Monthly Archives: September 2011

Word Cloud of Whitman’s “Song of Myself,” section 1

Using “Wordle” [available at wordle.net] and pasting in the online text of section 1 of “Song of Myself” (given at the end of this post), here is the “word cloud” that was generated: (Click on the image if you’d like … Continue reading

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Could Beowulf Have Been a Source for the Star Wars Lightsaber?

I’ve been reading my colleague Craig Williamson’s splendid new translation of Beowulf, the first time I’ve re-read this poem since college.  Coming across Craig’s fun discussion of compound words and “kennings” in Anglo-Saxon poetry (pp. 8-9; kennings are 2-word metaphorical … Continue reading

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