“Internationally recognized as the greatest Irish poet since
WB Yeats…*”, and a winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, the first poetry
of Heaney’s which I read was his masterful translation of
Beowulf. Though at that time I’d only heard of the poem, I had been
searching for it in the local bookshops for some months before finding the slim
volume hidden among other volumes on the “Poetry and Literature” shelf. When at
last I got my hands on it, I had no idea of the impact it would have on my
life.
As someone
mostly ignorant of Anglo-Saxon poetry (and the richness of the language and
culture) at that time, the poem opened up a whole new world. It was a world
veiled by time, culture and many of the prejudices held about the Dark and
Middle Ages. But it is a world steeped in legends and myths; the heroes great
but fallible, the warriors and lords capable of great destruction, and yet
lament at the death of friends. One of my favourite passages in the poem – and
one which still move me to tears, is when
Hrothgar laments his counselor Aeschere’s death:
Then Hrothgar, the Shieldings’
helmet, spoke:
‘Rest? What is rest? Sorrow has
returned.
Alas for the Danes! Aeschere is
dead.
He was Yrmenlaf’s elder brother
and a soul-mate to me, a true
mentor,
my right-hand man when the ranks
clashed
and our boar-crests had to take a
battering
in the line of action. Aeschere was
everything
the world admires in a wise man and
a friend.
There are also videos of Heaney reading from his own
translation:
Seamus Heaney - Beowulf (1/7) by poetictouch
Yes, Heaney left a body of work worthy of remembrance and
celebration. His name will be remembered and his works will endure. Yet, my
sorrow at the news of his passing was the sorrow of someone who was deeply
touched by a work over a thousand years old; a body literature suddenly made
accessible. It was the sorrow of someone who could never say “Thank you, you
have touched my life and led me on a path I could never have foreseen”.
In his foreword to
TheWord Exchange, Heaney noted “… Anglo-Saxon poetry isn’t all stoicism and
melancholy, isn’t all about battle and exile and a gray dawn breaking: it can
be unexpectedly rapturous as in
The
Vision of the Cross and happily didactic as in the allegory of
Whale. It can be intimate and domestic,
and take us to places far behind the shield wall…” (
Delanty & Matto 2011:XII).
A tree must shed its leaves, its branches be barren;
the traveler must embark on the start of travels;
all the mortals must meet their fate
But, Mr. Heaney, may your words live forever,
bringing new inspiration to those who already know your work and those who pick
up one of your volumes for the first time. Thank you for touching my life.
Sources:
