Given his passionate love for all things Anglo-Saxon, it's hardly surprising that the famed writer/philologist J.R.R. Tolkien did his own translation of the Old English epic, "Beowulf." 
 And since Christopher Tolkien is apparently determined to release every scrap of paper his father ever doodled on, the public is finally getting to see Tolkien's "Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary," along with an original piece based on Beowulf known as "A Sellic Spell." The translation is pretty good (if slightly clunky at times), but the real magic exists in Tolkien's own verse, which glimmers with the starlit beauty that he was so well-known for. 
 A creature named Grendel is attacking the beautiful mead-hall of Heorot, sneaking in at night to carry off and/or kill innocent people. King Hrothgar is powerless to stop the monster. But then Beowulf, an already-legendary hero from Geatland, arrives at Heorot specifically to kill Grendel -- and using only his superhuman strength, he is able to arm-wrestle Grendel to death. Not joking. 
 But that isn't the end of his troubles. Grendel's equally grotesque mother is enraged by her child's death, and attacks Heorot to lure Beowulf out. This time, he'll be fighting on HER turf, a toxic swamp where only he can go, and the legendary hero must marshal all his strength to stop the monster once and for all. And as the years go by, he's faced with a terrible new enemy, one that threatens his homeland and everyone in it. 
 Tolkien's translation of "Beowulf" is probably one of the more accurate, loving ones that is easily available, since the man had encyclopedic knowledge of Old English and its literature. And he clearly made an effort to maintain the meaning of everything he translated, giving it the rough, earthy flavour of Old English literature -- as lovely as some passages are, it's a story awash in blood, mead and noble warriors threatened by "billows of destroying fire." 
 The translation can be clunky at times, with a few lines feeling like they were translated by Yoda ("Thereafter was fortune in war vouchsafed to Hrothgar"). This is not a work to be read casually. Instead, it seems to be Tolkien's attempt to stick as closely to the original text as possible, complete with kennings ("warriorking," "ring-mail," "hearth-comrades") and a tendency to splinter sentences into a string of connected phrases. He did abandon the caesura (which split every line rhythmically), instead making long, songlike stanzas that flow like streamwater. 
 The biggest problem is perhaps that this is a translation, and as such does not allow Tolkien's writing skills to fully emerge. A few moments suit his rich leaves-and-starlight style of writing ("He set the radiance of the sun and moon as a light for the dwellers in the lands, and adorned the regions of the world with boughs and with leaves..."), but not as often as I could have wished. 
 That is saved instead for "A Sellic Spell," which was Tolkien's attempt to recreate what he imagined the original story may have been like, based on his knowledge of Anglo-Saxon language and culture. Here, Tolkien's imagination and linguistic skill are freer and smoother -- he presents "Beewolf's" story like a mythic fairy tale, with moments of luminous beauty ("they saw the King's house standing in a green dale; and all the valley was lit with the light of the golden roof") mingled with gory violence (" the hide split, and the bones burst, and her head rolled off down the passage into the water below, dripping with blood"). 
 By Tolkien's own admission, "Sellic Spell" does not exactly mirror the plot of the actual literary "Beowulf." Instead, like so many of his works, it seems to be an intersection between literature, fantasy and myth -- he speculates on the original names of various characters ("Unfriend," "Grinder," "Beewolf"), while also streamlining out some of the filler and adding a more magical, almost ethereal quality to the prose. 
 And finally, Tolkien attempted to rework the story into "The Lay of Beowulf," which is more of a medieval-style ballad than an epic poem. Anyone who has read Tolkien's poetry will recognize his lovely style here, with many references to the moon, the sea, flames, jewels, swords and gold. It echoes of the songs and poems that he wove into "Lord of the Rings" (" Far over the misty moorlands cold/where the wild wolf howled upon the wold,/past dragon's lair and nicor's hold/and far from the lights of Heorot"). 
 "Beowulf: A Translation and Commentary" is not the easiest translation of this classic work for casual readers, but it may be one of the most loving -- especially with the original retellings that Tolkien himself created, both in song and in prose. A long-lost treasure, at last revealed.