Table of Contents

List of plates and maps. Preface to the second edition. Acknowledgements. Publisher's Acknowledgements. 1. Why read Old English Literature? An introduction to this book. Richard North, David Crystal and Joe Allard. Names to Look Out For. Joe Allard and Richard North. 2. Is it relevant? Old English influence on The Lord of the Rings. Clive Tolley. 3. Is violence what Old English literature is about? Beowulf and other battlers: an introduction to Beowulf. Andy Orchard. 4. Is there more like Beowulf? Old English minor heroic poems. Richard North. 5. What else is there?. Joyous Play and Bitter Tears: the Riddles and the Elegies. Jennifer Neville. 6. How Christian is OE literature? The Dream of the Rood and Anglo-Saxon Northumbria. Éamonn O Carragáin and Richard North. 7. How did OE literature start? Cædmon the cowherd and Old English biblical verse. Bryan Weston Wyly. 8. Were all the poets monks? Monasteries and courts: Alcuin and Offa. Andy Orchard. 9. What was it like to be in the Anglo-Saxon or Viking World? Material culture: archaeology and text. Michael Bintley. 10. Did the Anglo-Saxons write fiction? Old English prose: King Alfred and his books. Susan Irvine. 11. How difficult is the Old English language? The Old English language. Peter S. Baker. 12. When were the Vikings in England? Viking wars and The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Jayne Carroll. Notes on the Old Norse language. Richard North. 13. What gods did the Vikings worship? Viking religion: Old Norse mythology. Terry Gunnell. 14. Just who were the Vikings anyway? Sagas of Icelanders. Joe Allard. 15. Were there stories in late OE literature? Prose writers of the English Benedictine Reform. Stewart Brookes. 16. What happened when the Normans arrived?. Anglo-Norman literature: the road to Middle English. Patricia Gillies. Epilogue. The end of Old English? David Crystal. The editors and the contributors. Index

Promotional Information

Beowulf & Other Stories was first conceived in the belief that the study of Old English – and its close cousins, Old Icelandic and Anglo-Norman – can be a genuine delight, covering a period as replete with wonder, creativity and magic as any other in literature.

About the Author

Joe Allard teaches at the University of Essex. He translates and publishes contemporary Icelandic poetry and fiction, and has written extensively on medieval Icelnadic prose and poetry. Richard North teaches Old and Middle English at University College London, and is author of Heathen Gods in Old English Literature (1997) and The Origins of Beaowulf (2006).