Teaser Tuesday and First Paragraphs

I haven't joined in with any memes in ages, real life was calling, but I'm back, hopefully with a vengeance. Teaser Tuesday is hosted by MizB over at Should Be Reading. I just posted a review for Oedipus Rex (I'd love for you to check it out) so I decided to tease you with two lines from the play.

'Chorus:One thing is clearyears back the Sphinx tested himhis answer was truehe was wise and sweet to the ctyso he can never e evilnot to me.'

Oh, the tragedy, the pain, the beauty of this play! Ready for the next one?

'Jocaste:Why should we fear, when chance rules everything,and foresight of the future there is none;'this best to live at random, as one can.'

Who had expected wisdom to come from the woman who married her own son?


And I also decided to join in with a new meme, First Chapter, First Paragraph, Tuesday Intros is hosted by Bibliophile by the Sea. I am now reading 'The Dream of the Rood', an Old English poem. Don't worry, I will not harass you with the actual OE, but here's the first paragraph in Modern Day English.

'Listen, and I will tell you the very best of dream which came to me in the middle of the night, while the tongues of men remained at rest. It seemed to me that I saw an extraordinary tree, brightest of all beams, towering up into the air and wound about with light. That beacon was all covered with gold and lovely gems: some stood at its base, fair on the surface of the earth, and five more gleamed above up on the crossbeam. Hosts of angels, eternally fair, kept watch over it. This was no gallows for a common criminal. Holy spirits watched it, men all over the earth and all this glorious creation.'

I really like this poem. In the dream, the narrator is told by the Cross about Christ's death. Christ is much more an Anglo-Saxon warrior type of man rather than a helpless sufferer and I really like that interpretation. They were ingenious, back in the day.



So, what are you teasing with this week?