Medieval Studies Seminar Series – “Who is Queer Translation and What is She, that all her Queens Commend Her?: (Re)Translating Verse from the Old English Exeter Book”
Ophelia Eryn Hostetter, Rutgers University-Camden
Thu, 11/6 · 12:00 pm—1:15 pm · 105 Chancellor Green
Program in Medieval Studies
Lunch will be provided. Please RSVP.
Translation always fails, at some level.
Translation theory has long argued that rendering a text from source to target is imprecise, messy, subject to the translator’s desire, & bound in preconceived narratives about the source culture. Old English poetry is all-too-often read as a monolithic expression representing the ideas, language, & beliefs of an entire culture — particularly upon moral or ethical values useful to modern mythologies of a national past. For instance, scholars have been happy to assume that Queerness had no legitimate place in early England — yet those categories do not exist before the nineteenth century’s “discovery” of heteronormativity.
This workshop is based on a simple idea: instead of failing to succeed in locating our Queer ancestors in early English literature, let’s set out to Fail right up front — and Fail as gloriously as we can. Come have lunch with Dr. Ophelia Eryn Hostetter *12 as we work together at a translation practice located in disruption, deformation, play, Queer joy, and, of course, Failure in the most stylish way possible.
Ophelia Eryn Hostetter (she/her) is an Associate Professor at Rutgers University-Camden, teaching & researching medieval literature and culture, 500–1500 CE. Her first book, Political Appetites: Food in Medieval English Romance, argues the vital connection between food and cooking & the political ambitions of these texts. Dr. Hostetter’s second book, Teaching “Beowulf”: Practical Approaches (DeGruyter, 2024, with Larry Swain), is a co-edited collection of pedagogical essays for teachers of this ancient epic. She is also an avid translator, working from Old English, Latin & Old French, frequently publishing her work in literary journals, & runs the Old English Poetry Project, an open-access archive of this impressive body of verse rendered into a fresh, contemporary voice. Dr. Hostetter’s current project questions the way that Old English poetry has traditionally been translated, limiting how it is interpreted, obstructing innovative approaches, and impeding inclusivity in the field. This approach informs her translation work and brings in queer theory, translation theory, glitch, hip hop, & affective studies alongside more traditional methods such as codicology, linguistics, and historicism. Dr. Hostetter’s teaching involves the interplay between medieval and modern, revealing what the Middle Ages can reveal about our contemporary world. She also is active in public-facing research, operating a Substack, Translations Beyond the Horizon, as well as anticipating the publication of The Queer Life of Riddles (punctum, 2025) a collection of creative-critical translations of Old English riddles. She is eager to work with students interested in pursuing their own independent research, in a wide variety of areas.
This talk is part of our Fall 2025 Medieval Studies Seminar Series. The next talk in this series will be held on December 4 with Antony Eastmond (the Courtauld).
