Seamus Heaney's Beowulf: An epic listen

Wise sir, do not grieve. It is always better to avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning. For every one of us, living in this world means waiting for our end. Let anyone who can win glory before death. When a warrior is gone, that will be his best and only bulwark.

--from Beowulf, author unknown

As I've stated in past posts I'm a devotee of audio books. They give me something constructive to do on my hour-long commute to work each morning. A good audiobook can lift you above traffic and the drag and drain of daily worries and transport you to better places where skalds sing the deeds of great men.

The world described in the ancient poem Beowulf is such a place. It's an era of warrior-heroes, men of martial prowess who value honor, bravery, and the everlasting glory that comes with a life spent performing great deeds. It's a tale of spear-Danes and the great kings who ruled them with courage and greatness. And Beowulf, the hero of the tale, stands head and shoulders above even these proud men.

I recently checked out a BBC recording of Beowulf translated and read by poet and critic Seamus Heaney. If you're also a fan of audio books and in particular of heroic fantasy, this one is definitely a must-listen.

The poem itself is a straightforward, simple story that begins with the tale of the monster Grendel harrying the hall of the Danish king Hrothgar, slaying and devouring his retainers at night. Beowulf arrives from over the sea with a small band of hand-picked spear Danes to put a stop to Grendel and his mother, a monstrous hag living beneath a tarn. Act two fast-forwards the reader 50 years later where an aging Beowulf, now a lord of renown, must strap on his shield and armor one last time to stop a dragon from ravaging his kingdom. That's pretty much it.

Beowulf's real reward is in its wonderful language. Heaney's translation is a joy to listen to. Great warriors are "wreckers of mead-benches" and kings are "generous ring-givers." The ocean is a "whale road," the sun "the world's candle," a gleaming sword a "battle-torch." It's also loaded with alliteration. Some might find this language tedious but I loved it. Here's an example of a passage that describes Beowulf's boat heading back home, loaded with riches heaped upon the crew by a grateful Hrothgar:

Then the keel plunged and shook in the sea, and they sailed from Denmark. Right away the mast was rigged with its sea-shawl. Sail ropes were tightened, timbers drummed, and stiff winds kept the wave-crosser skimming ahead. As she heaved forward, her foamy neck was fleet and boyant, a lapped prow loping over currents, until finally the Geats caught sight of coastline and familiar cliffs.

Beowulf contains an interesting mix of old pagan gods and beliefs meeting the new. Christianity is definitely on the upswing and we hear continued references to a singular God, "the glorious almighty." But the poem also contains references to "the wyrd," or the fate from which no man can escape. Great warriors are burned on funeral pyres, and we are not certain where men's souls return after death. When Hrothgar's great-grandfather, Scyld, dies at the beginning of the tale and his wealth-laden ship is set out to sea, "No man can tell, no wise man in hall or weathered veteran, knows for certain who salvaged that load."

J.R.R. Tolkien admits to being heavily influenced by Beowulf, and it's clear that the scene in The Hobbit of Bilbo filching a cup from Smaug's horde is lifted straight out of the poem (it's also no coincidence that Beowulf's dragon has a soft spot beneath his nigh-impenetrable scaly coat, another device used by Tolkien in Smaug's battle with Bard over Dale).

The poem also gives an invaluable glimpse into the morality of the era. Dictums by the poem's unknown author provide us with the values and behavior which men upheld in roughly 5th-7th century Scandinavia. For example, reverence of the dead: "Then 12 warriors rode around the tomb, chieftains sons, champions in battle, all of them distraught, chanting in dirges, mourning his loss as a man and a king. They extolled his heroic nature and exploits and gave thanks for his greatness, which was the proper thing, for a man should praise a prince whom he holds dear, and cherish his memory when that moment comes when he has to become void from his bodily home."

And this one: "And a young prince must be prudent like that, giving freely while his father lives. So that afterwards in age, when fighting starts, steadfast companions will stand by him and hold the line. Behavior that's admired is the path to power for people anywhere."

In short, highly recommended.

A fantasy blast from the past: The Enchanted World

My two daughters have recently started a habit that does my fantasy-loving heart good--paging through a series of Time-Life Books I purchased years ago, The Enchanted World. A really cool television ad that received a lot of airplay back in the early-to-mid 8o's roped me into buying several of them as a young teen, and they still stand proudly on my bookshelf today. Now much younger eyes and hands than mine are enjoying their wondrous contents.

Does anyone else remember these books? They were one of those deals where you bought the first book at a discounted price, then Time-Life would send you one each month (or maybe it was every other month) with "no obligation to buy." But of course these were so awesome I felt pretty darned obligated to purchase as many as I could afford. These books weren't cheap at the time, I think $20 each, but I couldn't resist buying several volumes. My collection includes:

Wizards and Witches

Spells and Bindings

Dragons

Ghosts

Fairies and Elves

Legends of Valor

Giants and Ogres

I wasn't a big novel reader back then and The Enchanted World hit a sweet spot: Some text mixed in with gorgeous, full-color paintings and other illustrations. I've included a few of my favorites in this post. They were beautifully laid-out and fairly well-written as well.

Eventually my money ran dry and I had to stop collecting the books. I'm not sure how many of them Time-Life eventually published, but the collector in me sometimes has the urge to complete the run. In particular, I wish I hadn't missed The Fall of Camelot.

For the D&D fans out there, the picture below is The Wild Hunt, albeit a slightly different depiction than the one in Deities & Demigods. From Time-Life Books Ghosts:

Their great horses screaming, their hellhounds howling, the riders of the Wild Hunt coursed the northern skies. A host of the dead, they sought new companions from among the living.

On the trail of the Grail: A review of Over Sea, Under Stone

So therefore, I trust it to this land, over sea and under stone, and I mark here the signs by which the proper man in the proper place, may know where it lies: the signs that wax and wane but do not die.

--Susan Cooper, Over Sea, Under Stone

Warning--spoilers ahead.

I love stories that involve the King Arthur legend, regardless of their form, and so it was with much anticipation that after more than 20 years I began re-reading Susan Cooper's Over Sea, Under Stone. While not exactly a children's book, Cooper's novel--the first in her acclaimed The Dark is Rising sequence--is geared for the young adult audience. But even though I'm far removed from that demographic I nevertheless found it to be very enjoyable and engaging.

Over Sea, Under Stone tells the story of the three Drew children--Simon, Barney, and Jane--who travel with their parents to Cornwall (located on the coast of England) for an extended holiday in the home of their great-uncle Merry. Merry is an eccentric but respected historian who lives in a many-roomed old mansion, the Grey House, which proves to be a fertile playground for the children. While rummaging about the attic they discover an ancient map which puts them on a quest for none other than the Holy Grail.

Merry explains that he came to Cornwall years ago to hunt for the Grail, which is also being sought after by the forces of the dark. The Drew children soon become involved in this ancient, millenia-old conflict. Says Merry:

"That struggle goes on all round us all the time, like two armies fighting. And sometimes one of them seems to be winning and sometimes the other, but neither has ever triumphed altogether. Nor ever will," he added softly to himself, "for there is something of each in every man."

Cooper is a good writer and she does a wonderful job making Cornwall into a living, breathing place. The Grey House and its concealed doors and dusty, treasure-laden attic is a memorable location, as is the rocky, sea-beaten coastline and its druidic standing stones. It's fun to watch the children puzzle through the map's ancient secrets, with Merry serving as a guide and protector, but always in the background. Because he must serve as a decoy and keep the attention of the dark forces focused on him, the children are thrust into the leading role in the quest to find the Grail.

This arrangment provides Simon, Jane, and Barney with plenty of chances to shine. In a memorable scene Simon and Barney are racing against time and the rising ocean, exploring a dark cave at the foot of Kenmare Head on the coastline which is revealed only during low tide. Like a young knight of the round table--or Arthur himself, perhaps--Barney fights back his fear and squeezes through a dark opening with only a small candle to illuminate the dark. Due to his small stature and uncommon bravery, he becomes "the proper man in the proper place" to find the Grail.

I did have a few relatively minor problems with the book. Great Uncle-Merry as a Merlin-like advisor was pretty apparent early on in the book (the "big reveal" at the end was hardly that), though this is only a minor quibble. More troublesome for me was the portayal of Mr. Hastings, the chief agent of the dark side. Though he was suitably sinister, Hastings was not nearly as frightening as he should have been. Given that Hastings knew the Drew children were on the trail of the Holy Grail--an artifact of such power that it would tip the scales of the milennia-old struggle into favor of the dark, perhaps forever--you'd think he and his minions would stop at nothing to get it. But perhaps because this is a children's novel, Cooper places the Drew children in very little physical danger, save for a few semi-tense moments in the final showdown for the Grail. This makes the forces of darkness and night seem a little more like semi-threatening agents of an overcast afternoon rather than evil incarnate.

Still, Over Sea, Under Stone is a fine, enjoyable, easy read and I'm looking forward to watching the days grow much darker in the books to follow.

Over Sea, Under Stone

"You remember the fairy stories you were told when you were very small--'once upon a time . . .' Why do you think they always began like that?"
"Because they weren't true," Simon said promptly.
Jane said, caught up in the unreality of the high remote place, "Because perhaps they were true once, but nobody could remember them."
Great-Uncle Merry turned his head and smiled at her.

--Susan Cooper, Over Sea, Under Stone

On a whim I removed the first book from Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising Sequence, Over Sea, Under Stone, from my bookshelf and started reading. I literally haven't cracked this book in more than 20 years.

I'm always afraid to re-read books that I enjoyed as a child, fearing that I'll either find them poor in retrospect, or that I'll discover I've simply outgrown them and lost my sense of wonder. But 70-odd pages in I've been pleasantly surprised by Over Sea, Under Stone. I'm sure I'll be posting a full review soon.

The Halloween Tree: Illuminating death's great mystery

What is Halloween? How did it start? Where, why, what for? Witches, cats, mummy dust, haunts… it’s all there in the country from which no one returns. Would you dive into the dark ocean, boys? Would you fly in the dark sky?

—Ray Bradbury, The Halloween Tree

This review may be a little out of season, but it was with relatively recent memories of carving jack-o’lanterns and taking my costumed children out to trick-or-treat that I listened to The Colonial Radio Players dramatized adaptation of The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury. This neat little tale is ostensibly for children and young adults, but it contains an illuminating look into the origins of Halloween as well as an honest exploration of our own cultural view of death, that greatest of all mysteries.

The Halloween Tree opens with eight young boys gathered together on Halloween night to go trick-or-treating. A ninth boy, Pipkin, is notably absent from the group, and when he finally emerges from his house it’s apparent something is terribly wrong: He’s pale, moving gingerly, and clutching at a lancing pain his side. But the call of Halloween is too strong and he joins his friends. Later we learn that Pipkin is suffering from an acute bout of appendicitis.

The boys decide to go trick-or-treating at a haunted house, and there they encounter the ghostly, skeletal, white-haired Mr. Moundshroud. Moundshroud takes the boys to see The Halloween Tree. En route they have to cross a deep ravine, which proves to be a metaphor for the Valley of Death, and Pipkin fails to reach the other side. When the boys call to him, his pumpkin light goes out and he vanishes from sight.

Moundshroud offers to take the boys on a dreamlike trip back through time in order to save Pipkin. Along the way he reveals the origins of Halloween and its association with death. The boys travel back to ancient Egypt and view that culture’s reverence of the dead, including its great pyramid-tombs, mummies, and the worship of the sun god Osiris, murdered each night by his jealous brother only to rise again the next morning. They are whisked away to pre-Christian Europe and encounter the cowled, scythe-wielding Samhain, the druidic god of death from which Halloween derives its origins.

The boys witness the extinction of the druids and their religion at the hands of the murdering Romans, whose polytheistic approach to religion is itself eradicated by the coming of Christ. “Now the Christians come and cut the Romans down—new altars, boys, new incense, new names,” Moundshroud says. Here I’ll mention that The Halloween Tree includes a subversive view of Christianity, as the boys witness the persecution of innocent witches in the dark ages in the name of Christ.

The boys’ journey continues to 16th century Paris and Notre Dame Cathedral and finally to Mexico for the Day of the Dead celebration. Their strange, dreamlike trip not only reveals the origins of Halloween, but also illuminates our own view of death here in the United States—cemeteries are lonely, cold places, and when someone dies we turn our attention to moving on and forgetting, rather than remembering and honoring our deceased loved ones. When contrasted with Bradbury’s bright description of The Day of the Dead, our cultural reaction to death seems stunted and sad in comparison:

By every grave was a woman kneeling to place gardenias, or azaleas, or marigolds, in a frame upon the stone. By every grave knelt a daughter, who was lighting a new candle, or lighting a candle that had just blown out. By every grave was a quiet boy, with bright brown eyes, and in one hand a small papier-mâché funeral parade, glued to a shingle, and in the other hand a papier-mâché skeleton head, which rattled with rice or nuts inside.

Halloween, this odd, out-of-place holiday that has persisted through the ages, and remains with us now as a night to beg for candy in a costume, is revealed as an ancient ritual denoting the end of the harvest season and the onset of cold winter, of night, and of death. Its origins trace back thousands of years and span multiple cultures. “Four thousand years ago, one hundred years ago, this year, one place or time, but the celebration’s all the same—the Feast of Samhain, the Time of the Dead Ones, All Souls, All Saints, the Day of the Dead, El Dia de los Muertos, All Hallows, Halloween,” Bradbury writes.

In the end the boys are presented with a difficult choice to bring Pipkin back from the dead, one that involves a paganistic sacrifice to the dark gods. I won’t spoil the ending. But there’s a great line where one of the boys asks Moundshroud, “Will we ever stop being afraid of the night and death?” Moundshroud (who may be death himself, or the spirit of Halloween) replies reassuringly, “When you reach the stars, boy, yes, and live there forever, all the fears will go, and death himself will die.”

I had a few minor quibbles with the presentation of the story. The Colonial Radio Theatre presentation at times relied too heavily on unnecessary sound effects and crashing music that threatened to overwhelm the story, although the voice of Moundshroud, Jerry Robbins, was excellent, as were the production values. The tale also contained a bit more whimsy (a giant kite that whisks the boys back through time, etc.) than I typically like, but Bradbury is such a gifted, poetic writer that it mostly works.

Death may be our greatest mystery, but Bradbury is not afraid to look into its cold, impenetrable depths in search for meaning. The Halloween Tree illuminates the subject with a ghostly pumpkin candle whose light remained with me long after the tale was over, which is one sure mark of a good book.

Note: This review also appears on SFFaudio.com: http://www.sffaudio.com/?p=3656

Delinquent posting

Sorry for the lack of posts lately. I haven't been slain in a viking raid, butchered by an orc chieftain on the Pelennor Fields, or had my skull split by a sword-wielding Cimmerian for impolite behavior. Rather, I've been busy writing about football (and other things).

Although I work full-time for a publishing company, I also moonlight covering high school football for a local newspaper (I was a sports editor in another life, and played football back in the day). Well, the team for which I'm the beat writer is 10-0 and heading to the playoffs, so I've been churning out a heavier stream of articles than normal. It's also approaching Thanksgiving and for anyone who knows Massachusetts high school football, it's rivalry week. And if you've ever worked as a sports writer for a small local Massachusetts newspaper (I can't imagine that anyone reading this blog has actually done this, but stranger things are possible), that means a separately-printed Football Bonus Supplement.

The regular posts on heavy metal, fantasy, role-playing, and other of my favorite topics will hopefully resume shortly.

Fantasy films update: Conan gets a director; A Song of Ice and Fire pilot gets green-lighted

Following are two news items that should be of interest to any fantasy fan. I'm not sure if these qualify as old news, but they're new to me:

1. Brett Ratner to direct Conan film. Although I will defend the original Conan the Barbarian film to the death (okay, not to the death, but maybe To the Pain), we're long overdue for a Conan film based on the actual character created by Robert E. Howard. This news, if correct, seems to imply that that's (sort of) what we'll be getting:

Ratner jibed to the "Conan" script by Gersh-repped Joshua Oppenheimer and Thomas Dean Donnelly, who looked to Robert E. Howard's original pulp stories of the 1930s to create their take on the character. The writers are doing a quick polish to incorporate some of Ratner's ideas, with an eye toward releasing the film in 2010.

I can't say I've seen Rush Hour 3 or X-Men: The Last Stand, which the story states that Ratner has directed. I get the impression, however, that these are run-of-the-mill action movies, and I hope that's not we get in the new Conan film. It deserves better than to end up as another entry in the recent run of forgettable fantasy films (see Troy, King Arthur). Also, let's hope the writers' "take on the character" does not deviate too much from Howard's source material. Suffice to say that I don't think anyone will be reading Oppenheimer or Donnelly 70 years (and counting) after their deaths.

2. HBO green-lights A Song of Ice and Fire pilot episode. So in case you've been living under a rock, author George R.R. Martin is currently in the midst of penning one of the better epic fantasy series I've ever read, and now it seems that HBO will be testing the viability and popularity of A Song of Ice and Fire on the screen with a pilot episode.

If the pilot gains traction, I think this could be a very good, long-running series. HBO had a smash-hit on its hands with The Sopranos, and what is A Song of Ice and Fire if not a medieval version of modern-day gangsters? Martin's tale is replete with seamy politics, warring families, revenge, and shocking violence. My mind is already turning with the potential casting decisions.

I do hope that HBO realizes that George R.R. Martin may never finish the series (this is no sarcasm on my part--I am not at all convinced that it will happen). So brace yourself for the possibility of a cliffhanger ending that never gets resolved.