This insightful essay comparing Tolkien’s Middle Earth to Beowulf was written by my friend’s seven-year-old daughter. Dad notes, “she came up with the contrasts on her own;” Mom adds, “Using the Seamus Heaney translation.” READ THE REST
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Sounds like a good, geeky Reddit username, tolkientobeowulf.
Reminds me of that famous essay, “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Seven-Year-Old Critics.”
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She used a translation? Hmph. I made my son read it in Middle English when he was only six, and no dinner until his thesis was finished.
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Old English, rather, as it’s an Anglo-Saxon text . . . that I first translated when I was three, haha.
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HAH! My kid read it, translated it into Urdu, then Esperanto, and did a beatbox performance of Esperantowulf while riding an tentacular octocopter he Made with his 3D printer, as the introduction to his 5th birthday party - for which his 2 year old brother prepared an elaborate, enormous and medically accurate unicorn cake…
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My kid has a ukulele. Game, set, match.
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That Tolkien made his own translation of Beowulf will blow that kid’s mind: http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Beowulf Parenting: you’re doing it right…
This is some great reading comprehension from a 7 year old. The contrast between the logic of the argument and the childishness of the printing is astounding. This is a really smart kid.
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Damnation! You have one-upped me sir, and I tip my hat to you.
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