Religion

How monsters are made

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The new Christianity Today came to the library today, and I had to stop and read the cover story, by Wess Stafford of the Christian charity Compassion International.

Stafford tells a harrowing story of years of abuse in an African boarding school for the children of missionaries (if you’re not aware, the standard practice for most Western missionaries in “the bush” has traditionally been to send the children to boarding schools for months of the year). The people who ran the school, as he remembers them, were people who’d wanted to be “real” missionaries, but didn’t make the grade for one reason or another, and were dumped into the “unimportant” work of loco parentis. Stafford’s analysis was that they were embittered, and took their frustrations out on the kids. Continue reading How monsters are made →

Fiction, Reviews

Reading report: Lokes Lek, by Edvard Eikill

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Once again, I offer something more in the line of a reading report than a book review, because (alas) the novel I’ve just finished reading isn’t available in English.

My friend Baard Titlestad of Saga Publishers sent along a copy of Edvard Eikill’s Lokes Lek, personally autographed for me by the author. I was fascinated and moved by what I read in its pages.

Lokes Lek (Loki’s Game) isn’t precisely a Viking book, but is set about a century after the death of Erling Skjalgsson, hero of my books. Indeed, Erling’s descendents at Sola are part of the story.

When Norwegians look back at their history, they see a Golden Age beginning with the Viking raids, and ending with the death of King Sigurd Jorsalfar (the Crusader). King Sigurd did mighty deeds in the Mediterranean as a young man, then settled down to a peaceful joint rule with his brother Øystein the Good, one of the country’s most beloved rulers. After Øystein’s death, Sigurd ruled alone, sometimes heedlessly, but there was peace in the land and the people loved him. Continue reading Reading report: Lokes Lek, by Edvard Eikill →

Poetry

The Landlord ended thus his tale

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Like great men before me (Lars, for one), I am taking leave of the blog for a few days. In the words of Longfellow:

25th Garmisch-Partenkirchen Beard Champioships

The Landlord ended thus his tale,

Then rising took down from its nail

The sword that hung there, dim with dust

And cleaving to its sheath with rust,

And said, “This sword was in the fight.”

The Poet seized it, and exclaimed,

“It is the sword of a good knight,

Though homespun was his coat-of-mail;

What matter if it be not named

Joyeuse, Colada, Durindale,

Excalibar, or Aroundight,

Or other name the books record?

Your ancestor, who bore this sword

As Colonel of the Volunteers,

Mounted upon his old gray mare,

Seen here and there and everywhere,

To me a grander shape appears

Than old Sir William, or what not,

Clinking about in foreign lands

With iron gauntlets on his hands,

And on his head an iron pot!”

All laughed; the Landlord’s face grew red

As his escutcheon on the wall;

He could not comprehend at all

The drift of what the Poet said;

For those who had been longest dead

Were always greatest in his eyes;

And be was speechless with surprise

To see Sir William’s pluméd head

Brought to a level with the rest,

And made the subject of a jest.

Uncategorized

Dueling for dollars

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The Duel: Captain

Yesterday our friend Ori sent me a link to an article (which unfortunately appears to have disappeared from cyberspace) on the custom of dueling, a tradition which (as you know) is of some interest to me.

The author’s thesis (making some use of game theory) was that the duel of honor was more than a ritualized method for obtaining personal revenge. It served a legitimate economic function in cultures where modern banking was unavailable, or where private borrowing remained a recourse for gentlemen in desperate circumstances.

In other words, imagine you’re a gentleman who sometimes needs a short-term loan, and your only source of credit is to borrow from another gentleman.

Now, imagine that someone publicly calls you a liar. Continue reading Dueling for dollars →

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Multicultural me

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I made it through the Festival of Nations, and now I remember why I usually skip it. This is the most exhausting way to spend three days just sitting around that I can think of (other than suffering through a Human Resources seminar).

Somehow it seems even more tiring than Minot’s Høstfest, though that’s longer. On the other hand, it has the advantage of being only a half hour’s drive away. But human interaction exhausts me, as I’ve whined before in this space. And the Festival of Nations is a twelve-hour day, 10:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., in a concrete bunker without sunlight. Like Hitler’s Last Days, with “It’s a Small World” piping in the background.

We Vikings were ensconced in our usual space, a sort of wide place in the corridor just off the vendors’ hall. Out of the way from one perspective, but a lot of traffic went by. I worked on tooling my leather trinkets—bookmarks and wrist bands—and sold a few of them, plus a moderate number of books. Nothing to write my publisher about, but enough for me to feel I hadn’t entirely wasted my time. Continue reading Multicultural me →

Authors, Fiction

Overstreet Interviews and Reviews

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Rachel Starr Thomson has a good interview with Jeffrey Overstreet in connection with a blog tour on his book, Raven’s Ladder. Here’s a portion:

Rachel: You’ve pointed out before that there are some amazing writers working in fantasy, some real depth and artistic merit. Why does the genre still get such a bad rap?

Jeffrey: Well, trashy book covers don’t help. And in a consumer-driven society, people will exploit their audiences by fashioning their work to appeal to our baser appetites. Thus, most fantasy takes from Tolkien the violence, the epic battles, the grotesque monsters, but they don’t carry on the grand and glorious ideals that stand in such stark contrast to the darkness.

Our imaginations are more easily dazzled by perversion, by what is lurid and twisted and shocking, than by what is true and beautiful. Beauty requires us to do some work to comprehend it. In our busy culture, where so much is competing for our attention, whatever is loud and shocking will win out. So a lot of fantasy writers and illustrators, as in any genre, exaggerate whatever will grab people’s attention.

But I also think that as people get older, they feel threatened by the mystery of fairy tales. They grow to prefer portrayals of a world that they can understand and control. So they write off fairy tales as childish, because their ego has a desire to feel very grown up, sophisticated, and in control. Not me. I like Madeleine L’Engle’s perspective: I’m 39, but I’m also 5, and 7, and 14, and 21.

Read the interview in part one, part two, and part three.

Links to the many reviews are here. And the same blog tour has coordinated other reviews of books I’m interested in. Andrew Peterson’s book North or Be Eaten! was reviewed by the blogger squad here. Athol Dickson’s book Lost Mission was reviewed here.

Music, Poetry

"What melodious sounds I hear"

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From the cross uplifted high

Where the Savior deigns to die

What melodious sounds I hear

Bursting on my ravished ear

Love¹s redeeming work is done

Come and welcome, sinner, come.

Sprinkled now with blood the throne

Why beneath thy burdens groan

On my pierced body laid

Justice owns the ransom paid

Bow the knee and kiss the Son

Come and welcome, sinner, come.

Read more from this hymn by Thomas Haweis (1732-1820)