A Facebook friend alerted me to the movie trailer above. “There’s Something In the Barn.” It’s not one I worked on, nor have heard of it before. Not my kind of thing, really, but some of you might find it amusing. As I’ve often mentioned, I just don’t get horror. I think this springs from being a coward. It takes a braver person than I to enjoy being scared. Let alone to laugh about it.
The take on the “barn elf” here is an interesting one. One would never actually call them barn elves in Norway, I’m pretty sure. As mentioned in my novels, the Hidden Folk don’t like to be called by name. You call them the Good Neighbors, or the Little Old Men, or something like that. And, as the movie emphasizes, offending them is nothing to be undertaken lightly.
It’s basically a reversal on the sweet – but overly sentimental – picture offered in the classic commercial below, released by the Tine Dairy Products Company back in 2017:
You can make a good Christian argument that the horror version is more appropriate. The church traditionally has considered the Hidden Folk to be demons (probably).
There’s a theory that all horror is conservative. I’m not sure that’s true, but I think you can make a good case that Horror as a genre is conservative in its essence, if not in all its instantiations. (Instantiations is a lovely word I learned in Library School).
Got my tree decorated today. And I found a section in The Baldur Game that I think I’ll have to cut, or at least reduce to its bare bones. Like a victim in a horror story.
This morning, during my writing time, I committed to paper (well, screen) my conception of the Battle of Stiklestad, where King (Saint) Olaf of Norway died, in circumstances that remain contentious among historians.
Above is a video I managed to find on YouTube at last, which seemed to me worth sharing. It’s a Vlog post, not very sophisticated, describing the Vlogger’s attendance at a recent production of the Stiklestad Drama, which is performed every year in an open-air theater near the battle site (which, due to topographical changes, is impossible to precisely locate anymore). This play has been going on almost annually since 1954 (it was one of Liv Ullman’s first acting gigs). No doubt the script has changed over the years, as Norwegians become less enamored of their Christian legacy.
This appears to have been the first production after the Covid shutdown, and had the distinction of being the first time (as far as I know) that St. Olaf was portrayed without a beard. I can’t say I approve.
Also, I note that in the associated art exhibit, there’s a “tree” called the Verdenstreet (World Tree), where children are encouraged to hang prayers. This is an obvious bow to heathenism, and I can’t say I approve of that either.
But Stiklestad is on my mind (I had ancestors from the area) and I thought I’d share something about it today. Describing the battle was a surprisingly emotional experience for me, even if I’m not a great fan of Olaf. As I wrote my books, he grew in my sympathy. Also, I killed off a couple old friends (I’m not saying whom).
What’s left of writing the first draft for me is mostly mopping up, tying up loose ends. Then, of course, there follow as many revisions as it takes.
As Olaf himself (reportedly) said: “Fram!” (Forward!)
I’m reading another long, long book – I don’t know why I put myself through these things. This circumstance forces me to come up with creative ideas for the blog, and blast it, Jim, I’m an author, not a creator!
My work on The Baldur Game proceeds on schedule. I’m nearing the final climax – the Battle of Stiklestad. So I thought I’d look for a YouTube video about the battle. Informational for you and I can always use more local color. But, oddly enough, there aren’t any YouTube videos on the subject that I consider much good. Someone should address this need, which will doubtless become acute once The Baldur Game is an international bestseller and a Major Motion Picture.
But my searches led me to the holiday of Ólavsøka, the great national holiday in the Faroe Islands (it’s the celebration of the feast of St. Olav, not coincidentally on the anniversary of the battle). I’ve reviewed a couple of Chris Ould’s Faroes mystery novels (which I’m enjoying a lot) recently, so I thought I’d post a video about that event. But most of the videos I found were just shots of people in folk costumes walking through the streets of Torshaven. Perfectly good in their place, but I wanted something with a little more scenery. I finally found the video above, which I think rather nice. Here is another place I’d like to visit someday, though it’s becoming increasingly unlikely.
I hope you had a blessed Thanksgiving. Mine was just fine.
Photo credit: Famartin. Creative Commons License via Wikimedia Commons.
I think it’s been a few years since I’ve performed my Thanksgiving act of public benevolence by sharing with you my mother’s pumpkin pie recipe. This is the only kind of pumpkin pie I actually like. And, since I’m a ridiculously picky eater, you’ll probably like it too.
The recipe is simple. Stupidly simple. You don’t need to print it out — you’ll remember it.
Do everything it says in the instructions on the pumpkin pie filling can (any brand will do), EXCEPT:
Instead of using 2 eggs, use 7.
Pour into 2,, not 1 deep dish pie shells.
Otherwise, continue following step 1.
That’s it. The result is 2 light, custardy pumpkin pies. No need to thank me; the warm sense of magnanimity I feel is reward enough.
The only slightly creepy animated Paul Bunyan statue at the Paul Bunyan Amusement Park in Brainerd. I did not visit this attraction during my recent visit. Photo credit: John Margolies Roadside America photograph archive (1972-2008), Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.
I’m back from Brainerd. Just a tad over a two-hour drive either way. Not that far compared with other trips I’ve taken this summer.
My hosts asked me at one point whether I (like many other people) had the idea that Brainerd is a town in northern Minnesota. I had to admit I did. Brainerd is, in fact, they explained, just about at the geographical center of our state.
I have a vague idea that I made a visit or two to Brainerd in my youth, but I can only pin one memory down. I know my family visited there when I was a kid, and we saw the animated Paul Bunyan statue (photo above). I also traveled a lot with my musical group, and I have an idea that Brainerd fell victim to at least one of our visits.
But now I’m in a position to recommend the place unconditionally. A beautiful little city in lake country, wooded landscape… and very nice people.
The president of Sagatun Lodge, Sons of Norway bought me a hamburger at a local place first of all (great burger), and then took me to the church where they meet. And here’s an amazing thing – nothing went wrong. I’ve learned to regard it as an inevitability that there will always be some glitch in any PowerPoint presentation. It’s like a law of nature – that’s why I always bring my own projector as a back-up. But their tech guy was there waiting for me, everything ready. I plugged my laptop in and it all worked straightaway. This seemed wrong in some existential way.
The crowd was interested and attentive. Some of them bought books. Then I followed my hosts to their home, where I was shown into a “mother-in-law apartment” that I had all to myself. We had a long conversation before I turned in. I got one of the best night’s sleep I’ve had in some time, and in the morning some neighbors joined us for a delicious brunch before I left. I suspect they may have formed the erroneous impression that I’m an outgoing person. What might have confused them is that I can act outgoing when I feel welcome. And I did feel welcome there.
Another amazing thing – the lodge president, a Subaru owner, explained to me the secret protocol that allows you to unlatch the tail gate with the key fob. As a new owner of a used Forester, I had not known this. Ever been gobsmacked? I was gobsmacked.
Many thanks to the Sagatun folks for their hospitality.
I meant to illustrate this little report with my own vivid, dramatic photography, but I forgot it takes an indeterminate amount of time to upload from my phone to Dropbox to Photobucket. So I’ll post the pictures whenever that’s accomplished, unless the passage of time should render them obsolete.
I have now completed what should become (unless the Lord or the festival organizers block me) the most intense couple of weeks in my annual schedule. Norsk Høstfest in Minot and the Midwest Viking Festival in Green Bay, it appears, generally run on adjacent weeks, which means a 9-hour (either way) drive to North Dakota and a 5-hour (either way) drive to Wisconsin on consecutive weekends. Which is a challenge for a man of my, shall we say, experience and maturity. Yesterday I spent mostly in bed, and I actually slept a lot – something that I don’t do much these days unless I’m physically played out. Today I did some catching up – unloading my car (for the last time this season), washing clothes (not for the last time this season – pay no attention to the rumors), and catching up on email. And now I report to you.
First of all, the Midwest Viking Festival in Green Bay was kind of awesome. I was highly impressed. We used to do it in Moorhead, Minn. at the Hjemkomst Viking Ship Museum. That was also great, but we outwore our welcome somehow. This festival involved the most serious reenactors I’ve encountered (in this country) and was very well organized. It’s assembled around a replica Viking house in the grindhus style, built by my friend Owen Christianson and his wife Elspeth.
The weather was cool and windy, with some light rain on Friday, the first day. Saturday was colder but clear. This was actually pretty good weather for a Viking encampment. One of the chronic problems of Viking reenacting in this country is that we usually do it at summer festivals, where the woolen clothing appropriate to Northern European conditions gets rather uncomfortable. But wool was just the thing this weekend.
We had a large assembly of reenactors, mostly craftspeople of one kind or another, eager to show off their skills. The group Telge Glima, from Sweden, was there to demonstrate Viking athletic games twice a day, and their shows were followed by blunt steel combat by our fighters.
Because of the specialized nature of the event, our visitors seemed, by and large, really interested in the festival’s topic. That meant they were eager to buy books, and I sold off my stock of Viking Legacy early the first afternoon. Next year I’ll know to bring more.
I was particularly gratified to hear Viking Legacy referenced in conversation by someone who wasn’t even aware of my connection to it. And one woman who examined my novels said she’d just been looking at them on Amazon. That’s something I don’t think I’ve ever heard before from a potential customer.
So I was pleased with the whole thing. Next time, I think I’ll schedule a third night in a motel rather than driving home the same night. I made it safely, but it was probably an imprudent journey for a man of my experience and… well, you know.
Some friends of mine at a previous Midwest Viking Festival, in Moorhead, MN.
In case you’re keeping track, I passed the 60,000 word count on The Baldur Game this morning. Since I anticipate a final length in the neighborhood of 100,000 words, I feel as if I’m making progress. I’ve wrapped up Ailill’s and Erling’s adventures in Caithness, Scotland with Jarl Thorfinn the Mighty (a whole lot more happened there than I expected), and now I’ve got them in the Orkneys, preparing for the crossing to Norway.
If you’re in the Green Bay area, you’ll find me (God willing) at the Midwest Viking Festival on the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay Friday and Saturday. They have a Viking house there, which will anchor our encampment. I’ve been to this festival before, but only in its former venue in Moorhead, Minnesota – a somewhat shorter drive. I’m crossing my fingers that I’ll satisfy the authenticity standards.
I’ll have some books to sell, but get there early. Supplies are limited.
(Note, I know Green Bay is an odd place to hold a festival for Vikings. Another of God’s little jokes, I suppose.)
My all-time favorite song is Michael Card’s “God’s Own Fool,” published in 1985 on the Scandalon album. That may have been the first album I bought with my own money. It’s a song about Jesus being misunderstood during his earthly ministry. The last lines are:
So, surrender the hunger to say you must know;
Have the courage to say, "I believe."
Let the power of paradox open your eyes
And blind those who say they can see.
I could understand if someone took lines like this to encourage blind faith, a faith that doesn’t question what we read in Scripture or what our ministers teach, but Christian faith isn’t blind. It’s reasonable and fits the real world He created.
When Jesus tells Peter to check the mouth of a fish for a coin to pay their taxes, Peter believes Him and checks the fish’s mouth. When Jesus tells a couple of His men to go into town, find a donkey and colt tied up, bring them to him, and if anyone asks what they’re doing, say that the Lord needs them, they go into town expecting to find exactly what He has said. That’s a reasonable faith. It’s one that recognizes the limits of our knowledge, not one that denies knowledge altogether.
But what else do we have today?
Art & Literature: David Platzer writes about a Paris exhibit on Gertrude Stein and Pablo Picasso. “Edmund Wilson—who was generally sympathetic to her work and compared it to Yeats, Proust, and Eliot—noted in a 1923 Vanity Fair article that her word-portraits of Matisse and Picasso published in Camera Work made it ‘evident that Gertrude Stein had abandoned the intelligible altogether.'”
Words: If you or someone you know have shown symptoms of being a witcracker, call the number on your screen. You are not alone.
American Words: American pioneers had to make up words for a new world. Rosemarie Ostler writes, “Often these simply combined a noun with an adjective: backcountry, backwoods (and backwoodsman), back settlement, pine barrens, canebrake, salt lick, foothill, underbrush, bottomland, cold snap.” “Yankee is also almost certainly a Dutch contribution. Various theories have been suggested for the word’s origin (for instance, that it’s a Native American mispronunciation of English), but the most likely one derives the word from Janke (pronounced ‘yan-kuh’), a diminutive of John that translates as something like ‘little John.'” (via ArtsJournal)
Artificial Intelligence: Tech companies are hiring writers and poets to compose somewhat refined work, particularly in Hindi and Japanese. “It is a sign that AI developers have flagged fluency in poetic forms as a priority, while refining their generative writing products.” To what end? (via ArtsJournal)
Photo: Fairyland Cottages Minnesota, 1980. John Margolies Roadside America photograph archive (1972-2008), Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.
Everyone knows, I hope, that actions speak louder than words, which is a saying my old book of proverbs seems to derive from similar, older maxims such as this one from the French: Le fait juge l’homme or the deed proves the man. (Phrase Finder points to a 1693 sermon for the specific wording.) Words reveal our intentions, how we frame a problem, and if our actions give proof to our words, people believe us. They attest our integrity. If our actions work against our words, then our hearers have every reason to say we’re full hot air.
Politicians have historically low trustworthiness, according to polls, because their job is to overpromise and underdeliver, especially congressmen. They can’t do all they say they will do, because they have to work with a crowd of others who promised to do other things—some of which should not be done. Since Nixon shattered American confidence, the highest average percentage of people “who say they trust the government to do what is right just about always/most of the time,” according to the Pew Research Center, is 54%. That was on October 25, 2001.
On Monday, we will mark the 22nd anniversary of the hijacking of four commercial aircraft in an effort to punish the United States for crimes against Islam. Many politicians and civil servants have learned nothing in that time, judging by their actions. They want to be judged by their words alone, and not all of their words. Only the current ones. Why dig up the past by rehearsing old lies when the current lie is all we need? If they say we’re safe, secure, prepared–that’s all the proof we should need.
This being the third year of the Biden administration, and our country is weaker than we were in 2001. Yes, it’s Biden’s fault, but any of the recent Liberal/Progressive crop would have done the same. Progressivism undermines its own goals. If the optics are good, the goal has been achieved.
They give money to Iran and say it can’t be used for nuclear weapons development, so it’s safe. They open the southern boarder to allow thousands of who knows who to cross every day but claim it’s secure, so no worries. They spend from the FEMA fund on non-emergencies and are caught short when wildfires catch Hawaii responders off-guard. Oh, but the optics were good on that one, so maybe the president can hand out some money, tell a story about almost losing his house and car, and that will smooth over hurt feelings.
If it doesn’t, you can shut up, because Progressives don’t want your words unless you agree with them. Disagreement on some subjects is violence.
If 9/11 were to happen under this administration, they would be give the same speeches they give today about bravery, American unity, and how the president knows from personal experience how hard something like this can be. But nothing responsible would be done.
Subtle Sounds: The Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, has a 93-foot tower with forty wind chimes for the forty passengers and crew who died while opposing their hijackers. It’s called the Tower of Voices. The National Park Service has a good description and many photos. This video has captures the sound better than others I’ve found.
Antiquities: In other news, detectorists win again! A Norwegian man named Erlend Bore found a “cache comprised nine gold medallions and gold pearls that once formed an opulent necklace, as well as three gold rings” dating from 500 AD. (via Prufrock)
There’s a sort of a book review hidden in this rambling post, somewhere further on, but to start with I just want to bellyache a little about how much I’m suffering my art. Which is writing novels, in case you’ve forgotten due to all the time I take between publications.
I’m happy to say that, to my own surprise, I’ve been keeping up my new regimen of getting up at 6:30 a.m. to write. My goal, nothing superhuman, is 1,000 words a day, and most days I do at least that much.
But right now I’ve been slowed down a little. From time to time my story runs up against actual historical events and real locations, and that calls for research. Stuck in the 20th Century though I am in spirit, I have to admit that the internet provides opportunities that weren’t available back when I wrote The Year of the Warrior (which, if you don’t recall, was only about twenty years after the events in the story).
My challenge is to describe a voyage by Erling Skjalgsson, under the leadership of King Knut of Denmark/England, to the Baltic Sea to attack King Olaf Haraldsson (St. Olaf) of Norway. I have to get them through the Skagerrak and the Kattegat, the entrances to the Baltic, and into the Limfjord, where the saga says Knut gathered his fleet. And then over to present-day Sweden (the border of Skåne, which was Danish at the time) to fight the Battle of Helge å (Holy River). There Olaf pulls off a clever (but slightly confusing) stratagem that I’ll have to work out too. I might mention that historians disagree about the actual location of the battle – there are two Holy Rivers in Sweden, and a third site has also been proposed (purely, I think, out of meanness). I believe I’m going to stay with the traditional site unless somebody makes a strong argument to change my mind.
Anyway, the great thing I’ve “discovered” (and by discovered I mean figured out long after all the other writers did) is YouTube videos. The best resource I found is a series of videos called Sailing Magic Carpet (Episode 1 above), produced by a young couple (I think they might actually be married, which is nice) taking a sailboat into the Baltic. They sail the Limfjord the wrong way for my purposes (it had no western mouth during the Viking Age), but they still provide a lot of vicarious experience with sailing conditions and topography. Unfortunately, they sail up the wrong coast of Sweden for my purposes, but still the videos were useful.
They also recommended a book called Seraffyn’s European Adventure, by Lin and Larry Pardey. This book describes a similar voyage made back in the late 1970s by the Pardeys, in a pilot boat built by Larry himself. Lin was a very good writer, and she does an excellent job describing a simpler – but more dangerous – voyage, back before satellite navigation. Recommended.
I think I may be able to get back to 1,000 words a day tomorrow.
