferno - Milton’s Satan exhibits very human traits from anger to defiance to envy to cunningness. He embarks on an epic journey through the cosmos to get to Eden. He has no horns or tail. In many of the illustrations associated with Paradise Lost (eg. Gustave Dore’s woodcutting for the cover of this volume), Satan is depicted in human form and even has wings just like an angel). You have to make up your own mind.

This story dispels a popular misconception: the snake that seduces Eve is not actually Satan. It is in fact a serpent which “the Devil entered” in from the mouth (IX.188), in other words a serpent whose body Satan possesses. The serpent is nonetheless cursed subsequently by the Son of God for its role in tempting Eve (X.175 ff) and this curse is later transferred to Satan and his demons (IX.504 ff).

I feel sorry for Adam and Eve as it begins to dawn on them (Book X) how high the price they have to pay for their transgression - not only expulsion from paradise but death for them and all their descendants. This begs the question why God (if he is omnipotent and omnibenevolent) allows Eve to be tempted.


Themes

One of the big questions raised by this poem is divine determinism v free will. If God has foreknowledge that Adam and Eve will sin, why does he allow it. Milton answers this when God says: “I have made (mankind) just and right / Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall” (III.99-100).

I find Milton’s depiction of Eve misogynistic. Eve says to Adam :

“My author and disposer, what thou bidd’st Unargued I obey; so God ordains, God is thy Law, thou mine; to know no more Is women’s happiest knowledge and her praise.”(IV.635-638)

Try getting a modern woman to include that in her wedding vows!

Later, after the fall, the Son of God descends to sentence Adam and Eve and he admonishes Eve “... to thy husband's will / Thine shall submit, he over thee shall rule” (X.195-196).

The poem explores many religious, moral and even scientific themes - some very obscure. Milton’s writing style is very different from modern English. He makes use of allegories, extended similes, references and imagery. There is also a lot of unusual sentence construction. Take the famous first sentence that starts “Of man’s first disobedience ...” It is 16 lines long and the subject and verb are in line 6. For all these reasons, a well annotated edition is a must.


What about the book?

I find this translation readable. It has a useful introduction that includes a discussion of three “controversies” around this work, eg the debate over whether Milton’s depiction of Eve is misogynistic (I think it is!). There are also ample footnotes.


Finally ...

Receommended. But you need to be patient to work through the language. Make use of the footnotes.


Et cetera

The title of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy is derived from the following passage:

“... Into this wild abyss, The womb of Nature and perhaps her grave, Of neither sea, nor shore, nor air, nor fire, But all these in their pregnant causes mixed, Confus’dly, and which thus must ever fight, Unless th’ Almighty Maker them ordain His dark materials to create more worlds ....” (II.910-916)