The Seafarer (Masterplots II: Poetry, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- First Published: 1957
- Type of Work: Meditation
- Genres: Poetry, Meditation
- Subjects: Christianity, Sailing or sailors, Sea or seafaring life, Middle Ages, Boats or boating, Anglo-Saxons
The Poem
The unique copy of “The Seafarer” is found in the Exeter Book, a manuscript anthology of Old English poetry assembled about 975 c.e., although many of the poems, including “The Seafarer,” may have circulated in oral versions before being written down in the form in which they now exist. The poem’s Christian message would seem to rule out any date earlier than the seventh century, when the Anglo-Saxons were converted; at the other extreme, it may have been composed, at least in the form in which it survives, around the time that the scribe copied it into the...
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