Oral-Formulaic Theory: Annotated Bibliography

Kemp Malone. Review of Storms 1957. English Studies, 41:200-5.

Denies Storms' assumption of Beowulf's orality, affirming that the poem is too sophisticated to be the product of a "minstrel" (204) and that traditional diction may be employed without entailing improvisation. One of the early objections to oral-formulaic theory as presented by Magoun (espec. 1953a) and his followers.
Area: OE