Zach Weener-Smith is the creator of the webcomic Saturday morning breakfast cereal. His new book, Bea Wolf, has been named number one in children's Norse literature. He talks to Russ Roberts about comics and how he got his inspiration from a much deeper French literary tradition than American illustrators.
Tolkien read it as a tale about mortality. The poet David Whyte said it was a metaphor for the psychological demons deep in our minds. And that, insists the cartoonist and writer Zach Weinersmith, is precisely Beowulf's appeal: Its richness opens the door to endless interpretation. Listen as the author of Bea Wolf, a graphic novel for children based on the Old English poem, speaks with EconTalk's Russ Roberts about poetry in general, Beowulf in particular, whether we should require students to memorize poems, and the value of stories for children even without a moral lesson.