eaker's excitement for travel. It exemplifies the Anglo-Saxon fascination with strange lands. Lines 39 through 49, that many previous critics had argued were pessimistic, he says, can be attributed to the hardship that everyone at the time would have had to suffer while at sea. Campbell argues that the reference to the cuckoo, a migratory bird, and its "mournful call" (The Seafarer, 53a), along with the coming of spring, emphasizes the speaker's growing wanderlust. Using this line of thought, the controversial lines 55 through 64 can be thought to merely depict the speaker's imaginative journey of the lands he will one day travel to. His wanderlust causes the speaker obvious discomfort, which leads him to the conclusion that he would rather have the "joys of God mean more to me / than this dead transitory life" (The Seafarer, 64). At this point the speaker realizes that the basis of his wanderlust is the desire to find his home in heaven.The Seafarer is one of the most written about poems in the English language. As we have seen there are many arguments for the case of one speaker, and many against it. This point will almost certainly never be agreed upon, but we believe that the speaker is the same one throughout.Works CitedAnderson (Arngart), O. S. The Seafarer: an Interpretation. Lund: K. Humanistiska Vetenskapssamfundets i Lund rsberttelse 1: Gleerups, 1937.Boer, R. C. "Wanderer und Seefahrer." Zeitschrift fr deutsche Philologie 35 (1903), 1-28.Campbell, A. P. "The Seafarer: Wanderlust and our Heavenly Home." Revue de L'Universit D'Ottawa 43 (1973): 235-47.Ehrismann, Gustav. "Religionsgeschichtliche Beitrge zum germanischen Frhchristentum. II. Das Gedicht vom Seefahrer." Beitrge zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und Literatur. 35 (1909): 213-218.Ferrell, C. C. "Old Germanic Life in the Anglo-Saxon Wanderer and Seafarer." Modern Language Notes. 9:7 (1894): 402-7.Kluge, Friedrich. "Zu altenglischen Dichtungen. 1. Der Seefah...
