J.R.R. Tolkien (John Ronald Reuel Tolkien) was very interested in "Beowulf" and many other literature works. Tolkien was so interested in "Beowulf" that he decided to translate it from Old English to our modern day language. He knew Old English very well and taught it at Oxford specifically with the first half of "Beowulf." Because he was clearly able to accurately translate the text with his vast knowledge of the language and text itself, he went on and finished his translation in 1926. He was 34 when he finished this task. After finishing the translation, he chose the obvious thing to do and left it in his desk unpublished. It was not until 40 years after his death that his son, Christopher, published it only after reading and marking on it himself. His translation differs from many others in the way that it ignored what critics think the story should be like and focused more on what the story really was. Tolkien touched on this (alive and translation still unpublished) when he published "Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics." It discusses how many aspects of the poem were changed in order to make a perfect story but Tolkien argued that the story was fine the way it was. The meaning was lost in all the changes, the words were swapped changing the tone, and the actual story was no longer the same. Tolkien in his translation kept the story the way it was regardless of what the critics thought. This is why the translation he wrote is so cool. It holds the true meaning of what Beowulf really was.