Description: "Dick Ringler's deceptively simple translation captures the rhythm, movement, and power of the original Old English poem while employing a fluid modern English style and a relatively spare vocabulary. A steady succession and alternation of various verse types and sub types together with recurring alliteration patterns give this translation a remarkable momentum, one that makes it ideal for experiencing either silently or aloud." "Typographically, the text is set as a column of "single verses" rather than the "long lines" (pairs of verses separated by a medial caesura) that most readers of Beowulf are accustomed to. This innovation - actually a reversion to an older style of layout - highlights the metrical contours of the verses and facilitates ease of reading; it also makes immediately apparent the interplay among the text's variously indented "normal," "light," and "heavy" verses." "Ringler's generous Introduction, a lively yet masterly guide to the work, along with his translations of three shorter Old English poems ("The Fight at Finnsburg," "The Wanderer" [re-titled "A Meditation"], and "Deor") elucidate a major English text almost as well-known for its subtlety and intricacy as it is for its monsters and heroes."--BOOK JACKET.

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