"She was bound she knew not where, to a meeting with she knew not what.
"Folk believed they did. But why then were their beliefs not the same?"
-Poul Anderson, Mother Of Kings (New York, 2003), Book Six, Chapter XXXII, p. 590.
An excellent question and one that makes me very skeptical about any claimed certainty even that there is a hereafter.
She sees:
"The Man on the Gallows, the Man on the Cross, the Man with the Drum. All had she known, but never altogether." (ibid.)
Odinism, Christianity, shamanism. She had tried to understand Christianity but failed because it did not support her dynastic ambition.
She hears waves:
"...their rushing rose to a roar. That song would go on till the ending of the world." (ibid.)
Earth abides.
"She had lost everything, she thought; yet in a way she had won everything, she who wrought mightily and never yielded. Men would remember her and her man." (pp. 590-591)
Merely to be remembered? That has to be the most immature goal imaginable. See here.
"Her strength ebbed into the wind." (p. 591)
- returning to the elements from which we arise.
11 comments:
Kaor , Paul!
And, as a Catholic, I believe Christ was Incarnated, lived, taught, and died, and rose from the dead to show us the way, by faith and reason, to that certainty thru the Church He had founded. Yes, I know, you disagree! (Smiles)
I have to disagree with Queen Gunnhild, as quoted here, she HAD failed in everything she had striven for, for Eirik Blood-ax and her sons. And while it seems immature for Gunnhild to think that being remembered is to still be a success, it's only fair to say that was simply how people of the Viking Age thought.
Sean
Sean,
That was how they thought. "This I know that does not die..." so my comment is aimed at the Viking Age, not just at Gunnhild.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
And Christianity, including the philosophy inherited from the Greeks and Romans, would utterly transform Norway and Scandinavia. Meaning that the bad aspects of the Viking Age would be rejected while, I hope, the good that was in it would survive.
Sean
'Merely to be remembered? That has to be the most immature goal imaginable.'
You clearly both agree with this comment. Why? I'd regard it as a privilege to be remembered - for something good, of course. Is that immature? If so, why?
Ketlan,
I think there is a difference between doing memorable things and wanting to be remembered? A Civil Rights campaigner in Northern Ireland, asked how she wanted to be remembered, replied, "I don't want to be remembered! I want the Irish people to have their full rights." (Or something like that.)
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I have to agree with Ketlan. I would not mind being remembered. For good reasons, of course! It's simply that I think the Viking Age Scandinavians may have OVERDONE the wish to be remembered.
Sean
Sean,
They certainly did.
Paul.
I don't know, really. I would love to be remembered for, for example, a single poem or novel. It doesn't have to be a dynasty, unless that's the way your mind works. For me, a single poem, echoing down the centuries, would be more than enough. Immature? I think not.
Sorry, talking bollocks of course, but there was ONE poem that came to me within twelve hours and was, as far as i was concerned, perfect. This single poem, is what I would like to have the world define me by. Good or bad, is it proper for me to be defined by this alone??? To me, this was perfection - to you, who knows? And if you, in some ill-defined future, find my poem distasteful, horrific, vile according to your own mores, who is to say that I, within my own mileau, might not find the same poetry beautiful and worthy.
Hi, Ketlan!
Actually, I agree with you, there's nothing wrong with being remember for writing a beautiful poem. Dante, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Kipling, are easy examples I thought of.
Alas, it's not always the case that authors of great poems are remembered. We don't know who wrote BEOWULF, THE SONG OF ROLAND, and SIR GAWAIN AND THE GREEN KNIGHT, to list three examples.
Sean
Ketlan,
But your aim is to write good poetry, not just to be remembered.
Paul.
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