Uncategorized

Thank you, Kenyon

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We know from the Bible that a prophet is never honored in his own country. By that standard, I definitely don’t qualify as a prophet. Because my talk last night in my home town (Kenyon, Minnesota, in case you missed it) went extremely well and was warmly received.

I gave a PowerPoint travelogue on my trip to Norway this summer, with a concentration on historical sights. Personally I think I went a little long, and some later alterations to the script came in ragged. But everybody seemed pleased and entertained, and my book sales were gratifying.

So, many thanks to the Kenyon Vikings Sons of Norway lodge.

Authors, Bookselling, Uncategorized

Headed home, briefly

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I was looking for a video about the Battle of Hafrsfjord for tonight’s post, but everything I found was longer than I wanted. But the film above is interesting. It’s not about Hafrsfjord, but about the Battle of Nesjar (1016), which I described in my novel, The Elder King. Erling Skjalgsson gets a mention.

The theme of my life just now seems to be homecoming. I went back to the first college I attended last weekend. And tonight I’m going to my home town, Kenyon, Minnesota, to speak to the Sons of Norway lodge (and hopefully sell some books).

I’m not lecturing in Viking costume this time. I’ll be giving a presentation on my trip to Norway this summer, emphasizing the historical sites I visited. I’ll concentrate especially on the battle of Hafrsfjord.

On the unlikely chance that you can be there (I should have announced this yesterday or earlier) the meeting will be held at First Lutheran Church in Kenyon at 5:30 p.m.

Religion

Pulling the Plug on the Metaverse

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Our friend Anthony Sacramone is the editor of Religion & Liberty for Action Institute, which focuses on the metaverse in the current quarterly edition. Gene Veith summaries it here.

In this issue, A. Trevor Sutton writes on our physical bodies in the act of worship and the problems a digitally limited, merely mental congregation can cause.

The feet, mouths, ears, hands, eyes, and hearts make it clear: Worship and the wonder of the human body come together in Luke’s Gospel. . . . The resurrection of Jesus forever altered our understanding of the human body and the way that our bodies respond in worship. Because the Divine Physician is risen, our organs cannot remain silent—they cry out in worship with hope and rejoicing.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Made a Killing,’ by Zach Abrams

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When a free (or cheap) British mystery, in a series new to me, shows up, I’m inclined to give them a try. I like the settings, and sometimes the books can be good.

Made a Killing by Zach Abrams had some things going for it, but ultimately I wasn’t pleased.

DCI Alex Warren of the Glasgow police goes to view a grisly crime scene. Scott Stevenson, a local antique dealer with a bad reputation, has been stabbed to death with a bizarre weapon – a carved elephant tusk. Nobody, except for the victim’s old mother, is mourning him. The man was widely hated, and Alex has personal knowledge of his deceiving and defrauding numerous people.

But murder is murder, and when potential witnesses start dying by stabbing soon after, the investigation ramps up. Meanwhile, Alex is also increasingly aware of the sexual interest of an attractive co-worker.

The story was all right, the setting interesting. But I did figure out the culprit before the end. And Alex’s affair with a colleague struck me as professionally dubious.

But most annoying was a writing problem, dangling modifiers. Sentences like, “Being the weekend, it could take time…” and “Although cold and dark, they found a bench to sit on…” appear again and again. There were other problems with diction too, like, “The flat itself comprised of an entrance hallway….” And “She bade them to sit on the couch….”

All in all, I wasn’t much impressed.

Non-fiction, Reviews

‘The Faded Map,’ by Alistair Moffat

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One of the most outstanding figures of the Dark Ages was St Adomnan. Much more than merely the biographer of St Columba, he was a politician and intellectual of considerable power. Perhaps his most notable initiative was the Law of the Innocents. At the Synod of Birr in central Ireland held in 697, he proposed that women, children and clergy be protected  from the brutal realities of Dark Ages warfare. Nothing else like it had been promulgated in Europe.

I bought Alistair Moffat’s The Faded Map on a sort of a whim. It’s not directly related to my central interests, but it seemed intriguing, and it relates to all that Arthurian stuff I’ve always been drawn to. And I’ve got to say, the book proved to be more than I hoped. Fascinating stuff, and written in a lively style.

“The principal focus of this book is failure,” the author writes. The subject is what we currently know as lowland Scotland and northern England, which until the early medieval period was generally occupied and ruled by British Gaels related to the Welsh. Threatened by Picts and Scots from the north, Anglo-Saxons from the south and east, and eventually Vikings (though they made shifting alliances with all these groups as circumstances dictated), these kingdoms were gradually pushed back and subsumed, so that their southern territories became parts of British Northumbria and their northern territories parts of Scotland.

The story is a fascinating one (at least to me), as it touches on much legendary material, and provides perspective on the Viking Age at the end. I was particularly gratified that the author entirely subscribes to the historical view endorsed by Prof. Titlestad in his (wonderfully translated) book, Viking Legacy, that ancient legend and poetry ought to be considered (cautiously) by historians:

But why should word of mouth be more untrustworthy than a written source? Who would rely on the British tabloid newspapers of the last thirty years as an honest record of anything? The bards of the fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries are to be trusted no less – and no more – than the scribes of the same period.

In short, I found The Faded Map a delight to read. Highly recommended.

Authors, Bookselling

Waldorf salad

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Salvesen Hall at Waldorf University. In my day, the library was on the ground floor at the left end, and in the cellar below.

So I did it. I went back to the college of which (out of the three I attended) I have the fondest memories, Waldorf College (now University) in Forest City, Iowa. It was Homecoming weekend, and they had an “authors’ fair” featuring four published authors who’d attended the school. I was the oldest of the lot, the Historical Footnote, you might say.

It turned out to be a fairly small affair, with maybe thirty people in attendance. The venue was a room in the new library (which looked pretty swanky to an old book gnome who used to toil in the former digs in the cellar of Salvesen Hall). We sat at a table at the front, and each of us got to do a 15-minute reading. Then there was a general Q&A session, and a time for bookselling. I read Chapter 15 of The Year of the Warrior, where Erling Skjalgsson meets Olaf Trygvesson as their ice-covered ships pass in the Boknafjord.

Two of my fellow authors were quite young, the third middle-aged but a recent graduate of the school’s Creative Writing program. That put me in the odd (to me) position of being the Grizzled Professional. A lot of the questions were directed to me as the one with the most experience of the publishing business. Although – as I took pains to point out – most of my experience is from another age and no longer applicable, except in spirit.

I hope I didn’t act like too much of an ass. Everybody was nice to me, but this is Iowa so that tells you nothing.

I sold a fair number of books for the size of the crowd, and received a handsome purple insulated cup with the school logo, from which I am drinking now, as a gift. Also an alumni sticker for my car.

The weather was glorious – bright sun and temperatures in the upper 70s, very clement for Iowa in late October. I hadn’t been back to Waldorf for decades (Christiania College in Wolf Time was modeled on it), and I was a little disoriented. First of all, the place looks smaller now than it did when I was 18. And they’ve changed a fair number of things. New buildings have been built, a reflecting pool has been dug by the Campus Center, and I had some trouble at first getting my bearings. Also, certain things are gone now, such as the World War II-era temporary classrooms where I studied Norwegian (I think I parked in that space, though I may be a few yards off).

I wanted to take time to do a walk-around, but didn’t get around to it. And it doesn’t really matter – it’s not the same school. It’s owned by new people and has a whole different mission. I came as the Ghost of Christmas Past, and I exited stage right when my scene was done.

Music

Sunday Singing: New Songs of Celebration Render

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“New Songs of Celebration Render” is an adaptation of Psalm 98 taken from Calvin’s psalter using a tune by Louis Bourgeois (1510-1561) or Claude Goudimel (1505-1572). The English translation appears to be by Eric Routley in 1974 and is still under copyright, so I’ll link to a version of the lyric instead of copying it here.

Blogs, Socials, Bookselling, Fiction, Poetry, Reading

Old Ogden Nash Hardcovers, Praising e-Readers, and Brain-Changing Reading

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For some years, I’ve had a water damaged copy of Ogden Nash’s Good Intentions. Here’s a look at a good copy of it; this one has the slip cover too (I hadn’t seen it before).

Yesterday, I found similar red, hardback copies of Many Long Years Ago, a collection of mostly previously published verse from 1931-1945, and The Private Dining Room, new verse published in 1953. I refrained from replacing Good Intentions or buying another volume they had, so you know what that says about me. We don’t need to say it out loud. I also could have purchased one of a couple more recently published anthologies. This is one of them. But, if I do anything, I’d like a set of the five red hardcovers.

Here are a few lines from Many Long Years Ago.

“Who wishes his self-esteem to thrive
Should belong to a girl of almost five.”

“We’ll remind each other it’s smart to be thrifty
And buy our clothes for something-fifty.”

“If turnips were watches they’d make as good eating as turnips.”

Reading: In praise of e-readers and the joy of winning an argument with a print-only reader who has so many books that he loses the ones he has.

How would Jesus advertise? I have a hard time believing Jesus would encourage us to spend millions on advertising his character traits. How many vice is being funded with a Super Bowl ad? But I also have a hard time throwing stones at this.

Does reading change the brain? “When it comes to a cultural trace in the form of literature, we would really like to know whether there is some sort of permanent alteration to the structure of the brain.” They chose Robert Harris’s Pompeii to see if they could detect a small brain change.

Banned Books: Anthony Sacramone has a book challenge for public schools. “Try and get all these at one go onto a public school curriculum (NYC, LA, SF) and see how that goes. I’d love to be proven wrong.”

Mystery: John Wilson reviews another Cameron Winter story, A Strange Habit of Mind, by Andrew Klavan, to be released in a few days.

Non-fiction, Reading

There are no Gaelic yes-men.

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I’m currently reading a book of history, The Faded Map by Alistair Moffat. It’s about ancient Scotland. In it I found this passage, which is of particular interest when considering the English language, which is spoken by so many of our readers.

Scots Gaelic is not like English, German or any of the Latin-based languages of southern Europe. There is no word for yes or for no. If a Gaelic speaker asks A bheil an t’acras ort? (‘Are you hungry?’), the answers use the verb forms Tha (‘I am’) or Chaneil (‘I am not’). This makes for greater precision and clearer understanding on either side of a question.

In other words, one of my grandfather’s favorites jokes would have been impossible if he’d been a Gael. If somebody asked Grandpa a question of choice, like, “Would you like apple or blueberry pie?” Grandpa would answer, “Yes.” Taking advantage, as you see, of the ambiguity of our English usage. (And possibly getting himself more pie.)

Languages evolve to deal with universal and localized communication problems, but they solve them in different ways. No language is superior to any other.

Except for English, of course. English is the best. Sure, it’s irrational in many ways, but that’s just to keep the riffraff out.

Also, Norwegian is pretty good.

Authors, Bookselling

Going public

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Above, something I’ve never seen before – a clip of John D. MacDonald giving a speech. He reminisces on his struggling years as a writer. The advice here is still good in terms of a writer’s attitude, but happily we don’t have to worry about the condition of returned manuscripts anymore. Say what you like about digital publishing, but you can’t deny the pages are always just as pristine, however many times you send them out. Any blemishes are likely to be grammatical, and your own stinking fault.

One thing I’ve rarely done in my long but obscure career  as a writer is give a public reading of my work. I’ve done a few signings – generally a harrowing and not very rewarding experience, but only a few readings. Which is odd when you think of it, because I’m good at that. Radio and acting experience, as I’ve mentioned more often than necessary.

But I’m going to be doing a reading on Saturday. It’s Homecoming time at Waldorf University, Forest City, Iowa, one of my several alma maters. Waldorf is special to me, because it was the first college I attended. They’re doing an authors’ forum, featuring several Waldorf graduates who write books. I’ll be one of them. I’m supposed to do a 15-minute reading, and then there’ll be a question-and-answer period, and we’ll have the chance to sell our books.

Consequently, I won’t be blogging on Friday, since I’ll be traveling that day. We appreciate your patience, and thank you for flying Brandywine Books.