Fiction, Reviews

Saga reading report: ‘The Tale of Thorvard Crow’s-Beak’

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13th Century illustration of the Battle of Stamford Bridge from Matthew Paris. It looked nothing like this.

I’m still slogging through a Very Long Book (a good book, but comprehensive), so tonight I’ll report on another tale from The Complete Sagas of Icelanders. This is the last story in Volume I, which means I’ll be coming to longer sagas again in the next one. I’m not sure what I’ll do to vamp while I’m reading future long books.

To my delight, this tale turned out have considerable personal interest. It involves Erling Skjalgsson’s grandson, Eystein Orre (son of Erling’s daughter Ragnhild and Thorberg Arnesson – you may remember the story of Thorberg’s courtship from King of Rogaland). Eystein had a sister named Thora who would, in time, become concubine (or wife, sources differ) to King Harald Hardrada, and would die with him following a legendary charge at the Battle of Stamford Bridge in England.

Our tale is the Tale of Thorvard Crow’s-Beak. Thorvard is a wealthy Icelandic merchant. He sails to Norway where he speaks to King Harald, inviting him to come down to his ship and accept the gift of a sail. (According to this article from the Viking Herald, the manufacture of one sail for a Viking ship could take as long as fifty years [!] Perhaps they mean 50 years in man-hours).

I’ve mentioned previously that King Harald appears uncharacteristically genial in most of these saga tales. But in this one we see him in his usual temper. He tells Thorvard, curtly, that he got an Icelandic sail once before, and it tore apart under wind pressure. So he’s not interested in another such gift.

However, Thorvard then offers the sail to Eystein Orre, the king’s best friend, and Eystein, on examining it, recognizes it as an excellent specimen. He accepts it with thanks and invites Thorvard to stop and see him at his own home when he sails back to Iceland. When Thorvard does so, Eystein gives him generous gifts.

And to cap it we are told that, on a later occasion, Eystein’s ship outsails the king’s. And when the king asks where he got this fine sail, Eystein tells him it’s one he had turned down. A nice final note for the storyteller – it could even be true.

I was surprised to see “Eystein Orre” translated as “Eystein Grouse” here. Orre does mean grouse, even in modern Norwegian, but I’m sure I read somewhere that Eystein got his nickname from Orre farm in Jaeder. Perhaps that’s the meaning of the farm’s name. If Eystein lived there, it would likely have been due to inheritance from Erling.

The Tale of Thorvard Crow’s-beak is one of the more plausible stories in the collection, just trivial enough to believe.

Music

Sunday Singing: How Good It Is to Thank the Lord

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For the final hymn this month, we have another adaptation of a psalm from the 1912 Psalter. “How Good It Is to Thank the Lord” is taken from Psalm 92:1-9, 12-15. The tune is called St. Petersburg by Ukrainian composer and harpsichordist Dimitri Stepanovitch Bortniansky (1751-1825).

“For you, O LORD, have made me glad by your work;
at the works of your hands I sing for joy” (Ps. 92:4 ESV).

1 How good it is to thank the Lord,
and praise to you, Most High, accord,
to show your love with morning light,
and tell your faithfulness each night;
yea, good it is your praise to sing,
and all our sweetest music bring.

2 O Lord, with joy my heart expands
before the wonders of your hands;
great works, Jehovah, you have wrought,
exceeding deep your ev’ry thought;
a foolish man knows not their worth,
nor he whose mind is of the earth.

3 When as the grass the wicked grow,
when sinners flourish here below,
then is there endless ruin nigh,
but you, O Lord, are throned on high;
your foes shall fall before your might,
the wicked shall be put to flight.

4 The righteous man shall flourish well,
and in the house of God shall dwell;
he shall be like a goodly tree,
and all his life shall fruitful be;
for righteous is the Lord and just,
he is my rock, in him I trust.

Authors, Publishing

Reading Thomas a’ Kempis, Great Art, and Intellectuals

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A little from Kempis’s Imitation of Christ

In the video above, I share from an 1898 (or earlier) inexpensive edition of The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a’ Kempis. It’s one of those books that looks as if it could have been valuable (just because it’s old and if it was in better shape), but it’s actually a cheap copy. This site on Chicago history notes the publisher of my book, Donohue, Henneberry, & Co., as purveyors of “inexpensive and unauthorized copies of popular books,” mostly fiction. I think my copy is from their set of cloth bound books, 50 in the series, sold at 75¢ each.

Most of the video is my unpolished reading from the book with a couple comments.

Art: Does great art come mainly from morally great men? “One lesson of a great city like Florence is that cruelty, greed, and depravity often coexist with civilization’s finest achievements. “

C.S. Lewis: November 29 is the author’s birthday. He was born in Belfast, 1898. In his chronicle of Lewis, Colin Duriez notes a meeting of Tolkien, Charlies Williams, Dr. Robert “Humphrey” Harvard, Owen Barfield, and Lewis on Nov. 23, 1944. Tolkien said the conversation was “most amusing and highly contentious.” Barfield, he said, could meet Lewis head on during a rousing argument, “interrupting his most dogmatic pronouncements with subtle distinguo’s.”

Intellectuals: Philosopher Roger Scruton talks with Hamza Yusuf about the natural bent of intellectuals toward leftism and what should just as naturally draw them out of it. That’s the first part of the linked recording. They go on to speak of many other topics, including the King James Bible, English grammar, and Islamic society.

Tristram Shandy: Writing advice from Laurence Sterne, “a line drawn as straight as I could draw it.”

Uncategorized, Writing

Local color in the Faroes

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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.

Uncategorized

Follow these 4 crazy steps for a better pumpkin pie!

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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.

  1. Do everything it says in the instructions on the pumpkin pie filling can (any brand will do), EXCEPT:
  2. Instead of using 2 eggs, use 7.
  3. Pour into 2,, not 1 deep dish pie shells.
  4. 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.

Fiction, Reviews

‘The Killing Bay,’ by Chris Ould

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Heljarayga was a small, natural cove no more than a hundred yards wide at its midpoint. Beyond that I couldn’t see much. The mist hung like a damp dust-sheet over the headlands and above the almost mirror-smooth water it appeared to ebb and flow slightly, gossamer fine. The stillness made you want to hold your breath. Nothing and nobody moved.

I knew a few things about the Faeroes before I started reading Chris Ould’s mystery novels. One of my Norwegian cousins (gone now) was married to a Faeroese woman (still around). The hymn, Tiðin rennur, which Sissel sings so beautifully, comes from there…

And they still hold an annual whale hunt in the old Norse tradition. The old Norse tradition was to herd whales into a bay or inlet and beach them in the shallows, then kill them there. It was an important element of survival in a subsistence economy. (My own ancestral home in Norway is a farm called Kvalavåg, which means “whale bay” or “whale inlet.”) But the custom has been abandoned in most places. In the Faeroes it still continues, stubbornly maintained as a central element of local culture. This has not entirely escaped the notice of anti-whaling organizations, and that fact generates the central conflict of The Killing Bay, second of Ould’s Faeroes mysteries.

Our hero, Jan Reyna, is still in the Faeroes. He’s an English police detective (born in the Faeroes but raised in England) currently on suspension, not sure if he even wants to go home. He rather likes the Faeroes, and most of the relations he’s met there, but he doesn’t really feel at home.

The female cousin who’s hosting him brings him along to witness the grindadráp, the whale hunt. He’s not enthusiastic about the thing, but doesn’t feel qualified to judge. While there he meets Erla Sivertsen, a female Faeroese native who’s working as a photographer for an environmental protest group, documenting the kill. While there Erla clashes with Finn Sólsker, a local fisherman, but violence is averted.

Not long after, Erla is discovered murdered, and the local investigators, led by Jan’s new friend Hjalti Hentze, have it as their first job to check whether Finn has an alibi. (This is awkward because Finn happens to be his son-in-law.) When Erla’s coat and hat are discovered hidden in Finn’s fishing hut, Hjalti is forced to arrest him, but he’s not convinced of his guilt. In addition, why is he getting pressure from his superiors to close the case before he’s examined all possible leads?

The mystery in The Killing Bay was well-constructed and solid, but it was the setting that really riveted me, as it did with the previous book, The Blood Strand. Author Ould does a masterful job of evoking the setting and atmosphere of the islands. I felt like I’d been there.

Highly recommended. Cautions for language and mature themes. Environmental politics are treated with an even hand.

Authors

Tolkien, in his own words

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I found the above video on YouTube, and as you can see it’s entitled, “There’s no way Tolkien was speaking English here.”

This is fascinating. If you’ve read biographies of Tolkien, you’ll have read about the fact that his speech in conversation tended to be garbled. (He’s said to have blamed it on an injury to his tongue, though that’s disputed.) The most famous recording of his voice, where he reads short excerpts from The Lord of the Rings, is not hard to understand — and that isn’t surprising, since everyone agreed that when he was lecturing he was always loud and clear.

But here we hear him casually enthusing about one of his favorite topics — trees, and he’s babbling away pretty incomprehensibly.

So now we can share the confusion. I’m gratified.

Fiction, Reviews

‘You’ll Get Yours,’ by Gerald Hansen

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Good characters do a lot to make a book work. But now that I’ve finished You’ll Get Yours, by Gerald Hansen, I think it’s possible to overdo it.

In the city of Derry, Ireland, a middle-aged woman’s body is found, dressed only in sexy underwear, on top of a cannon on the old city wall, her thumb superglued inside her mouth. As Detective Inspector Liam McLaughlin begins investigating, they find the woman hard to identify. No one seems to have known her. And when she finally is identified, as a woman who worked as a stocker at a nearby supermarket, it turns out she’s still a bit of a mystery. She seems to have no family, and there’s no record of her existence prior to four years ago.

In time it’s revealed that she’s been living under a false identity. She was once – briefly – famous, as a member of a Spice Girls-type girl band that had a few hits in the ‘90s. None of the other old group members are living in hiding, though, so what was she afraid of?

And the cops’ work won’t be made any easier by the almost universal hatred for the police that lingers in Derry, a residue from “the Troubles” of the old IRA years. In the end the solution will take them back to an old crime that time can’t bury and no one could possibly guess.

The emphasis in You’ll Get Yours is vivid characterization, and frankly I thought it was a little overdone. DI McLaughlin is a slob who’s always getting interrupted in the middle of eating a sandwich. His subordinates include a feminist detective with OCD, a fashion-plate womanizer, an over-eager rookie detective, and a female computer nerd. I think I was supposed to be amused by their interactions and frictions, but I found it all a little overdone and unconvincing.

The book wasn’t really that bad, plot-wise, and the solution was horrific and moving. But I couldn’t help being annoying by the comic book characterizations.

I should note, however, that references to religion were mostly respectful, and the author took trouble to avoid cursing.

You might enjoy it.

Music

Sunday Singing: O Lord, by Grace Delivered

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Noel tune by Arthur Sullivan

Today’s hymn of God’s sustaining faithfulness is an adaptation of Psalm 30 from The Psalter (1912). The Trinity Hymnal arranges the text to a tune by the great Irish-Italian composer Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900). It may be more commonly sung to another tune by Arthur Sullivan, but I stuck with the hymnal beside me and found the tune performed in the video here.

“I will extol you, O LORD, for you have drawn me up
and have not let my foes rejoice over me” (Ps. 30:1 ESV).

1 O Lord, by grace delivered,
I now with songs extol;
my foes you have not suffered
to glory o’er my fall.
O Lord, my God, I sought you,
and you did heal and save;
you, Lord, from death did ransom
and keep me from the grave.

2 His holy name remember;
you saints, Jehovah praise;
his anger lasts a moment,
his favor all our days;
for sorrow, like a pilgrim,
may tarry for a night,
but joy the heart will gladden
when dawns the morning light.

3 In prosp’rous days I boasted;
unmoved I shall remain;
for, Lord, by your good favor
my cause you did maintain;
I soon was sorely troubled,
for you did hide your face;
I cried to you, Jehovah,
I sought Jehovah’s grace.

4 What profit if I perish,
if life you do not spare?
Shall dust repeat your praises,
shall it your truth declare?
O Lord, on me have mercy,
and my petition hear;
that you may be my helper,
in mercy, Lord, appear.

5 My grief is turned to gladness,
to you my thanks I raise,
who have removed my sorrow
and girded me with praise;
and now, no longer silent,
my heart your praise will sing;
O Lord, my God, forever
my thanks to you I bring.

Blogs, Socials, Bookselling, Writing

The Rise of Christmas Books in Britain

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Giving books at Christmas has been a long tradition with readers. In the early 19th century, plenty of books sold in the weeks preceding Christmas, but none of them were published for the season. Often people bought attractively bound collections of essays, poems, or classic novels that they knew they would enjoy.

In one of his books on the industry, publisher Joseph Shaylor writes, “Between 1820 and 1830 there came into existence a series of Annuals which caused quite a revolution in the sale of books for Christmas.” British bookman Rudolf Ackermann came up with the idea, publishing Forget-Me-Not: A Christmas and New Years Present for 1823. They were published every year through 1848, having a circulation of 18,000 at the height of its popularity.

Cover of 1823 annual, titled "Forget Me Not"

Another publisher released Friendship’s Offering in 1824, which found its way to America some years later as knockoff copies. Apparently, many volumes were hacked this way in America, even lesser works rebound and distributed under new popular titles (which sounds like clickbait to me). Friendship’s Offering may have published some higher quality literature than most. For example, Thomas Babbington Macaulay’s poem “The Armada” was printed in the 1833 edition. It ran until 1844.

Engraver Charles Heath launched multiple annuals, “such as the Picturesque Annual, in a guinea volume which contained engravings from the best landscape painters of the day,” and The Book of Beauty, edited by Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington and Irish novelist in her own right. Her social influence drew attention from many literary stars and would-be stars, including Disreali.

“The rise of the Annuals appears to have diffused a fashion for artistic and elegant pursuits, and helped to evolve a taste for literature and the fine arts. They were the principal publications of the year, and much time and consideration were given to their production.”

Booksellers have tried to inspire an Easter season of book-giving to no avail.

All right. What else we got?

Literary Translation: Joel Miller talks to Russian translator Lisa C. Hayden about the art of moving a novel into another language.

When it comes to translation choices, there’s not always a “right” choice, just the choice that seems best. How does literary intuition play into your work?

I rely a lot on intuition. It particularly kicks in when I’m reading the manuscript out loud. I’m listening for lots of things but particularly want to feel that there’s an ease to the reading and a rhythm to the writing. I know when they feel right but rarely know how to explain why they feel right.

Secular Morals: Seth Mandel writes the former director of Human Rights Watch “is what you’d get if Soviet ‘whataboutism’ were a person, a golem manifested by the chantings of Oberlin freshmen. . . . HRW and Amnesty International both had no idea how to handle a post-9/11 world because terrorism didn’t really fit into their worldview.”

Writing: “True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,
As those move easiest who have learned to dance.”

Books: “Books are men of higher stature, And the only men that peak aloud for future times to hear.” – Elizabeth B. Browning, “Lady Geraldine’s Courtship”