The Wanderer
Wanderer, The,an Old English poem of 115 lines in the Exeter Book , one of the group known as ‘elegies’, telling of the hardships of a man who has lost his lord. It is a plangent lament for the transience of life, culminating towards its end in a powerful Ubi sunt passage. It begins and ends with a brief and bald statement of Christian consolation, but that is not the prevailing sentiment of the poem. It is paralleled in spirit and structure by the Seafarer , particularly in the latter's first half, and similar arguments have been advanced for and against the coherence of organization in both poems. The poem was admired by Auden , among other modern poets, and he translated it loosely. Ed. R. F. Leslie ( 1966 ), A. J. Bliss and T. P. Dunning ( 1969 ).
[The entire page is 141 words long]
Join eNotes
Over 3,500 study guides, question and answer forums, literature criticism, reference content, and much more!
Oxford University Press Titles
