Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary is a prose translation of the early medieval epic poem "Beowulf" from Old English to modern English language. Translated by J. R. R. Tolkien from 1920 to 1926, it was edited by Tolkien's son Christopher and published posthumously in May 2014 by HarperCollins. In the poem, Beowulf, a hero of the Geats in Scandinavia, comes to the aid of Hroðgar, the king of the Danes, whose mead hall Heorot has been under attack by a monster known as Grendel. After Beowulf slays him, Grendel's mother attacks the hall and is
The dragon (Beowulf) Germanic literature and the literature of Christian hagiography featured dragons and dragon fights. Although the dragons of hagiography were less fierce than the dragon in "Beowulf", similarities exist in the stories such as presenting the journey to the dragon's lair, cowering spectators, and the sending of messages relaying the outcome of the fight. The dragon with his hoard is a common motif in early Germanic literature with the story existing to varying extents in the Norse sagas, but it is most notable in the "Völsunga saga" and in "Beowulf". "Beowulf" preserves existing medieval dragon-lore, most notably in the extended digression