The great hero Beowulf, wrestling with the monster Grendel, split the sinews of his foe and snapped his arm off at the shoulder. Going up against the monster's mother, he slammed her to the earth, ...

I'm a big fan of Beowulf: no, not the new movie, the Anglo-Saxon epic poem. I've read it several times in the original and in modern English translations, most recently in the bilingual edition with ...