Reaving, Grieving

The Broken Sword, X.

Leea sings to Skafloc and concludes:

"...when the sea their life is reaving.

"And their women will be grieving." (p. 66)

Does this sound a bit like Dies Irae?

1 Day of wrath and doom impending.
David's word with Sibyl's blending!
Heaven and earth in ashes ending!

7 What shall I, frail man, be pleading?
Who for me be interceding,
When the just are mercy needing?

-copied from here.

Something resonates when lines end in "-ing"!

This also reminds us of another verse by Kipling:

What is a woman that you forsake her,

And the hearth-fire and the home-acre,

To go with the old grey Widow-maker?

-copied from here.

I have quoted the two best parts of Kipling that I know and unfortunately will sail no further with Skafloc tonight.

Theology

Lunarians need a source of energy - antimatter - whereas elves just need to know the right spells. Poul Anderson's creative versatility and literary skills enabled him to construct, with apparent ease, fictional narratives based on either of these two very different sets of premises. Fantasies can assume either polytheism or medieval monotheism. Sf features characters who at least believe either in diverse monotheisms or in alternative religious metaphysics. Norse and other deities can appear as fictional characters in novels or short stories. The One God of several well known scriptural traditions intervenes less frequently but can be there when needed. 

Thus, the content of religious beliefs is at least a major background issue in Poul Anderson's works. For what it is worth, my most recent foray into theology, an attempt to improve on an earlier version, and now entitled "Prophecy And Contemplation," is here.

Embarkation

The Broken Sword, X.

How can we convey the detail of Poul Anderson's descriptions without quoting some at length? Instead of composing the following paragraph, Anderson could simply have written that the warriors embarked:

"On a night just after sunset, the warriors embarked. A moon newly risen cast silver and shadow on the crags and scaurs of the elf-hills, on the strand from which they rose, on the clouds racing eastward on a wind that filled heaven with its clamour. The moonlight ran in shards and ripples over the waves, which tumbled and roared, white-maned, on the rocks. It shimmered off weapons and armour of the elf warriors, while the black-and-white longships drawn up on the shore seemed but shapes and light-gleams.

"Skafloc stood wrapped in a cape, the wind streaming his hair..." (p. 65)

Two paragraphs: two references to wind. Colours, clamour, cape, wind, waves, white manes, weapons, warriors... And at last a conversation in which Leea warns Skafloc not to go. He goes.

We know only that doom awaits.

Many Winds

 

The Broken Sword, IX.

When Asgerd, Aelfrida's daughter, agrees with her betrothed that the garth is hollow with its men gone:

"A cold sea-wind, blowing fine dry snowflakes, ruffled her heavy locks." (p. 59)

Then:

"As night fell, a strong wind came with snow on its wings, to howl around the hall. Hail followed, like night-gangers thumping their heels on the roof." (ibid.)

Almost immediately, Valgard and his Vikings arrive, kill men, burn the hall, abduct the sisters, Asgerd and Freda, and depart by sea:

"...rowing against a wind which blew icy waves inboard." (p. 61)

But Valgard, following the witch's instructions, unties a sack that releases a favourable wind. Back at Orm's garth, among the women and children left behind, Aelfrida sits:

"...with hair and dress blowing wild..." (ibid.)

A gale drives the ships and wind whoots in the rigging. The cliffs of Finnmark bear "...wind-twisted trees." (p. 62) The wind blows the ships into a fjord where the waiting trolls, visible only to Valgard's with-sight, wear little or nothing:

"...however freezing the wind." (p. 63)

As already agreed with Valgard, the trolls attack and kill his men who cannot see them.

I have skipped past some details like the disgusting appearance of the trolls and the description of the troll-king's hall. However, for the most part, focusing on the winds has given us a good summary of the action.

Valgard gives Asgerd and Freda to Troll-King Illrede. 

It is my time of night for other reading. But I think that we have done justice to Poul Anderson's winds.

What The Priest Says

The Broken Sword, IX.

Looking at the dead bodies of her husband and sons, Aelfrida whispers:

"'The priest says it would be a sin, or I would slay myself now and go to my rest beside you...'" (p. 58)

I agree with the priest although not for his reasons! By remaining alive, Aelfrida can later appreciate life although differently from before and even though this seems impossible to her at the time. More fundamentally, we are the organisms through which reality is known/knows itself. As such, our role is to remain conscious as long as possible, not to give up when times are bad.

The most fundamental question of philosophy is the relationship between being and consciousness and the most fundamental question of life is: "To be or not to be," - in Shakespeare and also here.

Two Winds

The Broken Sword, VIII.

When Valgard sees the witch not as a beautiful woman but as the hag that she really is, he burns her hovel. Then:

"...there were only the leaping flames and the piping wind and the snow hissing as it blew into the fire." (p. 55)

The wind, with its appropriate sound effects, punctuates the main action scenes and plot turning points.

When Valgard announces that his fleet will raid Finnmark, one of his captains suggests instead:

"'...England, Scotland, Ireland, Orkney, or Valland south of the channel...'" (p. 56)

- but Valgard's axe settles the matter.

(Hugh Valland is a character in an sf novel by Poul Anderson.)

For a winter voyage to Finnmark, Valgard can:

"'...snuff a good wind coming.'" (p. 57)

But first he will plunder Orm's garth where he had grown up as Orm's son. The changeling's:

"'...league with the lands of darkness...'" (p. 55)

- seems to be complete.

Every chapter advances the action.

Long And Cold, Blown On The Wind

The Broken Sword, VIII.

The witch asks her familiar, a rat:

"'...how went the journey?'" (p. 50)

He replies:

"'Long and cold... in bat shape, blown on the wind, I fared to Elfheugh...'" (ibid.)

That is as much as I plan to quote this evening but it suffices.

First, we notice that the wind takes a reasonably active role in the proceedings. By now we expect it to.

Secondly, the familiar's first three words sound familiar. I have read very little of Rudyard Kipling but have always been impressed by the following verse:

What of the hunting, hunter bold?

   Brother, the watch was long and cold.

What of the quarry ye went to kill?

  Brother, he crops in the jungle still.

Where is the power that made your pride?

 Brother, it ebbs from my flank and side.

Where is the haste that ye hurry by?

 Brother, I go to my lair to die!

-copied from here.

In a Poul Anderson text, there is always something to post about. Until some time tomorrow.

Wind-Driven Sleet And Stars

The Broken Sword, VII.

See Bluster, Chill, Whine.

When Valgard, who, of course, is a changeling, not really Ketil's brother, approaches the house where he will kill Ketil:

"A thin wind-driven sleet stung his cheeks." (p. 44)

The wind becomes fiercer as the action intensifies.

Ketil's younger brother, Asmund, finds Ketil's body under a cairn:

"'...with naught but wind and the stars for company.'" (p. 48)

- and with Valgard's axe in its head.

Asmund returns to the hall with the body, thus provoking a fight in which Valgard kills Orm, Asmund and several others and escapes into the woods.

The witch's vengeance seems to be complete but what happens next? I do not remember despite several previous readings (!) and, as frequently happens, I have to go out before possibly reading and posting more later this evening.

Life is good, especially with Poul Anderson in it.

Bluster, Chill, Whine

The Broken Sword, VII.

"On a blustery fall day, with the smell of rain in the keen air and leaves turned to gold and copper and bronze, Ketil and a few comrades rode forth to hunt." (p. 42)

They feel bluster and keenness, smell rain and see colours: three senses.

After chasing a huge noble white stag, Ketil is separated from his companions and:

"A thin chill wind whimpered through dusk." (ibid.)

Later, when Valgard seeks his now lost brother, Ketil:

"Wind whirled dead leaves through the air like ghosts hurrying down hell-road, and its whine gnawed at Valgard's nerves." (p. 44)

Wind blusters when the hunt is good, whimpers when Ketil is separated and whines when Valgard follows him. Poul Anderson's winds always follow his narratives. Will these autumnal Northern winds whirl two brothers down hell-road? Maybe but not tonight. I am going back to Stieg Larsson, then to bed.

Good night if you are in a part of the world where it is dark right now...

Truth

The Broken Sword, VI.

Odin disguised as Satan tells the witch:

"'...that truth is a thing which bears as many shapes as there are minds which strive to see it.'" (p. 39)

Not exactly. Something that was completely different for everyone would not be truth. It would be entirely subjective with no objectivity.

Science has become our way to discern some measure of empirical objectivity although it cannot tell us everything. When a man is diagnosed with cancer, that is his objective medical condition but it does not tell us everything about him. Two men with the same diagnosis can be in very different mental/psychological/spiritual states. 

When I was at University, a religious dogmatist proclaimed, "Truth is one. Error is manifold!" I replied, "Truth is one. Its expressions are manifold!" Those propositions are a classical Hegelian thesis and antithesis. We approach truth through syntheses. And at most we know only partial truths. "Truth is one" has a very different significance depending on who says it.