[Aiwendil]

After savoring the book over several weeks, I've finally finished it.

I thought the translation was excellent. Despite being a prose translation, it preserves much of the rhythm of the Old English verse. And while the sentence structures are idiomatic modern English, the style is dominated by the retention of poetic inversions. The diction is especially good and suitable for the matter being translated; it is 'elevated', as seems only fitting in the translation of a poem that was, after all, written in an elevated and archaic style in its time. He also avoids the primitivist tendencies of some translators, who tend to use things like 'chieftain' and 'tribe' where Tolkien uses 'prince' and 'people'.

Comparison with Heaney's well-known translation is inevitable, and the difference of approach may be seen examples such as:

Original: Þæt wæs god cyning
Heaney: That was one good king.
Tolkien: a good king was he.

Original: ecg-hete
Heaney: killer instinct
Tolkien: murderous hate

Original: Ða se ellen-gǽst earfoðlice / þrage geþolode, se þe in þystrum bad
Heaney: Then a powerful demon, a prowler through the dark / nursed a hard grievance
Tolkien: Then the fierce spirit that abode in darkness grievously endured a time of torment

Even though Heaney's is a verse translation, it is Tolkien's that, to me at least, comes nearer the feeling of the original. (I'm picking on Heaney, though I do actually like his translation in itself).

The commentary is the most substantial part of the book, and it is very interesting. Tolkien doesn’t hesitate to enter into detailed considerations of the relations among the various nations as imagined in the poem, the ways in which originally historical material was blended with folk-tale, the likely meaning of enigmatic passages, or even the chronology and relative ages of the characters. And it is, throughout, supported by a close reading of the Old English text. It is useful to read the commentary in conjunction with Tolkien’s ‘Finn and Hengest’, which enters into related questions.

‘Sellic Spell’ is Tolkien’s imaginary version of the original folk-tale that, in his view, must have lain behind ‘Beowulf’, presented along with an unfinished Old English version. Written in a deliberately simple and straightforward style, it tells the story of Beewolf and his battles with the monster Grinder and Grinder’s mother (the later battle with the dragon is not included). While I enjoyed it, I must say I don’t think its literary value is all that great. What is interesting, though, is the insight it gives into Tolkien’s view of the origins of the story.

Finally, there are two versions of the short ‘Lay of Beowulf’, another retelling (in verse this time) of the Danish portion of the Beowulf legend. I enjoyed this poem quite a bit. One bit I found particularly interesting and effective is the way Tolkien here links the ultimate destruction of Heorot with a curse placed on it by Grendel or Grendel’s mother. And Tolkien fans (I think there are a few of those around here...) will take note of the line ‘Far over the misty moorlands cold’, particularly since the poem seems either to predate or to be roughly contemporary with the writing of The Hobbit.