""What doth the lord require of man but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God."-Micah 6:8" When Eleanor Ramsay Williamson was ten, her father, Kerr Craige Ramsay, died of a heart attack. Her idyllic life in North Carolina was shattered. Eleanor lost not only a parent who adored her, but her whole world. In this memoir, Eleanor explores the effects her father's death had on her as she grew up. Her experiences were similar to that of others who had also lost their fathers as youngsters: she cared for her alcoholic mother and tried to be strong, but found it difficult at best. In exploring her relationships, Eleanor recognized much of her father in her: his smile, energy, and self-confidence. Relying on these qualities, Eleanor unshackled the restraints placed on women of that era and blazed her own trail. She even married a Yankee, Sterling Rudolph Williamson, and later developed her passions for literature, foreign cultures, and teaching. This insightful memoir follows Eleanor's emotional journey from life as a youngster, through the loss her father and the subsequent upheaval, to her own experiences as a mother and wife, and finally her blossoming into a passionate teacher of international students. With "My Father's Daughter," you will experience the events of Eleanor's life as she plucks the strings of your subconscious emotions with her keen observations.

From the riddling song of a bawdy onion that moves between kitchen and bedroom to the thrilling account of Beowulf's battle with a treasure-hoarding dragon, from the heart-rending lament of a lone castaway to the embodied speech of the cross upon which Christ was crucified, from the anxiety of Eve, who carries "a sumptuous secret in her hands / And a tempting truth hidden in her heart," to the trust of Noah who builds "a sea-floater, a wave-walking / Ocean-home with rooms for all creatures," the world of the Anglo-Saxon poets is a place of harshness, beauty, and wonder. Now for the first time, the entire Old English poetic corpus-including poems and fragments discovered only within the past fifty years-is rendered into modern strong-stress, alliterative verse in a masterful translation by Craig Williamson. Accompanied by an introduction by noted medievalist Tom Shippey on the literary scope and vision of these timeless poems and Williamson's own introductions to the individual works and his essay on translating Old English poetry, the texts transport us back to the medieval scriptorium or ancient mead-hall, to share a herdsman's recounting of the story of the world's creation or a people's sorrow at the death of a beloved king, to be present at the clash of battle or to puzzle over the sacred and profane answers to riddles posed over a thousand years ago. This is poetry as stunning in its vitality as it is true to its sources. Were Williamson's idiom not so modern, we might think that the Anglo-Saxon poets had taken up the lyre again and begun to sing once more.

The best-known literary achievement of Anglo-Saxon England, Beowulf is a poem concerned with monsters and heroes, treasure and transience, feuds and fidelity. Composed sometime between 500 and 1000 C.E. and surviving in a single manuscript, it is at once immediately accessible and forever mysterious. And in Craig Williamson's splendid new version, this often translated work may well have found its most compelling modern English interpreter. Williamson's Beowulf appears alongside his translations of many of the major works written by Anglo-Saxon poets, including the elegies "The Wanderer" and "The Seafarer," the heroic "Battle of Maldon," the visionary "Dream of the Rood," the mysterious and heart-breaking "Wulf and Eadwacer," and a generous sampling of the Exeter Book riddles. Accompanied by a foreword by noted medievalist Tom Shippey on Anglo-Saxon history, culture, and archaeology, and Williamson's introductions to the individual poems as well as his essay on translating Old English, the texts transport us back to the medieval scriptorium or ancient mead hall to share an exile's lament or herdsman's recounting of the story of the world's creation. From the riddling song of a bawdy onion that moves between kitchen and bedroom, to the thrilling account of Beowulf's battle with a treasure-hoarding dragon, the world becomes a place of rare wonder in Williamson's lines. Were his idiom not so modern, we might almost think the Anglo-Saxon poets had taken up the lyre again and begun to sing after a silence of a thousand years.

In "A Feast of Creatures," Craig Williamson recasts nearly one hundred Old English riddles of the Exeter Book into a modern verse mode that yokes the cadences of Aelfric with the sprung rhythm of Gerard Manley Hopkins.Like the early English riddlers before him, Williamson gives voice to the nightingale, plow, ox, phallic onion, and storm-wind. In lean and taut language he offers us mead disguised as a mighty wrestler, the sword as a celibate thane, the silver wine-cup as a seductress, the horn transformed from head-warrior to ink-belly or battle-singer. In his notes and commentary he gives us possible and probable solutions, sources, and analogues, a shrewd sense of literary play, and traces the literary and cultural contexts in which each riddle may be viewed. In his introduction, Williamson traces for us the history of riddles and riddle scholarship.

Most of us take the acts of sitting, standing, and walking for granted, but for those suffering from back, muscle, and joint pain, even these seemingly simple actions can be extremely uncomfortable. Poor body alignment or habitual movement patterns that crop up when we compensate for a bad back or painful neck can only further exacerbate existing issues--and create new problems. In this accessible workbook, Craig Williamson, a respected occupational and massage therapist, demonstrates how by just doing these three basic actions with optimal body alignment and attention, you can help free yourself from existing pain and prevent further injury. The protocol is simple but extremely effective.

The "Exeter Book," a late tenth-century manuscript of early Old English poetry, is an anthology of religious homiletic verse, elegiac poetry, and ninety-one lyric riddles. The riddles are of particular interest to students of Old English poetry and Anglo-Saxon culture, to archeologists, anthropologists, and folklorists. This volume will supersede all earlier editions of the riddles as the text contains many new manuscript readings, and a summary is given of the scholarship on each riddle.

""What doth the lord require of man but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God."-Micah 6:8" When Eleanor Ramsay Williamson was ten, her father, Kerr Craige Ramsay, died of a heart attack. Her idyllic life in North Carolina was shattered. Eleanor lost not only a parent who adored her, but her whole world. In this memoir, Eleanor explores the effects her father's death had on her as she grew up. Her experiences were similar to that of others who had also lost their fathers as youngsters: she cared for her alcoholic mother and tried to be strong, but found it difficult at best. In exploring her relationships, Eleanor recognized much of her father in her: his smile, energy, and self-confidence. Relying on these qualities, Eleanor unshackled the restraints placed on women of that era and blazed her own trail. She even married a Yankee, Sterling Rudolph Williamson, and later developed her passions for literature, foreign cultures, and teaching. This insightful memoir follows Eleanor's emotional journey from life as a youngster, through the loss her father and the subsequent upheaval, to her own experiences as a mother and wife, and finally her blossoming into a passionate teacher of international students. With "My Father's Daughter," you will experience the events of Eleanor's life as she plucks the strings of your subconscious emotions with her keen observations.