Tribute to Seamus Heaney

Today the great Irish poet and Anglo-Saxon scholar Seamus Heaney passed away. My first experience with Heaney was as an undergraduate in Survey of British Literature (or Brit Lit, as we called it). An early translation of Beowulf by Heaney was included in the Norton Anthology (the year was 1977). By the time I taught Beowulf for the first time, Heaney had completed his definitive translation, published a parallel text version, and had made an audio recording of the poem, highlighting his beautiful, rich Irish voice.  Heaney truly captured Beowulf's elegiac tone, both in his translation and his reading, in contrast to Benjamin Bagby, who performs Beowulf at colleges, museums, and in castles across Europe and America. Bagby screams "Hwaet!" as he runs through the audience and begins a lively, intense and sometimes joyful performance of the poem, complete with Celtic harp (He portrays a drunken Unferth, in a way that is totally charming).  Bagby translates "hwaet" as "Listen to me", whereas Heaney translates it as merely "so".
But Heaney was not a mere translator of Old English poetry: he was a poet in his own right, winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1995. He was a teacher and was on the faculty of both Oxford and Harvard, although Ireland was his permanent home. One of Heaney's favorite poets was Robert Frost, and he was featured in "Robert Frost, Voices and Visions", a documentary film. Heaney used to guest lecture at Middlebury College's Bread Loaf summer program for English teachers and writers who are working on their graduate degrees-- a program started by Robert Frost and some of his friends. Heaney appreciated 'the sound of sense', which was Frost's operating principle of poetry writing.  In 2011 Heaney had a stroke, and his health declined until his passing this morning.. His poem "Miracle" is based on the biblical story of  a paralytic whose friends take him to see Jesus to be prayed for to be healed. As they approach the house, the crowd is so big they cannot get even close to Jesus. Undeterred, the friends carry the paralytic to the roof and lower him down to Jesus, who heals the man and praises the friends for their faith. Heaney wrote this as a paralyzed man. Here it is for you:

Not the one who takes up his bed and walks
But the ones who have known him all along
And carry him in -

Their shoulders numb, the ache and stoop deeplocked
In their backs, the stretcher handles
Slippery with sweat. And no let up

Until he’s strapped on tight, made tiltable
and raised to the tiled roof, then lowered for healing.
Be mindful of them as they stand and wait

For the burn of the paid out ropes to cool,
Their slight lightheadedness and incredulity
To pass, those who had known him all along.

I see Beowulf as a stepping stone towards Chaucer in the history of British literature and feel it an honor to pay tribute to one of the greatest literary scholars of our day.

My Little Video

This is a video I made a few years ago for my high school students. I don't think the pronunciation is perfect, but it is close.

Did Chaucer Anticipate Luther?

Hwaet! I would like to pose an outrageous question that focuses on the clergy in The Canterbury Tales. With his sateric characterization of the prioress, the monk, the friar and the pardoner, did Chaucer anticipate the Reformation? The prioress is anything but a sister of charity. She is quite worldly, actually. She has impeccable manners, cares more for puppies than for the poor, and she has some great jewelry! The monk would rather be out riding his horse than be in his cell praying. The friar loves the women of the town and loves to trade cash for penance. The pardoner is the worst of all, selling indulgences- false trinkets-- as if they were sacred treasures belonging to St. Peter or even Jesus himself. In contrast stands the poor parson-- a model of what clegy should be. This contrast hints that Chaucer does not condem all clergy. It was for such sacrilegious crimes as the selling of penance and indulgences that Martin Luther nailed the 95 theses on Wittenberg's door in 1519, 120 years after Chaucer's death. It seems as though Chaucer and Luther had similar concerns. Did Chaucer anticipate the Reformation?