6 Scandinavian Translations of Beowulf

The Beowulf diaspora in Scandinavia does not end with the many and continuing scholarly investigations of the poem that started in the early nineteenth century. That diaspora is limited in scope, because the audience for those scholarly investigations is itself mainly scholarly. With the publication of the first Danish translation of the poem in 1820, however, and then the Swedish in 1899, Norwegian in 1921, Icelandic in 1983, and Finnish in 1999 (partial translation in 1927), the poem became accessible for the first time to the general public in the North and, with that, to poets, illustrators, city planners, artists, and other creative individuals working in all media. For example, in 1899, Valdemar Rørdan (1872–1946), the Danish nationalist poet, novelist, playwright, and Nazi sympathizer, published his epic poem Bjovulv: Et digt, which “doesn’t have much to do with the OE [Old English] poem”;1 Möller-Christensen, “Valdemar Rørdan.” “ikke har meget at gøre med det oldengelske kvad.” Haarder, Sangen om Bjovulf, p. 15. in 1954, the Swedish artist Per Engström (1895–1992) contributed his distinctive linoleum cuts to Björn Collinder’s Swedish translation of the poem; in 1956, the map of Djursholm outside Stockholm included “Grendel” as one of its street names;2 Mjöberg, Drömmen om sagatiden, vol. 2, pp. 9–10. in the 1980s, the Gotlandic/Swedish artist Erik Olsson (1919–2006) depicted Beowulf’s sea voyage from southern Gotland to Stevns Klint in Denmark in an oil painting housed in Gotlands Museum, Visby;3 Sanda 82, “Beowulf.” and in 1983, Alfreð Flóki (1938–87), a controversial and provocative Icelandic artist and illustrator, added his stunning drawings to the only Icelandic translation of Beowulf ever produced. He was influenced by the Expressionists Paul Klee, Wilheim Heinrich Otto Dix, and Helmut Görsz, and was drawn to the irrational.4 Ingólfsson, Furðuverörld Alfreðs Flóka, p. 6. For him, “man is born corrupt, without hope of redemption, and should simply accept his wickedness with a modicum of dignity. That way, life will not disappoint.”5 Ibid., p. 7.