Book is 236 pp.; b/w illus. The chapters are by various authors. The book is illustrated by Alan Howard, but there are no illustrations in the Beowulf chapter. Section titles: "Norse Myths: The Gods in Their Glory," "Germanic Heroic Legends," "Icelandic Sagas," and "Norse Myths: The Twilight of the Gods." The chapter "Beowulf Fights the Dragon" (in "Germanic Heroic Legends") reproduces the concluding portion of Crossley-Holland's 1968 full translation of Beowulf (not his 1982 children's version).

After a short prose summary of the poem's preceding action, the excerpt begins:

Then the bold warrior, stern-faced beneath his helmet,
stood up with his shield; sure of his own strength,
he walked in his corslet towards the cliff;
the way of the coward is not thus!
Then that man endowed with noble qualities,
he who had braved countless battles, weatherd
the thunder when warrior troops clashed together,
saw a stone arch set in the cliff
through which a stream spurted; steam rose
from the boiling water; he could not stay long
in the hollow near the hoard for fear
of being scorched by the dragon's flames. (98)

And ends:

The twelve brave warriors, sons of heroes,
rode round the barrow, sorrowing;
they mourned their king, chanted
an elegy, spoke about that great man:
they exalted his heroic life, lauded
his daring deeds; it is fitting for a man,
when his lord and friend must leave this life,
to mouth words in his praise
and to cherish his memory.
Thus the Geats, his hearth-companions,
grieved over the death of their lord;
they said that of all kings on earth
he was the kindest, the most gentle,
the most just to his people, the most eager for fame. (107)

Not in MO2.

BAM.