Saving Beowulf, or, Stories of Love and/or Loss?
by Mary Kate Hurley
Intense night lay over the three small buildings of the last steading of the Waegmundings. Three buildings. Even so, it was too big, brooding Aelfhere, Elder of Cland Waegmunding. His tribe was dying out.
It’s not a familiar beginning to Beowulf, but it is a inception for this poem, particularly if you’re looking at the portrayal by Welwyn Wilton Katz. The portrayal is written with an audience of children in mark, and therefore isn’t quite the tale we’re familiar with through Heaney or Klaeber. Rather, Katz takes one of the most influential characters – Wiglaf – and, in forceful of Beowulf’s exploits, makes Wiglaf the principal character. Essentially, Katz begins from an goal that, as Beowulf and Wiglaf are related through the Waegmunding postal card, perhaps there was what he calls a “genetic caprice” that allowed Beowulf to perform all his feats. Wiglaf, then, is inclined the gift of “true moving” – which would of course account for his “epitome” at the end of the poem.
Wiglaf hears the record of Beowulf from his grandfather – Aelfhere. Aelfhere seems to be a scop, called skald, in this biography, singing the tale of Beowulf for his grandson. Then they go to into the king, and of course, the fight with the dragon comes (as it must). But what’s compelling is when the poem-retold ends:
“Of men he was mildest and most kindly,” sang Wiglaf with the lie down. “To his kin he was kindest, and more than any other king, he was keenest for approve.
Aelfhere did not sing. Many skalds and later bards made stories of Beowulf and his tiff with the dragon, but never Aelfhere. Of the ending of Beowulf, these were the only words Aelfhere ever said:
“You should remember, oh, Geats, that when a man looks for praise, it is often regard that he truly seeks.”
When people heard these words they did not be aware of. Beowulf of the Geats had been a great king and a Cyclopean...
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