by Richard Subber | Jul 27, 2023 | Book reviews, Books, History
swords, and dragons, and boasting…
Book review:
Beowulf
Seamus Heaney, trans.
New York, W. W. Norton and Company, 2000
213 pages
A long time ago, a thousand years, give or take, an anonymous Anglo-Saxon poet writing in the Old English language completed a 3,182-line poem we call “Beowulf.”
Just about everyone thinks it’s a classic.
It hasn’t been adapted for TV yet, and there are a number of reasons for that. It’s heroic, but the modern English translation is dramatically flat.
It’s about tough guys with swords, and dragons, and mead halls, and manly boasting, and such.
Beowulf is everything it’s made out to be, and not much more.
I’m happy to assume that it was a more thrilling read and a more entrancing tale in the 9th or 10th century, or whenever it was first written and taken on the road by the storytellers.
Beowulf is a whole lot better than TV.
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Book review. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
Book review:
The American Revolution: A History
The “Founders” were afraid
of “democracy”…
by Gordon S. Wood
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Above all: Poems of dawn and more with 73 free verse poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | Jul 25, 2023 | Human Nature, My poetry, Poetry, Reflections
the waitress knows my name…
The corner booth
Maybe you wonder how I can spend
so much time in this corner booth…
It’s easy, really, I have nowhere else I need to be,
this place is nicer than my place,
and I see people here,
years ago I met my friend here
almost every day,
I miss his cheerful contemplation
of so many things.
I’m alone now,
but not lonely,
I think about the times of my life
and the people I shared it with,
we shared good times in this booth,
and we shared the sadness we couldn’t avoid,
it’s a comfort being here,
the waitress knows my name, of course,
and she knows what I like to eat…
I didn’t think I would become
the old man in the corner booth.
You don’t think you’re going to be like me.
March 26, 2023
Inspired by “Old Man Eating Alone in a Chinese Restaurant”
by Billy Collins, as published in “Poem of the Day,” August 21, 2022,
by Poetry Foundation
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My poetry. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
We Were Soldiers Once…and Young
…too much death (book review)
Lt. Gen. Harold G. Moore (ret.)
and Joseph L. Galloway
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Seeing far: Selected poems with 47 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
Your comments are welcome—tell me what you’re thinking.
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by Richard Subber | Jul 20, 2023 | Joys of reading, Language, Tidbits
the right words
“He is hasped
and hooped
and hirpling with pain…”
Beowulf describing the wounded dragon, Grendel
Beowulf, p. 65
Seamus Heaney, trans.
New York, W. W. Norton and Company, 2000
Beowulf, the Old English epic poem, was written more than a thousand years ago. No one knows who wrote it.
He or she had a way with words.
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Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
Book review: Cleopatra: A Life
…don’t even think
about Gordon Gekko…
by Stacy Schiff
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Writing Rainbows: Poems for Grown-Ups with 59 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | Jul 18, 2023 | Language, My poetry, Poetry
…a reverie of imagination
456
Time becomes energy.
The clean slate waits for the first mark,
she will make that stroke
when she is ready,
she moves beyond not knowing,
as she unwinds the calculus of understanding,
and lightly trembles
with the gentle passion of curiosity.
She learns new tools
and learns that mistakes can be erased
after they have done their work.
Persistence is a new glee,
she turns the cat’s cradle of unknowns
in her reverie of imaginations,
and forgets to look up from her book,
learns to welcome the gestalt
of words on the previous page…
she coolly adds 137 and 319
in her head,
and with her chalk pencil
she writes the secret sum.
November 14, 2020
Inspired by Die Hausaufgabe (The Homework), painted in 1893 by Simon Glücklich (1863-1943)
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My poetry. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
“Fishering,” by Brian Doyle
…what meets the eye…
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In other words: Poems for your eyes and ears with 64 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
Your comments are welcome—tell me what you’re thinking.
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by Richard Subber | Jul 15, 2023 | Human Nature, Theater and play reviews
joie de vivre, the real McCoy…
Movie review:
The African Queen
The African Queen (1951, rated PG, 105 minutes) was an adventure film when adventure had more to do with intrepid characters and the right thing and joie de vivre than with car chases and bullets flying every which way.
Charlie Allnut (Humphrey Bogart won an Oscar for Best Actor) kindly offers to take Rose Sayer (Katharine Hepburn was nominated for Best Actress) on a boat ride—in his broken down scow (The African Queen) on an unforgiving river in German East Africa in 1914.
Rose, the unworldly widow of a missionary, learns to manhandle the tiller, pours all the gin overboard, and generally civilizes Charlie quite enough. That scrufty bon vivant teaches her about pluck, honor, and kicking the old boiler to keep the boat going.
They risk their lives for the war effort by sinking the German warship, and they decide to get married. Ain’t love grand?
Even if you saw the movie long ago, try it again.
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Movie review. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2023 All rights reserved.
Play review: A Doll’s House
Henrik Ibsen’s classic on abuse…
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As with another eye: Poems of exactitude with 55 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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