Tiwaz's Shaw And Literary Sources

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth."

On Midwinter Eve, in Tiwaz's Shaw, horse, hound and slave are offered to the Binder of the Wolf who then banishes darkness and cold. No one goes there at any other time - except Carl who is seen to enter the Shaw by a boy who follows him once when he leaves the thorp. What more practical or appropriate place for Farness to conceal his timecycle? - just as time corridors are placed under dolmens in The Corridors Of Time. It is as if such places had been prepared for time travellers to make use of them.

The literary sources of Wagner's Ring Cycle and of Anderson's "The Sorrow of Odin the Goth" are:

the Volsungasaga

the Nibelungenlied

the Elder and Younger Eddas

Farness recounts a story to Everard. Wagner has used the first half and Anderson the second. Most of the events described by Farness in the second half of the story happen to his own descendants in the fourth century.

Winter And Spring

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth," 300-302, pp.362-374.

Time travel fiction should recognize the ordinary passage of time. HG Wells' Time Traveller and Poul Anderson's mutant time travellers witness the passage of days, nights and seasons while time travelling whereas Time Patrol agents jump instantly from one place and time to another. However, the people visited by the agents experience time in the ordinary way:

"Winter descended and then slowly, in surges of wind, snow, icy rain, drew back." (p. 362)

Winter is lightened in the thorp by the river by the presence of Carl. He comes and goes and we know that he sometimes jumps ahead in time but that is unknown to his hosts and not mentioned in this chapter.

"Spring stole northward, snow melted, buds burst into leaf and flower, the river brawled in spate. Homebound birds filled heaven with wings and clamor. Lambs, calves, foals tottered across paddocks. Folk came forth, blinking in sudden brightness; they aired out their houses, garments, and souls. The Spring Queen drove Frija's image from farm to farm to bless the plowing and sowing, while garlanded youths and maidens danced around the oxcart. Longings quickened.

"Carl went away still, but now he would be back on the same evening. More and more were he and Jorith together." (p. 365)

Indeed. Longings quicken, including in Carl. He is becoming involved in one place and time in a way that a Time Patrol agent should not.

Interventions In Past Events

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth."

Everard asks:

"'Who knows what a happening early on - a victory or a defeat, a rescue or a death, a certain individual getting born or not getting born - who knows what effect that could have, as its results propagate through the generations?'" (p. 355)

Farness replies that he is concerned with stories and poems, not with events. Despite this, he intervenes in a war and causes a pregnancy! His defence of his intervention in the war is that:

he did not kill anyone;

if anything, by throwing illusions and making the Vandals retreat, he saved lives;

history did not record that raid or its outcome.

He adds that the line of descent that he started was a minor statistical fluctuation in the gene pool of the kind that soon averages out.

But this does not respond to Everard's original question. Saving lives might be as dangerous as ending them. The fact that the raid was not recorded means that the effects of intervening in it are unknown and therefore potentially dangerous. The line of descent that he started comprises the characters in the story that he is studying! When he learns this, he seems to take it for granted.

Cosmic Consciousness

"'Has the universe therefore brought forth sentience, in order to protect and give purpose to its own existence? That is not an answerable question.'"

-Poul Anderson, The Shield Of Time (New York, 1991), PART SIX, 1990 A. D., p. 435.

Why not answerable? One answer would be that the pre-conscious universe could not do anything in order to do anything else. That would have been a purpose before there could have been a purpose. 

But was there an inevitability about the emergence of consciousness? Mass and energy always had the potential to become conscious so maybe statistically it had to happen somewhere and some time?

We try to understand the universe. Does it have not an intention but at least a tendency to try to understand itself through us? So far, empirical scientific knowledge and introspective self-knowledge do not connect: subatomic particles and neuronic interactions as against subjective experiences and mental processes. But it is the reality composed of particles and neurons that becomes conscious of itself through experiences and minds so they must connect somehow.

Carl With Winnithar; Farness With Everard

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth."

In 300, Carl arrives at the home of Winnithar the Wisentslayer above the River Vistula as a stranger who must have travelled far yet has clean garments with no change of clothes and no food and acknowledges that he has not stayed at any walking-distance dwelling en route. When asked about this, he replies:

"'There are things I may not talk about.'" (p. 350)

Thus, he has established himself as supernatural from the kick-off. Surely he should have taken steps to make his arrival seem normal?

In 1980, Farness (same person as Carl but we use a different part of his name in a different century) says to Everard:

"'...all you need do is read the reports I'll have filed in my own personal future. If the early accounts show me bungling, why, just tell me to stay home and become a book researcher. The outfit needs those too, doesn't it?'" (p. 355)

But that would involve changing the course of events which is what the Patrol avoids doing. Everard replies that he has inquired and that Farness will have performed satisfactorily. Surely Everard should not have inquired and should not have told Farness how he would perform?

Farness, Everard And Ganz

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth," 1980, pp. 351-362.

Manse Everard was off-stage in 372, 1935 and 300 but returns with elder statesman status as recounted by Carl Farness in 1980. Of course, there could have been many Time Patrol stories that never mentioned Everard. However, we will learn that he is always present even if only in a supporting role.

Farness wrote papers on Deor and Widsith. His mentor in the Patrol, Herbert Ganz, wrote a paper on the Gothic Bible. Ganz's paper was published in Berlin in 1853 and Farness read it before joining the Patrol. In 1858, pp. 399-404, Farness shows Ganz the hologram recording of his meeting with Ulfilas. Farness tells us that Ulfilas translated the Bible but see the link to "Gothic Bible" above.

Farness tells Ganz that he has found:

"'New poems; lines in them that definitely look ancestral to Widsith and Walthere.'" (p. 404)

I cannot find Walthere. We get a sense of the scholarship involved in the Patrol's researches into past periods.

Donar's Lightning

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth."

"'I do give you my oath - may Donar's lightning smite me if it is false -...'" (p. 350)

This is one of several references to Thor in Poul Anderson's works. The gods live. In our imaginations. Where else? But in very different forms. I had problems with accepting the new Thor film but I like the version of Thor in Marvel Comics' Ultimates line. (See here.) That is a final thought for tonight after returning from the cinema. Good Night.

300

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth," 300, pp. 347-350.

When Carl approaches:

"At first, spying him at a mile's reach, they took him for a mere gangrel, since he fared alone and afoot." (p. 348)

A gangrel - or Gangleri?

In 372, the Wanderer, addressing Alawin, referred to:

"'...that kindred which sprang from your father's father's mother Jorith...and myself.'" (p. 340)

At the end of the chapter headed 300, Carl, the Wanderer, first meets the maiden, Jorith. (p. 350)

Seventy two years of family chronicle link these chapters. In 372, Alawin's father, Hathawulf, is present and we are told that, five years previously, he had inherited tribal leadership from his father, Tharasmund. Thus, we already know the line of descent from Carl, believed to be Wodan.

In 1980, pp. 351-362, Carl Farness, newly graduated from the Time Patrol Academy, is interviewed about his proposed first assignment by Unattached agent, Manse Everard. A family saga among the Goths was a routine work assignment for a Time Patrolman.

In 1935

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth," 1935, pp. 341-347.

A change of century - from 372 to 1935 - is expected. However, this is the first time in the Time Patrol series that the narration changes from third to first person. We soon understand that the narrator in 1935 was the Wanderer in 372. He leaves his spear strapped to the side of his time hopper. The Goths do not suspect where their gods disappear to, in this case to a warehouse in New York. The Patrol front is a construction company. Farness, the narrator, knows that New York will become "...uninhabitable." (p. 342) When? Anderson describes the fourth and twentieth centuries and hints at future troubles. Disintegration will accelerate, in Farness' opinion, after the 1964 election. A character's opinions are not necessarily those of the author. Sometimes, they are. 

The ghosts of the Goths crowd around Farness until the streets and buildings seem unreal. That would make a good cover illustration, conveying both time travel and Pagan ideas of a hereafter. 

Patrol antithanatics do not merely slow but arrest the aging process, again implying that agents live until killed by accident or violence.

A Longer Narrative

"The Sorrow of Odin the Goth."

The Time Patrol series is transformed: a longer narrative with a wider cast of characters.

Speaking Parts In 372, pp. 333-341

Hathawulf

Solbern

Ulrica

Alawin

Liuderis

the Wanderer (we have not yet been told that he is a time traveller)

Also Mentioned

Tharasmund

Erelieva

Randwar

Swanhild

Ermanaric

Jorith

We are told something of the relationships between these characters and will learn more. No mention of Manse Everard as yet.

I think that imagination is essential to humanity and that gods have been powerful in the collective imagination but do not literally exist. I welcome narratives that give the gods a major but not ultimate role:

"'That is as Weard wills, who sets the doom of gods and men alike." (p. 338)

The Buddha is a teacher of gods and men.