Hávamál

Hávamál

The Sayings of Hár

1

The man who stands at a strange threshold,

Should be cautious before he cross it,

Glance this way and that:

Who knows beforehand what foes may sit

Awaiting him in the hall?

2

Greetings to the host,

The guest has arrived,

In which seat shall he sit?

Rash is he who at unknown doors

Relies on his good luck,

Voluspa :The Song of the Sybil

The Song of the Sybil

(W H Auden & P B Taylor Translation)

Heidi men call me when their homes I visit,

A far seeing Volva, wise in talismans.

Caster of spells, cunning in magic.

To wicked women welcome always.

Arm rings and necklaces, Odhinn you gave me

To learn my lore, to learn my magic:

Wider and wider through all worlds I see.

Tolkien and the Northern Tradition

Tolkien and the Northern Tradition

By Kveldulfr Gundarsson
J.R.R. Tolkien was a Professor of Anglo‑Saxon at Oxford for twenty years and, for some time thereafter, a Professor of English Language and Literature (his specialization was the West Midland dialect of Middle English). These positions required him to be fluent and deeply versed in Old English and Old Norse language and literature and to be a first‑rate philologist ‑ an expert in Germanic language and myth. His essay "Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics", for instance, has been one of the most influential writings in the scholarly study of that complex Anglo‑Saxon epic.

Solar Symbology in the Chronicles of Narnia

Solar Symbology in the Chronicles of Narnia
by Christopher Knowles

Far from being the dour hermit of Evangelical propaganda, CS Lewis was a much more complex and fascinating character. His eccentric personal life has come under scrutiny in recent years (his only marriage came in his late middle age and was an immigration scam, he also never fathered any children) and his religious eccentricity has never really been a secret. He once wrote to a friend, "I had some ado to prevent Joy and myself from relapsing into Paganism in Attica! At Daphni it was hard not to pray to Apollo the Healer. But somehow one didn't feel it would have been very wrong - would have only been addressing Christ sub specie Apollinis." Lewis biographies are rife with this kind of enthusiasm.

Lewis' first novel in The Chronicles of Narnia series, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, tells the story of the four Pevensie siblings- Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy - sent away from London during World War II to the countryside to stay with a kindly professor named Kirk.