PRE2 Reading and Spiritual Comprehension

The Exeter Book (Context)

- Contains the vast majority of surviving Old English Poetry

- Composed 960-80 AD

- Almost 100 riddles and several saints' lives and a body of elegiac verse

Stasis of outside world vs heat/movement of soul in 'The Seafarer': 'wæron mine fet...

forste gebunden' (my feet were bound with frost) vs 'hat ymb heortan (hot about the heart)'

Elegiac heteroglossia with birds in 'The Seafarer': Hwilum ylfete song...

dyde ic me to gomene (Sometimes I took the song of the wild swan as my comfort)

Reference to whale in 'The Seafarer' indicating how if you stop moving, you are vulnerable to being led into temptation (mouth of whale linked to mouth of hell, hwael can also mean slaughter): hwete∂ on...

hwælweg hre∂er unwearnum' (incites on the whale's road heart irresistibly)

Blending of Christian and Germanic ideas on how to be immortal in 'The Seafarer': ond his lof si∂∂an...

lifge mid englum' (and his good reputation live among the angels)

Riddles linked to Christian teaching methods

- Lying within safe parameters

- Form of teaching

- Link to pedagogy: tutor leading student down wrong path and then revealing the mistake, corrective way of teaching

- No 'unfeigned' answers, meaning is often doubled and left open to interpretation as solutions are absent

Riddle 85 has physical and metaphysical meaning as one cannot live without the other: 'gif wit unc gedælað...

me bið deað witod' ('if we two are divided, death is certain for me')

- Fish will die if leaves river, but body will die if soul leaves

Phallic imagery in Riddle 44, exposing immoral reading practices, need to search for 'correct' and re-creative answer

'stiþ ond heard' (stiff and hard) and 'bi weres þeo' (by a man's thigh)

Phallic imagery in Riddle 44 that can be solved as key and lock, reproductive rather than destructive process, suggests earthly sinfulness but opens up meaning: 'wile þæt cuþe hol mid his hangellan...

haefde gretan þæt he efenlang ær oft gefylde (he wants to greet with his dangling head that well-known hole, of equal length, which he has often filled before)

Phallic imagery in Riddle 25 exposing immoral reading practises, need to search for correct and 'nutritious' answer (onions believed to be good for fertility), jouissance of reading pleasure

- 'wifum on hyhte' (a joy to women) - sexual and domestic joy

- 'stonde ic on bedde' (I stand in a bed) - phallic but also leek/onion standing in bed of compost

- 'Wæt bið þæt eage' (wet will be that eye) - tears caused by onion but also semen

Riddle 47 communicating danger of surface level reading but also fragility of human life/reputation

- Deceptively simple and seems to reveal self in opening line: 'Moððe word fræt' (a moth ate words')

- Swallowed but not shared, not reproductive but destructive: 'Forswealg... þrymfæstne cwide/ond þæs strangan staþol' (swallowed... a glory-fast speech and its strong foundation)

- Student is a 'Stælgiest' (stealing guest)

- Parody of rumination (turning over, chewing but destroyed and not thought of again, riddle enacts this - straightforward so no careful chewing and digestion is needed)

Marie Nelson on 'The Paradox of Silent Speech in the Exeter Book Riddles' (1978) which can also be linked to 'The Dream of the Rood': 'An inanimate being speaks, and the speech is, in effect at least...

silent for everyone but the intended receiver'

Alliteraton in Riddle 13 between the immaterial spirit and transient flesh: 'hæfdon feorg cwico...

fell hongedon (had living spirits, their skins hung)'

Rachel Burns in 'Solomon and Saturn': 'The act of responding to a riddle exposes something about the...

inner life of the respondent'

Niles in 'God's Exiles': 'with their quasi-enyclopaedic scope and their engagement with the particulars of the...

material world, riddle collections had the potential to illuminate aspects of the Christian view of the universe'

How does the macro structure of Aldhlem's riddle collection encapsulate Christian life?

Begins with 'earth' and ends with 'creation'

From Old English Boethius, ed. Godden and Irvine (2009): Idea that the' selestan men... Swa [hi] hiora lufe near Gode lætað and ...

(best men)' place affection 'near Gode (close to God)' and 'swiðor þas eorðlicon þing forsioð (despise more those Earthly things)'

From Old English Boethius, 'Consolidation of Philosophy' (524) contrasting instability of physical dwelling with stability of mental dwelling: 'Ne mæg hæleþa gehwæm...

hus on munte lange gelæstan (Nor can the house of man last long on the mountainside)' vs true happiness of 'his modes hus (mind house)'

Marino in 'The Literariness of the "Exeter Book" Riddles' (1978): 'Old English riddle poetry was...

built on deceits'

Boethius from 'The Consolidation of Philosophy' (translated from Latin under Alfred the Great's reign) on the virtue of wisdom: 'Swa wisdom is se...

hehsta craft (So wisdom is the highest virtue)

Summary of Germanic Warrior Culture from Mitchell and Robinson (can compare and contrast with Christian teachings)

- Warrior was a member of a warrior-band

- Life was a struggle against insuperable odds, against the inevitable doom decreed by a meaningless fate

- Immortality is gained by fame and admiration among living men

- Warrior owes loyalty to Lord but Lord has to be generous

- Women placed in difficult position regarding loyalty when used as 'peace weavers' during family feuds (must be loyal to both husband and father)

- Emphasis upon heroic love between men (rather than romantic love between men and women)

- Focus on the transitoriness of life (but this is not specific to Germanic culture - can be seen across many belief systems)

'The Seafarer' on how earthly fame is futile as it will not help one reach heaven: 'ne mæg ∂ære sawle ∂e bi∂...

synna ful (gold cannot be a help to the soul that is full of sins)'

Link between images of transitoriness in 'The Wanderer', 'The Seafarer' and 'The Whale'

- Sea (instability of things within it)

- Seabirds (confuse Wanderer and swim away)

- Whale (sweet breath in Seafarer ('sweta stenc') but leads to sin, and also a 'false' land)

How can I link 'The Whale' image to other poems in the Exeter Book?

Concept of 'false' land links to crumbling buildings in 'The ruin' and also the crumbling manuscript which links to Riddle 47 (book worm)