Welcome to SPACE, our adult continuing education program which offers interactive monthly courses for personal enrichment! Learn more here.
Mixed Lecture/Discussion
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Medium intensity
This class needs more votes by September 1 to get confirmed.
This module is a standing candidate which means it will be ready to launch as soon as it gets enough interest. Token holders can set aside a Token to reserve their seat for this candidate and help it get confirmed.
This course offers a deep analysis of Tolkien’s seminal essay “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics,” which truly changed the course of scholarship on the most important text in Tolkien’s Cauldron of Story. The essay began as Tolkien’s 1936 Sir Israel Gollancz Memorial Lecture to the British Academy and was published that year. Thanks to “Beowulf and the Critics” (2002) published by Michael D.C. Drout we have a wonderful edition of the early drafts. Tolkien’s essay brings to the fore the powerful achievement of the Beowulf poet in crafting an expression of celebration and defiance, of heroism and death. In this fun SPACE course, we will explore Tolkien’s attitudes and assumptions on the poem in greater detail. Students will gain a greater appreciation for the essay and for Tolkien’s legendarium.
Required Texts
There are no required texts for this module. "Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics" will be supplied as a pdf.
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Days and Times
As soon as we obtain enough interest in this class we will be in touch to work out a meeting time that works for the group. Thank you for keeping your October 2025 availability up to date!