Answer:
Step-by-step explanation:
Seamus Heaney is unusual among translators of Beowulf in that he was himself a poet. This shows in his translation. The language he chooses in rendering Beowulf into modern English is stark, rhythmic, and often surprising. It is not the most accurate of translations, but it is arguably the most beautiful. It also accomplished the remarkable feat of landing a medieval epic, a text over a thousand years old, on the New York Times bestseller list.
That Beowulf survives at all is remarkable: only a single manuscript of this anonymously authored poem exists. The richness of its language and the detail it contains about political, religious, and social customs of the early Middle Ages have made it beloved of scholars. It's also a standard among literature courses throughout the English-speaking world. Unfortunately, this has given it an unfair reputation as somehow inaccessible or arcane. However, although it describes a vanished culture, its language is as vivid as the drama it describes.
In translating Beowulf, Seamus Heaney strikes a balance between creativity and emulation. He often copies the direct speech patterns of the Old English, especially when modern versions of the original words survive. In the poem's introduction, for instance, 'þaet waes g?d cyning!' becomes 'That was one good king' (line 11).
The use of alliteration, or presence of the same consonants, found in Old English is frequently preserved, as when Grendel, the monster, is described as 'blundering back with the butchered corpses' from an assault on King Hrothgar's mead-hall (line 125). In other places, Heaney plays with language in ways distinctive to modern English, as a homage to the similar creativity of the original. In describing the shock of the Danes after Grendel's first raid, for instance, Heaney writes:
'Their wassail was over, they wept to heaven
And mourned under morning' (lines 128-29).