Beowulf

I started reading Beowulf again the other day. I read it once several years ago (Seamus Heaney's translation. No, as much as I would like to, I don't read it in Anglo-Saxon. I only know about four words of the language. Hwaet, werguild, wyrd, and wyrm, if you care to know.) I wasn't that impressed with it then. The story was good - I could see that - but I felt let down by the words Heaney used to translate it. They didn't seem to me to fit, somehow. The story would be soaring along and then some jarring, modern word would intrude. I suspect that this was chiefly because I had just finished reading Tolkien's The Lay of Leithian (which is an awesome epic poem, by the way, though it be incomplete) and he matches his style his theme. This time round I laid hold of different translation. Strange to say, I'm finding I don't really care about the style it's told in - the story's simply too wonderful. It feels almost as if I'm reading Lord of the Rings in verse, even to the point where they seem to share the same characters. Its even set in Middle-earth, or Middangeard.I read somewhere recently (can't remember where) that Tolkien himself said that Beowulf was one of the greatest influences on his work.
I took the book to the beach with me yesterday, found a lonely rock upon the silver strand and, to the sound of the waves (I can never decide if they sound mournful or joyous) read a good bit of it aloud to myself - the part where Beowulf is preparing himself to wrest with the demon Grendel. Ah! But it was stirring!
I remember the basic plot line, but not the details of the rest of the story - may it meet my expectations and hopes!
And just for the record: Beowulf is NOTHING like the despicable film that has been made based on it. Beowulf is really a hero! Suffice to say, I have not seen the film, but when I heard the movie had been released, I read a review and was shocked - nay - scandalized by the changes they'd made.

Balrog in the Bible?

I couldn't help but smile when I read this verse the other morning: "Then I saw another beast, coming up out of the earth. He had two horns like a lamb, but he spoke like a dragon." (Revelation 13:11) It goes on to describe how he calls down fire from heaven too.

Heroes from Literature

I came across this idea whilst sampling yonder blog, and it seems to have caught on somewhat, I thought a male perspective to complement it wouldn't be amiss.
When I first put together this list, I got about twenty-five heroes. Having just recently read a chapter in Doug Wilson’s Future Men on fairy tales and heroes, I decided to choose which of these make virtue most lovely, most commendable. Which would want to be like, if I could? After that it wasn’t so hard. Still, all these fellows I should just like to put at number one and list nine others after them.

10. Edwin Ransom from Perelandra

I can’t leave off a fellow who actually fights in hand to hand combat with a man possessed with Satan. I’d like to list him in a better spot, but there are too many others who deserve to be awarded those. In the newly created world of Perelandra (which we call Venus) he realizes that if he is to defeat the Devil and win for Perelandra the freedom from sin which was lost in our world, then he can’t try to reason with him. That might postpone evil for a while, but eventually the possessed Dr. Weston would win. He must fight him; destroy the instrument that the Devil uses to tempt the Eve of Perelandra into staying on dry land (a thing which is forbidden.) He is Perelandra's ransom.

9. Aragorn from The Lord of the Rings
I originally had Aragorn much further up the list, at third, actually, but as I wrote about the others he kept being knocked down a position. I don’t know how he got down (or up) quite this far. I can’t pin down one particular thing I like about Aragorn, he seems to be everything. A gentleman, a knight, a king. I do like the way he behaves toward Éowyn. And also the way he patiently waits and proves himself for Arwen.


8. Beren Erchamion from the Silmarillion
People tout Romeo and Juliet. Others talk of Helen and Paris. And apparently Heathcliff had a bit of a thing for Cathy. All these shoot rather wide of the mark, I’m afraid. The greatest romance is that of Beren and Luthien. Beren, a mortal man, literally goes through hell to win the elf maid Luthien’s hand (and has one of his own bitten of by a demon wolf in the process.) I don’t know if many of you know the story, but her father jokingly promises to let them marry if Beren brings him back one of the priceless jewels from the iron crown of the Dark Lord (Morgoth, not Sauron), a task which he thinks impossible. But of course, Beren takes him at his word and, with a goodish bit of help from Luthien herself, enters hell and steals the jewel, only to have the hand which held it bitten off! I won’t say any more, just read it, if you haven’t, but it is a tale of love beyond death, much more so than Heathcliff’s and Cathy’s. I guess Beren doesn’t always come across as the humblest, but the elves do tend to treat him somewhat slightingly – he is, after all, only a man. But he fights nobly to win his love against all odds, and, off course, she helps him win in every way she can.

7. Colonel Brandon from Sense and Sensibility
I can’t rave about him as much as I can some of these others, but that is only because I don’t know him as well, having only read the book once, quite awhile ago. I can really only go by the portrayal of him the films, which is noble, kind, and good.



6. Anados from Phantastes
He enters Faerie, and all the opportunities of the land before him, and what does he do? Exactly what I would do in his position: makes a hash of everything. He lets his selfishness and ignorance rule most of his actions. When he awakens the White Lady and falls in love with her, he pursues her across Fairyland assuming that he has a right to claim her as his own, because he woke her. But then he loses her, and begins to redeem himself. Until he is able to say, when the goblins and the old hag taunt him that the Lady is to marry another, for Anados is not worthy of her, that he is glad of it. Finally he redeems himself fully when he dies protecting the Lady’s husband (who is a truly good knight.)
I also love the tale of Cosmos (a person) that Anados reads in the Fairy Queen’s Library.

5. Faramir from The Lord of the Rings
To be so hated by your father, and blamed by him for your dear brother’s death! Despite that fact, when faced with the chance to gain his father’s love by taking the Ring he passes it up. (And he handles it much better in the book than in the film.) And then, off course he saves Éowyn from despair, and gives her something to live for. He’s noble and courteous. He doesn’t want to fight, preferring his books. But when the days are dark and his people need him, then he leads them bravely. (Boromir could have easily have taken this place, a pity he couldn't fit on the list.)

4. Samwise Gamgee from The Lord of the Rings
What is there not to like about Sam? Few authors achieve the accomplishment of making a hero out of the simple folk without creating something of an obnoxious brat. Maybe it’s because Sam is so humble that he avoids this fate. He is so dedicated to Frodo, so hopeful, so cheerful, and courageous. He watches his master slowly dying in the torture of the Ring, and can do nothing but carry him up Mount Doom – which is perhaps one of the most moving acts in the book, if not in the entirety of literature. He loves his master with a manly loyalty greater than his fear and his overwhelming inadequacy for the task before him.

3. Mr. Knightly from Emma
He always does the right and decent thing, regardless of what people think of him. He honestly cares about everyone, he doesn’t fain politeness. Actually, he’s not polite. He’s good. That is, he doesn’t do what he should do, but what he wants to do (which happens to be the same thing.)
I’ve heard people say that Emma doesn’t deserve him, but that’s just it. It is almost as though he condescends to love her, but not in the proper meaning of the word. There is no pride in his make-up. Not of the wrong sort. Probably that is the wrong word altogether. It’s not that he marries Emma because he thinks it will be good for her to have him around all the time, so he can lecture her with greater ease. He does love her, and redeems her through his love, as it were. He cares enough about her to hurt her.

2. Gandalf the Grey from The Lord of the Rings
I always liked Gandalf the Grey better than the White. By which, I don’t mean I don’t like him as the White. He may basically be an incarnate angel (take a look in the appendices and the Silmarillion) with all the power of such a being, but he must work within the confines of the body of an old man. He gets tired, he gets cast down, he loses hope. But he labours on, like most of Tolkien’s characters, beyond immediate hope, because of the indefatigable knowledge of what is right and good. Although he is grey, it is only the grey of light veiled behind a cloak, not of goodness compromised. He knows that there are greater powers than that of evil. Of the five wizards who came to Middle-earth to fight Sauron, he is the only one who keeps to his purpose.

1. Aslan from The Chronicles of Narnia
Who said these all had to be human? Aslan just has to be the greatest of my heroes. He strides rightfully proud though the green hills of my imagination, a blaze of gold, might and nobility. He gave his life for the traitorous Edmund, suffered gross humiliation before his enemies, and was willing to do so. (I’ve just realized that four of my heroes die and come back to life.) He always loves and protects the children, and rebukes them when they need it, in the way they need it. I don’t think I need to say anymore, we all know him. But, oh! To sink my hands into his golden mane and laugh and cry at his feet! To say nothing of the fact that he is about the best Christ figure that ficton’s got going.

The Lord of the Rings in Sixty Seconds

Now this is funny

Just a couple of youtube videos I thought were rather neat. The first needs no introduction - Jerry Lewis & Lord of the Rings. The second is a Paul Colman song, before he became a Newsboy - back in the PC3 days - set to Lord of the Rings. Good music, good movie.