A01=Francis Leneghan
Age Group_Uncategorized
Age Group_Uncategorized
Anglo-Saxon
Anglo-Saxons
Author_Francis Leneghan
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Beowulf
Biblical Paradigms
Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=DSBB
COP=United Kingdom
Delivery_Delivery within 10-20 working days
Drama
Dynastic Crisis
Dynastic Drama
Dynasties
Early Modern Period
Epic Poetry
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
Geatish Hero
Hero
Interpretation
Kingship
Language_English
Middle Ages
Monsters
National Crises
Original Audience
PA=Available
Portents
Price_€20 to €50
PS=Active
Royal Legend
Scandinavia
Scandinavian Royal Legend
softlaunch
Structure
The Dynastic Drama of Beowulf
Product details
- ISBN 9781843846291
- Weight: 484g
- Dimensions: 156 x 234mm
- Publication Date: 03 May 2022
- Publisher: Boydell & Brewer Ltd
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Paperback
- Language: English
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A strikingly original approach to Beowulf, linking its structure to the dynastic life-cycle.
The original audience of Beowulf was steeped in ancient Scandinavian royal legend. But for modern readers of the poem, these traditions are frustratingly obscure and confusing.
This book argues that Beowulf is a dynastic drama centred on the fortunes of three great royal houses, the Scyldings, Scylfings and Hrethlings. At the centre of the poem is the Geatish hero, whose adventures provide the link between these three dynasties. By unravelling the web of Scandinavian royal legends known to the work's original audience, the volume allows the modern reader to appreciate better the role of the monsters as portents of dynastic and national crises. It begins by offering a new interpretation of the work's structure based on the principle of the dynastic life-cycle, providing explanations for features of the poem that have never been satisfactorily explained, most famously its many digressions and episodes. Highlighting the work's often-overlooked originality, it then proposes that the poet created a fictionalized monster-slaying hero and inserted him into royal legend in order to dramatize specific moments of dynastic crisis. Finally, it brings into focus the poet's debt to biblical paradigms of kingship and considers how the Anglo-Saxons came to read Beowulf as their own Book of Kings.
FRANCIS LENEGHAN is Professor of Old English at the University of Oxford.
