Research Catalog

Title

Beasts of time : apocalyptic Beowulf / Edward L. Risden.

Author

Risden, Edward L., 1957-

Publication

New York : P. Lang, 1994.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

165 pages; 24 cm.

Summary

• Over time the reputation of Beowulf as a poem continues to rise. Extant in only one manuscript, yet perhaps the most studied of English poems, it represents a remarkable text and artifact: the first European vernacular epic. And like much of the work of its age, Beowulf exhibits a strong native strain of apocalypticism, a pervasive awareness of the imminence of end-times.
• The chief source of its apocalyptic power, the poem's beasts, haunts the reader; one cannot depart the poem without a sense that the monsters and heroes continue their battle into the present and beyond.

Series Statement

Studies in the humanities ; vol. 8

Uniform Title

Studies in the humanities (New York, N.Y.) ; v. 8.

Subjects

• Literature and society > England > History
• Bible > In literature
• Epic poetry, English (Old) > History and criticism
• Christian poetry, English (Old) > History and criticism
• Apocalyptic literature > History and criticism
• Death in literature
• Cosmology, Medieval, in literature
• Paganism in literature
• End of the world in literature
• Beowulf

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. [143]-158) and index.

Contents

Ch. 1. Apocalyptic Backgrounds. I. Apocalypticism and the Anglo-Saxon Age. II. Apocalypse as a Literary Construct. III. Apocalypticism in Old English Literature. IV. Beowulf and the Christian/pagan Christian -- Ch. 2. Beowulf, Revelation, and Ragnarok: Monsters, Signs of Doom, and Apocalyptic Narrative -- Ch. 3. Beowulf's Tripartite Apocalypticism. I. Societal Apocalypse. II. Personal Apocalypse. III. Cosmological Apocalypse -- Toward a Conclusion: Beowulf, Date, Theme, and Close Reading.

ISBN

0820423343

LCCN

93037320

OCLC

• 29030433
• ocm29030433

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries