Hello. From January next year, Irina Dmitrescu and Mary Wellesley will be starting a new 12-part series of LRB

Close Readings podcasts, exploring the strange and wonderful literary landscape of the Middle Ages.

With a new episode appearing each month, medieval beginnings will consider some well-known works,

such as Bear Wolf and Segwayne and the Green Knight, as well as many lesser-known texts from across the European continent, that have all helped

to lay the foundations of English literature. If you subscribe to the full programme, as well as the

podcast episode, you'll get copies of all the key texts accompanying the series, and access to online

seminars with Mary and Arena and special guests including Simon Armitage.

You can find out more and subscribe at the link below or in the shop section of the LRB website.

Or go to lrb.me forward slash beginnings where you'll also find details of audio-only options.

In the meantime, here's a sample from their first episode on Beowulf.

Okay, Irina, how do we begin? I mean, perhaps the first question should be, what kind of a poem is Bearwolf?

I think most people think of Beowulf as a monster story. That's how it's usually depicted in movies.

That's the most obviously cinematic quality. You as a monster story. That's how it's usually depicted in movies. That's the most

obviously cinematic quality. You have a great hero, stronger and burlier than all the other men in his time.

He successfully rids a hall of two terrifying semi-human monsters, Grendel and Grendel's mother, both of whom have a propensity

for eating people. And then at the end of his life, after a long reign as king of his geotish folk,

he winds up fighting the dragon who is setting fire to all the settlements and dying in that

fight. So that's the general idea most people have of

Beowulf and it's fair because it is structured around these three monster fights. But at the same time,

Baywolf is a story about people and it's a story about people who make war and the way that war is

endless. And in the way that it's remained to us,

it's also a story about the things we don't know.

...