10 books like Beowulf

Journeys are most often linear – Here to There – or circular – "There and Back Again." The Odyssey is actually a return leg in the most traumatic and perennial circular journey: going to war, and then, getting back. "Wily" (in modern terms, read, "sneaky," "trickster")  Odysseus left Troy a famous warrior, but takes seven years to get home. The fabulous episodes of that journey, the Cyclops, the Sirens, Scylla and Charybdis, Circe, and Calypso, the wreck in Phaeacia that leaves him bereft even of clothes, have grounded the Western imagination. But the concluding little things – the recognition scenes, the dog that dies, and the nurse who doesn't – push that epic past into a close, human Now.

Dark and violent, this twelfth-century tale of love and revenge is a compelling vision of medieval values, combining many of the tropes of later pseudo-medieval sagas – treasure, gory battles, a cloak of invisibility, sexual deception and a dragon – with the spiritual angst that the later tales miss. From Siegfried’s brief encounter with a scaly beast to the fire-and-blood blitzkrieg of the climax – a ferocious battle in the hall of Attila the Hun – the story is told with breathless passion. Whether it glamourises war, or warns against its cost, is a matter of enduring debate. The tale has certainly had its share of cranky fans, from the silent movie filmmaker Fritz Lang to Heinrich Himmler, a testament to its provocative power.

Which version to read? The Penguin edition, translated by A.T. Hatto and published in 1965, offers a very readable prose version that captures the tale’s fiery… show more.

The scale of this ancient Indian epic is off the charts, fusing Hindu iconography with story beats of startling familiarity. Monkeys build a bridge between India and Sri Lanka, an army of demons takes on the vanguard of the gods and the villain is felled by a celestial bow. An influence on storytelling down the ages – notably Star Wars – it’s a tale as exciting as it is charming, with a surprisingly downbeat coda, as Queen Sita discovers that being rescued by her divine husband isn’t enough to survive the prejudices of her age.

Which version to read? Arshia Sattar’s 1996 translation is available in Penguin translation. I can’t testify to its accuracy, but it’s a magnificent read.

Thousands of years and fifty reigns are dramatised in this chronicle of sixty thousand verses. Set down in the eleventh century by an engagingly grumpy Persian poet who enjoyed the odd cup of wine and fretted about his finances. In the process, he saved (as some would have it) the Persian language and culture. The resonance of his tales has endured down the centuries: traveling in Iran, I met artists who used the story of a snake-shouldered tyrant who gobbles the brains of young men as a parable for the inter-generational tensions of the mullahcracy and the trauma of the Iran-Iraq War; whilst the romance of a beautiful long-haired princess and her tower-climbing lover is the earliest recorded iteration of ‘Rapunzel’.

Which version to read: The nineteenth-century Warner brothers produced an atmospheric full translation, but for a more modern abridgment, I’d recommend The Epic of the Kings, translated by Reuben… show more.

I love Neil Gaiman; he’s a true storyteller, one who doesn’t shy away from the dark.

He takes old, well-known stories of Norse gods and presents them in a refreshing and quite clever manner. At the end of the book, I felt like I knew how Thor and Odin, and other petty gods would react to any given situation.

The icing on the cake is the tongue-in-cheek, witty narrative voice which really brings this book to life. Reading this book feels like having a gifted storyteller narrate the events to you and your friends as you lounge around the fire. Good stuff!

The D'Aulaire's book is a visual feast of stories from the land of ice, fire and Viking culture. The tales are well-told and exciting. It comes with lively illustrations which offer children who haven't encountered Thor, Odin, Freya or Loki before, a panorama of this marvelous world and the many adventures of the Norse Gods.

For serious readers of Norse mythology, its origins in literature and early culture the Byock translation of the 13th-century text by Snorri Sturluson presents the Viking equivalent of Heroditus’ Histories of the Ancient Greeks and the religious texts of the Abrahamic religions. It’s a thrilling read and forms the basis of all modern versions of Viking legend. I still refer to this, years after first reading it.

Have you ever been curious about changlings, banshees, or megaliths? Have you wondered who, exactly, Merlin the magician was? It's all in Sofia Visconti's timeless tales. This book is a great guide to the Celtic, Irish and Scottish myths. It's like having an encyclopedia of magical beings at your fingertips.

Looking for the quintessential guide to Greek mythology? This is the book I studied in high school, the first time learning the stories that have stuck with me to this day (many decades later). Hamilton’s storytelling feels authentic to the voices of the original authors without being dry. Among this collection, you’ll find creation stories (think Titans, Olympians, Zeus, and Hades), fabulous love stories (Orpheus and Eurydice, Cupid and Psyche!), heroes of the Trojan War (Odysseus and Achilles) and earlier (Hercules and Perseus), famous families (Oedipus and Antigone), and monsters (Cerberus and the Minotaur). You may not sit down and read this cover to cover, but Edith Hamilton’s Mythology is a great reference you’ll want on your shelf.

For a generation brought up with Netflix, Disney Plus, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the original Marvel comics are a modern form of mythology. I grew up with such comics, reading Thor and Tolkein, Dune and Asimov’s Foundation series alongside tales of Celtic and Greek mythology. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s version was the Thor I knew, an exaggerated, simplified but utterly compelling character with his trickster brother Loki and all-too-serious father Odin. I loved it, so I’ve included this as pure nostalgia – don’t judge me!