The Hooverville Hexagon: We Get Needlessly Intellectual on You

 

  

Reflections on the Rimes of Ancient Mariners

 

I was reading Emily Wilson's review of Christopher Nolan's Odyssey movie and being amused at its Olympian-level snottiness when I remembered a conversation I had with my late dad a very long time ago concerning another epic poem.

 

Dad: I don't understand why you have to translate Beowulf. I read that in college.

 

I pause to digest this. My dad, a civil engineer, famously told me about the time he and his friends all turned in a project for astronomy class: a scale drawing of the solar system, duly measured in feet and inches. (Their professor, an erudite European, chortled.) I ponder the likelihood of these fine young engineering students, all war veterans from the Tennessee mountains, intoning hwaet we gardena in deep-fried accents and then I realised…

 

Me: Your version had words like 'forsooth' and 'lo!', didn't it?

Dad: Yep.

Me: Mine sounds like this: [reads part of the intro ending with 'þæt wæs god cyning.']

Dad: I got that last sentence.

Me: I thought you would.

 

Apart from my Appalachian relatives' assertion that my great-grandmother spoke Old English ('what does sugain mean?'), I have often found that epic poetry generally tends to bring out the Fachidiot in people. When it comes to their own folklore, they're often like the lay art appreciator: they don't know anything about it, but they know what they like. Unfortunately, I suspect a lot of medieval and classical linguists have a similar problem when it comes to film art: yes, I'm sure Nolan's film leaves out a lot of detail when it comes to the Odyssey. But the poem is 12,000 lines long and the movie's only three hours. Odysseas would think you got off easy.

 

Personally, I wish more scholars took themselves less seriously these days. I learned to read Beowulf and other trifles from Professor Mary David at the University of Pittsburgh. She was a fine scholar with an equally fine sense of humour. At the time I was studying with her, she was spending her evenings and weekends in her garage office collating and translating a manuscript – I think it was Historia destructionis Troiae – with the help of her mother, a lady of mature years. According to her, late-strolling suburbanites were being shocked, shocked, we tell you, by the mirthful sounds of two women cackling in their garage.

 

The cause? Trying to find yet another synonym in the 500-line description of Helen of Troy's left breast.

 

Enjoy the movie.

 

 

Wildlife Caption Challenge

 

SashaQ sent in this amazing duck photo.

Write a caption, you clever people.

 

 

Cartoonish Thoughts

 

(Netflix can be very illuminating.)

It's a Sign

 

 

Caiman Raptor Elk again. He's wondering if he should call an exorcist for this SatAnic satellite dish.

I'm worried that the Radiobauer is planting electronics.

 

Video of the Day

 

Feed Me First: Blackheaded Gull Chicks

By SashaQ

This is some first-rate wildlife footage. Good for saying 'aww…' and laughing at the same time. Or writing your own voice-overs. If you come up with one, let us know.

 

for ur sooþ, Dmitri Gheorgheni, Editor