Meditations on "The Monsters and the Critics" by J. R. R. Tolkien

I've just read Tolkien's famous lecture/essay on Beowulf, "The Monsters and the Critics." In it he takes certain literary critics to task for their assertions that Beowulf's author eschewed the lofty in favor of the trivial by placing the monsters – Grendel, Grendel's mother, and the dragon – at the center of the poem.

It is a beautiful, beautiful essay that, apart from scoring an absolute bull's eye (and applying the zinger: I have, of course read The Beowulf, as have most [but not all] of those who have criticized it), also weighs in on the power of myth and the importance of looking at art as art. It also demonstrates how we can gain perspective through a thoughtful examination of historical context.

Near and dear to my heart, and at the heart of his argument, Tolkien staunchly defends the northern
mythological imagination. This is a balm to my soul! I show great restraint by not simply retyping the whole thing right here!

Though scarcely a child of the internet age, I wanted so much, as I read the essay, to send Dr. Tolkien an email, or tweet to him in sincere appreciation and in solidarity; but Tolkien, of course, was, as he himself said of Beowulf, a man, and that…is sufficient tragedy: man falls prey to death and then he is lost…! How fortunate that his words may live on, so that one may meditate upon them, as below.

A person alive and a person dead exist at the same time 

Like Tolkien, I believe strongly in the significance of myth.

Myth does not unfold in an "historical" time, but rather in an imagined time. However, as Tolkien says, it is at its best when it is presented…as incarnate in the world of history and geography…

I would add that, in myth, meanings bleed to the surface of the ordinary, so that this bloodiness, this
contact with the juice that (normally) flows invisibly within, becomes ordinary.

In my novel The Bear Wife, bones - skeletal remains emptied of a person's soul - are inhabited,
pregnant, in a sense, with significance. (He who in those days said and who heard…[the kenning] ban-hus 'bone-house'…thought of the soul shut in the body, as the frail body itself is trammelled in armour, or as a bird in a narrow cage, or steam pent in a cauldron. There it seethed and struggled in the wylmas, the boiling surges beloved of the old poets, until its passion was released and it fled away on ellor-si∂, a journey to other places 'which none can report with truth, not lords in their halls nor mighty men beneath the sky.')

In this mythological way of thinking, a thing is both what it is, and what it is not. Or maybe what it is, and what it once was, both at the same imagined time.

In this way of thinking, a person alive and a person dead exist at the same time, in balance, as Tolkien describes the two halves of the Anglo-Saxon line of verse, halves that balance and build upon each other, "more like masonry than music."

In this way of thinking there is the sense of a building, a structure, "a tough builder's work of true stone," rather than a sense of moving forward, or of narrative. But I don't think – and I don't think Tolkien thought either – that this 'structure' represented a state of repose. Far from it; the balance,
in fact, was an uneasy one.

In The Well and the Tree Paul Bauschatz discusses the lack of a future tense in Germanic languages. There are only the past and the present, two conditions, and the future is called necessity.

Some say the future is now. Perhaps, essentially, necessity is the now, the only weapon we may wield against the monster, a stonemason's tool in the delicate balance between life and death.


Quotes are from "Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics" and "On Translating Beowulf", both from The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays, by J. R. R. Tolkien. Edited by Christopher Tolkien. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1984.

I also refer to The Well and the Tree: World and Time in Early Germanic Culture by Paul C.
Bauschatz. Amherst: The University of Massachusetts Press, 1982.

Please, gex youz acx xogexhez, Bew Yozk Ximes!

What
if I wrote an article about The New York
Times and decided to leave out the letters n, r and t and substitute some other letters in their places? It might
become the Few Yolk Limes. Or the Bew Yozk Ximes. Ix would be absuzd,
righx?

I
just read "Pommes de Terroir," a short article about the specialty potato industry in Sweden, in Sunday's New
York Times travel magazine. And would you believe it? The writer and
editors completely disregarded three letters of the Swedish alphabet!

They
just weren't there at all.

 

It's Spelled That Way for a
Reason

The
travel writer, Abby Aguirre, went to Skåne, one of Sweden's southern provinces,
and visited the municipality of Båstad. Båstad, because of the å in the first syllable, is pronounced almost like "BOO-stah." It's not spelled Bastad, as the Times would have it; Bastad
sounds more like a snooty British rendering of bastard.

According
to Båstad's website, there are different theories for how the town got its name.
Like many place names, it could derive from an early resident's name. Båstad
could be a shortened version Bootho's-sted (the place where Bootho lives). Or
perhaps Bodo's-sted. Both are
regional names going back at least to the ninth century; we know of them
because they appeared in a French chronicle identifying Norman/Viking men with
origins in Skåne. Another possibility is that the name is a shortened version
of båtställe (båt being the word for boat),
probably meaning some sort of boat passage or landing.

But in either case you can see how keeping the å rather
than an a in the first syllable of Båstad is absolutely key; spelled with
an a it has a completely different
pronunciation, one that would not link it to either of its possible origins. Thus,
one could say that changing the å to a not only sounds like a nasty insult,
but also robs the town of a bit of its meaning and history.

 

A rose by any other name...would be something else entirely

Continuing
on through the Times piece, the sjö in Rammsjö is a word that means sea
or lake. Sjo is meaningless and I'm
pretty sure it's unpronounceable as well.  

Also, a trädgård is a garden. It is composed of
the elements träd (tree) and gård (yard).  Tradgard means nothing in Swedish. (In English it might be
the name of some product advertised on late-night television, designed to
protect your trad, whatever that is.)

Väderö is an island, indicated by
the final element ö, the word for island. The first element, väder, means weather. Vader means
nothing (unless we're talking about Darth).

Moreover, the
name of the Cape on which the potatoes in question grow is, as it says on the sign
pictured on page 107 of the magazine, Bjäre,
not Bjare. Also, I believe the vodka
is named after Börje Karlsson, not Borje, and the potato dealer's name is Göran not Goran. (Not only does ö
sound completely different than o,
but it also renders the g soft and
thus is essential for intelligibility. I ask you: would Jennifer want you to call her Gonnifer?)

Finally,
there's no such thing as farsk
potatoes. They are färsk: fresh.

 

A language resonates with
the history, the logic and the character of its people

I mention
all of this not to be picky, and not to try to seem cooler-than-thou because I
know a little Swedish. I bring it up because I think it really matters.  

I mean, come on! Man up, people!

They
may inconvenience your typesetter, but the three letters å, ä and ö comprise nearly 10% of the Swedish
alphabet. Ignoring them demonstrates a profound lack of respect for the Swedish
language and for language in general. I mean, did the folks who standardized
Swedish just go on a drinking binge one day and randomly decide to place dots
over some of their vowels just for the heck of it? Well...maybe.

But seriously, however it happened, the fact is that Swedish has 29 letters. They are all
necessary to differentiate the sounds of the language. A is different than å or ä. O
is different than ö.  They look different, they sound
different and they have different effects on the consonants that surround them.
And the spelling of a word speaks to the word's composition, its meaning
and its origin.

 

What is a travel magazine
for, anyway?

Is
it ignorance, laziness, or does the New
York Times just not care about getting it right? Maybe it's just taking advantage of the good-naturedness of Swedes, of their willingness to extend themselves to understand us, even when we don't reciprocate. But in this global age, no one
– certainly not a publication that considers itself to be relevant to
people traveling overseas - can afford to display this sort of ignorance and disrespect.

Getting
the names right is an important part of showing respect and highlighting the
beauty and uniqueness of a place and a people. That, after all, is what a
travel magazine should be for.

What this fan wants to see...

 

I want to see smiles from these guys!

What does this fan want to see from her dear but beleaguered team, the Washington Capitals? Well, of course, I'd like to see them bring the Stanley Cup home to DC. (Yes, HOME!)

But the Cup is, for all its mystical pull, one of those rewards that we work for but whose actual meaning is in the hurdles we must clear to win it: we must constantly hone our skills, practice, prepare, and endure physical and mental sacrifice and hardship. The Cup is what it is because of what it demands: dogged, persistent play on every shift, tons of courage and spirit, plus a grand dose of favor from the hockey gods. You can strive your entire life for a reward such as this, and never win it. Many never do. But they can hold their heads high because of the striving. 

I want to see the Caps play hard, give up nothing easy, and, if they do, come back immediately, with a vengeance.

Last spring, swept by Tampa Bay, they looked like deer in the headlights. This season, it seems, they have been in the process of transitioning into the kind of team that won't go down easily. Who knows whether they've accomplished the full transition? No one. But the playoffs - a heightened version of hockey reality - will surely hold the answer. Maybe, just maybe, the playoffs will be the anvil on which the new Caps are finally, fully, forged. 

That's what this fan wants to see.

Painting by letters, or writing through an artist's lens

One of my current projects is to find an agent to represent The Bear Wife, and to represent me as a writer.  Out of the seemingly kajillions of literary agents out there I must find someone who represents books that are in some way similar to mine, and who, therefore, might know where to go to sell it.  

To this end I've been spending hours on agents', authors' and book-selling websites reading about novels. The upside of this is that I've discovered some books that I otherwise wouldn't have (given that my recent reading has revolved around hockey and western Canadian native history).

Two of these books, The Russian Dreambook of Color and Flight by Gina Ochsner and The House of Tomorrow by Peter Bognanni, have become special favorites of mine. As it turns out they are represented by the same agent. So she must really like them both, too. The interesting thing is how very different they are from each other.

I was wondering to myself, how can I describe how they differ? It's true that their settings and characters have nothing in common, but that doesn't really explain it. Ochsner and Bognanni could quite possibly swap out setting and character, so that each writes a story using the other's characters and setting, and still come up with completely different results. As if you asked Rembrandt and Kandinsky to draw pictures of the same horse.

If I wanted to liken their styles to visual artists, it's an easy call for Ochsner: Chagall, no doubt. The title Russian Dreambook of Color and Flight doesn't lie, folks. It is Chagall, through and through. Brilliant color. Floating clouds, bottles of liquor, worn-in work-boots and souls. Dreams and passions and all the music of life are unmoored from the bleak, painful realities of post-Soviet Russia which, quite literally, sink away. Ochsner's lens is perfect because it adds another layer of authenticity to her story.

The House of Tomorrow is more difficult to pin down. It is not particularly "painterly"; the "brushstrokes" are invisible compared to Ochsner's in the Russian Dreambook. Bognanni's characters, filtered through the consciousness of his protagonist, Sebastian, are necessarily drawn with some distortion, but subtly so,lovingly, and with great respect, even as they are dishing out lines like, "you sound like a big limp wang every time you open your mouth." Lines that (from my perspective as a nowadays mother-of-two who once did her time with a high-school rock band) sound simultaneously hilarious,obnoxious and poignant. Lines that function as comic relief even as they sing with meaning. Lines that, rather than a painting, evoke a graphic novel, where utterances vibrate into images, the expressionist hatches from the shell of adolescent cool.

I'm thrilled by how differently these two authors perceive the realities of their fictional landscapes and people-scapes, what they choose to emphasize or exaggerate or ignore, each within an aesthetic of operatic intensity. And as I think about it now, I wonder if each author's choice of lens wasn't inevitable, given the story they were trying to tell.

 

I may be a hockey fan but my son's really into basketball. The NBA lockout was a real hardship for him, but ultimately, of course, he got the best Christmas present ever:  the beginning of a brand new NBA season. My first reaction was incredulous. The season starts with a bunch of games on Christmas?  Those poor guys! Shouldn't they be home celebrating or relaxing with their families?  Not to mention the NFL guys who have to play on the holiday!  And all those college bowl games on New Year's Day!  Those guys don't even get paid!

But as part of my research for my next book, I was just reading a couple of articles that made me revisit and perhaps revise my outrage.  They are from a collection titled "Winter Sports in the West."  (The west of Canada, that is.)  

The first, "Sports and Leisure in the Nineteenth Century Fur Trade," by Greg Thomas, reminds us that holidays, and in particular, Christmas and New Years and the week in between, were perfect for games and sports, mainly because so many people (read: men) didn't have to work on those days.

On Hudson Bay Company fur trade posts in the 18th and 19th centuries, the game of choice was "football," which at the time was probably some combination of what we now know as rugby and  non-American (un-American?) football, i.e. soccer.  Thomas says that "mention is made of playing football as early as New Year's Day 1734 at a Prince of Wales Fort at Churchill, and the games remained a frequent part of the Christmas-New Year's holiday season at the Hudson Bay Company bayside posts throughout the 18th and early 19th centuries." From there the tradition spread to other HBC posts. Competition was keen, because the winners were often awarded with large quantities of liquor.  ("Here we go!")

A Christmas Day game at York Factory in 1823 was apparently "not kept up with much spirit probably from the severity of the weather [gee, at York Factory - on the balmy shores of Hudson Bay! - on December 25th?  ya think?] combined with a previous too free use of the bottle."

Thomas states that "the contests also may have acted as a useful safety-valve for social tensions" between the "gentlemen" who ran the posts and the company servants. In other words, the games, like other holiday traditions such as wassailing, were one of the only times when those of a lower station could gain the upper hand.

 

Watch night for the Caps

Twenty-four hours ago I had no idea that Bruce Boudreau, Washington Capitals head coach, had been fired. It had been an unusual morning for me; I hadn't checked email or twitter or even listened to the radio.

I arrived at Kettler Capitals Iceplex just before 11:00 for the public skate. I hadn't been on the ice for a week and was really looking forward to a good workout, in spite of a sore foot. To my dismay the parking lot at the top of the garage was very crowded. The Caps' cars were there, of course - they would start a homestand Tuesday after a couple of humiliating losses over the weekend - but their assorted sports cars and SUVs don't fill the lot. As I circulated looking for a spot I imagined that the rink would be, as it was last week, full of children on school holiday, streaking around recklessly and impulsively, adding a dash of je ne sais quoi to my morning.

Anyhow, I had to drive partway back down into the garage to get a spot, which is pretty unusual. When I walked into the building there was a definite buzz, but I averted my eyes from the Caps' rink. All I wanted was to skate; after a long holiday weekend of distractions (albeit pleasant ones), I wouldn't be deterred.

I exchanged pleasantries with the skate guard, but my regular rink buddies weren't there, so I didn't talk with anyone else. I just got onto the ice as quickly as I could. About 15 or so minutes in, a large group of very nice looking young men in suit jackets came in through the mall entrance and circled around to the locker room area. Turns out they were the St. Louis Blues, in town early for their game tomorrow against the Caps, and scheduled to practice in the public rink at 1:00. Maybe they were the cause of that extra buzz?  

The rink became more crowded and my sore foot got tired. I decided to pack it in, but since I'd only been on the ice for about 35 minutes I thought I'd go across the lobby and check on my boys. Immediately I realized that something was up. The bleachers and the balcony and the standing room all around the Caps' rink were totally jammed with people. (The Post this morning said that there were "more than 100" - yup, way more than 100, I would say.) Normally there are quite a few folks at Caps practices, but never this many, except when the schools are closed  - and then it's a majority-kid crowd. Today was different. The spectators were adults, intense and expectant. They sat in pairs or small groups, greeting friends as they came in, talking about how they found out, or what plans they had changed in order to attend this impromptu gathering. There was a real community feeling, almost like a town meeting, and a feeling of expectation. A camera man was making his way up the bleachers, filming interviews with some of the fans. Overhearing one of these interviews - of which the main topic was Dale Hunter - I finally realized what had happened.

The oddest thing was that, even though it should have been the middle of their practice session, there were no players on the ice, only piles of pucks.  Clearly the thing to do was to join the wait, and so I did.

Finally Alex Ovechkin led his team onto the ice, and the crowd broke into cheers. Even louder, more sustained cheering and applause, though, were reserved for the entrance of Dale Hunter, a very popular player and captain of the Capitals in the late '80s and '90s, named to the be new head coach. 

Practice commenced. It actually looked fun. I saw a tweet by a Baltimore news outlet saying that it was intense, that guys were trying to impress the new coach, and I'd be worried if that wasn't true. But I saw some smiles on the ice, and that gave me heart.

As a fan, you want to see your team work hard, but you want them to have some fun with it. Otherwise, how can you have fun? All of these guys worked to get where they are today, and they know they have to work now, to pull themselves out of this latest round of misery. Under these circumstances, it should feel good to get to work; they should be smiling. That is the hockey credo so oft repeated: work hard and you'll be rewarded. And if somehow a renewed joy in work - brought in by a former player who was known for his hard work - can bring some lightheartedness to what was once a thrilling team full of swagger, but has lately been a lost, dazed-looking group, there should be a snowball effect.  Let's hope.

When I left the building I stopped to take off my jacket - even on a late November day it was much warmer outside than in. As I dropped my skate bag on a concrete planter and fished around for my car keys, I became aware of a man standing to my right, speaking loudly into a cellphone. Joe Beninati! Caps commentator extraordinaire! I didn't want to eavesdrop, but I couldn't help but overhear. He said something to this effect: (and I apologize for quasi-quoting without permission this verbal gem from a man who is known for them) ...When I came here this morning, part of me felt like I was going to a funeral, and part of me felt like I was going to a birthday.  For Dale Hunter, it's a birthday...  

I'm sure that Bruce Boudreau tried his best, and no one can deny that the Caps had a lot of success during his tenure, but it's time to bring in the new. As the fans at Kettler demonstrated yesterday, holding a sort of vigil for their team at what was effectively a "watch night" - a time of great vulnerability but also of promise and renewal - the Team is bigger than any one person. Though owned by Ted Leonsis, it is really a collective property, fed by the endless stream of words and ideas, blogs and tweets, agony and ecstasy and (we can't forget) cash of its fans. In the heart of each one of them there shines a vision of the Stanley Cup held aloft by a player in a Caps jersey. Time to get back to work!

Let's hope for not just a birthday, but a re-birth day for the Caps. 

Excerpt from "The Bear-Wife"

Ragnar came upon Fardan near his hut, where the priest had just concluded the mid-afternoon prayer. Ragnar clapped his shoulder joyously, and the priest nearly buckled with the force of the blow. "Fardan, you must congratulate me. My grandson is born. He is strong like his father and already his eyes are bright and clear as he looks upon the world."

"Ah, Ragnar, that is wonderful news. Accept my sincere best wishes for you and for your grandson."

"I thank you, Fardan." replied Ragnar.

"And might I add, my friend, how pleased I am to see a smile upon your face." said the priest. "I can tell you something that will cause it to broaden even more."

"What could that be, Fardan?" asked Ragnar.

"Well, Ragnar, it is with great gratitude to the Lord God and the blessed Saint Bede that I am able to report to you that, like yourself, the child's mother has received the sign of the cross and, in so doing, has taken the first step along the path that leads to salvation."

"The child's mother?"

"Yes, your grandchild's mother. She who dwelt among the beasts of the dark forest. She who some called the Bear-wife. Under my humble guidance she has accepted Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior.

"And there is further cause for rejoicing, Ragnar, because your grandson shall be baptized and his soul, although stained with sin, shall be granted salvation, and when the Day of Doom comes, he shall sit with you at the right hand of the Lord God, in Eternal Bliss.

"And so it remains only to bestow this blessing upon your son and upon the others of your family, and the task shall be complete. Your household shall assume its place in Christendom and you shall see what glory awaits."

It seemed to Ragnar that his mind was spinning, that all the world around him was spinning. How had it come to this? Must he endure now, at this moment of joy, the gloating of this wearisome priest, Sven's cast-off, who, he suddenly realized, had convinced him of nothing aside from his own fears? How easy it must have been for Fardan to accomplish this in the heart of the poor orphan girl. Yet even she had shown courage and deserved better.

"The beasts of the dark forest indeed," sputtered Ragnar. "You are the beast. Yes, you, priest! Stalking – terrorizing – here, on my own land - preying upon the fears and the uncertainty of your victims. You are a blight upon us! You are a pestilence! Be gone and let us be!" Ragnar waved him aside and strode off, out of the infield and up the path to the open pasture.

That high land was empty now of men and beasts, for Ragnar's rams had long since rejoined the rest of the herd for the breeding season. Ragnar came to the stones of the grave-field by the Mirror Tarn and he stood among them, staking his claim, as they did, to all of the windy plateau and the rolling land below.

There lies the valley. There the flat lands stretch toward the sea. There lie the meadows, there runs the river, there stand rock and oak. There lie the stones of Thorbjorn's ship and there the sturdy timbers of Svanhild's altar are planted. There, beside the Old Road, scratched along the ridge-top, dwell Gunnar and his kin. And beyond lies the lake – see it sparkle against the green velvet forest.

This is it. This, to me, is everything there is.

Ragnar sat down upon the damp earth. He leaned on one of the rough, lichen-covered boulders that rested there, one of a ring of stones. Golden grass-strands with their heads of perfect seeds, thick bunches of dark green heather clothed in purple, blueberry shrubs tinged with scarlet, all blended and bowed before his eyes. When was the last time he had looked at these small things, each gleaming like the rarest jewel? They had been here, always, through seasons of plenty and seasons of want, growing from the bones of the earth, and from the bones of his parents and grandparents, their parents and theirs. He delighted in them now, in this still, silent moment. For though he knew in his heart that the turning point of his world had already come and gone, here, in this landscape of cairns and mounds and standing stones; here, at the threshold between this world and the next, was an opening to taste the sweetness of that late-summer blossoming of life, that moment of knowing that the long days are irretrievably gone. It was as if, having climbed for a lifetime, he had at last come up over the crest of the hill and just as he was taking in the panoramic view, he found himself beginning to roll down the other side, wheel upon wheel, faster and faster – and what waits at the bottom?

Around him now Ragnar sensed many voices, many gestures: gentle, harsh, demanding, judgmental - sympathetic. They were gathering behind him now, his forebears: Aelfrid the hero, his great brass-studded shield shattered; Old Ragnar, who had built the hall in which the household still lived, and also Red Thorbjorn, Ragnar's grandfather, drinking and toasting at his return from the lands of the Franks. Although their lives, like Ragnar’s own, had doubtless hurtled from birth to death with barely a pause to reflect, to him they had always seemed as fixed and eternal as the mountain of which they were now a part. But during their lives they, too, must have faced choices. Had they wavered? Had they been afraid? Had they chosen well? Or poorly? He lived with the consequences of their choices, as his grandson would live with his. They had left him here, at their lives' end, but he must go on, with or without their understanding or their approval. It would be for later generations to look back upon him and judge.

As he sat there, resting among the stones, nearly hidden by the tall meadow grasses, two young girls came up the path, walking together towards the Mirror Tarn. They seemed to float across the meadow, golden hair blowing and long, white arms. He couldn’t see what they had in their hands but whatever it was they deposited it there, at the spring, in a manner at once solemn and conspiratorial.

Ragnar waited for them to be done with their small offering, and to turn back toward the settlement. How lightly they tread upon the earth. How simple their desires. A handsome young groom? A new set of ribbons for their hair? He smiled to himself, and felt his heart lighten. Then he rose, gathered himself up, and returned to his hall.

Above is an excerpt from The Bear-Wife, my novel set in 10th century Sweden.  I'll be posting updates as the book moves toward publication.  If you like you can also check out this post I wrote about the book a while back.

What Is Left?

The Caps don't need to win. But it hurts to see them skate through the final period of a pretty-much-must-win playoff game looking like they don't care.

What draws me to hockey is this:  you FIGHT! And no matter what happens, no matter what the odds, no matter if you're bruised or broken or twisted or bleeding, you struggle to make the right choices and you fight until the end.

It's a beautiful metaphor for life. You may not win. Hey - let's face it - most of us don't. You're often up against forces that are larger and stronger than yourself. But you keep fighting. You don't stop skating, or thinking, a quarter of the way through the third period. You keep thinking, you keep talking with your teammates, you keep playing hard, you keep fighting.

And if you do that, then even if you loose - hey, this year 29 out of 30 NHL teams will NOT win the Stanley Cup! - you deserve to be proud.

I just want to feel proud of my team.

What is left at the bitter end, in the dusty display case of life: Some old hockey pants and a stick, a jersey or two - and, if you've earned it, PRIDE!

Okay guys, here's how you win

Okay Caps fans, because I'm so brilliant (not!) and have won so many hockey games (not!), here's another stab at it.

Coach Bruce Boudreau once likened coaching to parenting. You try to give them all the tools, but then they've got to do it themselves. And they're not going to do it until they're good and ready. And like the poor Arlington, Virginia, 3-year old who was kicked out of preschool because she wasn't fully potty trained, the Caps will keep losing until they're ready to win.

I'll call her Little Suzy, because I don't know her name. (It was probably withheld so that this unfortunate episode doesn't keep her from being admitted to Harvard someday.) Usually Little Suzy can tell that she has to go potty, but she needs the muscular coordination to hold it in, the will to stop digging that hole in the sandbox, the poise to approach her teacher and say "I need to go potty," the courage to climb onto the step-stool, the dedication to pull down her pants, the will to sit down on that icy cold seat...

No, I'm NOT belittling Little Suzy or the Caps. Not at all. I'm counseling patience. Not easy for us Washington-area type-A fans. We want the Stanley Cup now!

"Sidney got it; why can't I have it too?"

Patience! Defense is good. Offense is good. Having the control and the wherewithal to utilize them both at the appropriate times, having them both clicking at the same time is really good. Sure as Suzy will some day be potty trained, the Caps will be able to put these pieces together.

But they have to really want to win.  They have to be desperate to win. Could it be that they're just not developmentally ready?

Yes,they need the tools and they need the discipline - they also need the experience to take those, in a poised way, into a tough game situation and employ them at will. Hopefully this period of pain is giving them some practice in that regard.

But then they have to grasp that stick and hop out onto the ice. They have to muscle that opponent, command that puck, wrench the game out of the other guys' hands. They have to will themselves to see, to take advantage, to improvise and, ultimately, to control the action.

That's the magic part. It's when, all of a sudden, Little Suzy can go all by herself!

That's when the Caps begin to choreograph - creating a dance with puck as partner. It's not enough to wait for her, to hope for her, to dream of her like a lovesick schoolboy. But like a jealous lover you must control where she goes, who she's with.  You must command her, control her and then send her smashing into the net

 

 

Unleash the sprinklers!

One of my favorite movies is Bull Durham. I just love the thick, ungainly rookie pitcher "Nuke" Laloosh. He's the Natural Man: unfiltered, unabridged, uncensored, unexamined, unzipped. Hilarious! And somehow he ended up with the million-dollar arm. (I guess in today's dollars it would be 100 million.)

One of my favorite scenes in Bull Durham is when the Durham Bulls - a minor league baseball team - turn the sprinkler system on at the field they're scheduled to play on the next day, and slip-n-slide into the wee hours in the resulting mud, causing an artificial "rain out." For some reason that scene popped into my head last spring while the Caps were in the process of blowing it in the playoffs. It's recently returned.

I came across a reader's comment on a website a couple of days ago. Something to this effect: the Caps should have stuck to their old (pre-losing streak) style of play because they don't have the personnel to be good enough on defense, and the new system is too difficult for the offensively-minded stars to master. Play to your strengths! the reader admonished.

It's easy enough to dispute the first part of this; it seems the lads can play defense; the team's GAA is down, the PK has been very effective, and even an non-expert like myself can see that they've got a new, more aggressively defensive style going. Even when they don't have the puck, they are, by and large, skating purposefully and working hard. Those things are good.

But - too true! - they haven't been scoring goals. Monday night they scored only one goal - and that was on "a depleted Rangers squad" (check out my awesome sportscaster lingo!) - and they can't even blame it on a "hot goalie," because ours was way hotter than theirs. On Saturday they scored 4 against the Maple Leafs, but that was first time they've scored more than 3 in a game since who knows when.

Obviously I'm not alone in worrying that the new system has irrevocably sucked the life out of this team - and sucked the life out of, specifically, Alex Ovechkin, Captain.

Let's talk about Ovie for a moment, shall we? (I love to talk about Ovie!)

Of course, I don't actually know him, I only admire him from afar.  And it's not only for his hockey skills, either, or his good looks (thank you, Gillette), his ability to pick up the tab, or even the fact that he wears his mother's number (bless his heart). No, what finally bumped me over the edge and caused me to plunk down my $24 to purchase that Winter Classic t-shirt with the "C" and the "8" and OVECHKIN on the back was my feeling for the guy himself. It's clear that he's been having a tough time this year, and I wanted to show my support. I won't go into all the gory details, because we all know them.  But I do want to point out that before, during and (probably) after his current tribulations, expectations are heaped upon him by the dozen, by friend and foe alike, while at the same time he's all too often put down, vilified, or pointedly ignored by the North American hockey powers-that-be.  

At the risk of sounding too maternal, let me remind you how young he was when he first came to this country (20 years), and how young he still is even now. And while some may envy the acclaim that has come his way, the celebrity, and the salary (heck, with that kind of money I could have bought the damn jersey instead of the lousy t-shirt!), those things don't necessarily make it easier to adjust to a new country, a new language, a different style of play, and a different hockey culture. (How well would Crosby have done in Krasnojarsk? Or Novosibirsk? I can't be sure, but, it's safe to say, it would have been a challenge.)

So maybe Ovie's hit a rough spot. Development - physical, mental, emotional - is not a constant upward slope. There are plateaus, and there are setbacks. But what I think we see now is someone who is growing up. Willing to risk change. Taking on new responsibility. Playing a new role on this hockey team. The role of captain. He is, as they say, buying in - not only to the new more defense-oriented system of play, but to the system writ large. Both are adjustments.

And, generally, I think, that's what the whole team is doing, or trying to do. It has to be tough, it has to be scary to make changes in mid-stream. To change the way you think of yourself. It takes intelligence, work, confidence, and a leap of faith. It takes mental toughness to stare down the naysayers.  

So what does this have to do with sprinklers? "Crash" Davis - the veteran catcher assigned to grow Nuke up - sort of a Jeeves to Nuke's Wooster - switched on the sprinklers to punctuate an interminable, losing road trip that was just oozing demoralization and misery. Why? It wasn't to avoid losing the next game; rather, he manufactured the rain-out in an attempt to take control of an out-of-control situation.  

But of course, it's only in the movies that "taking control" is as easy as flicking a switch and sliding around in the mud, or breathing through your eyelids, or wearing a woman's garter belt, or pulling the head off of a live chicken. Or a goat. But the Caps are doing it in real life, they're taking control again, little by little, with every battle won, every pass completed, every shot blocked, and every goal scored, even if they are few and far between at this point.

The other part of the sprinkler scene, though, is the mud-sliding part. That's the fun part, the letting loose. That's key, and I hope Ovechkin and the Caps are still having fun - on the ice as well as off. They're young guys, playing a game, and they need to find a way to relax and - in the words of my favorite color commentator - enjoy the journey.  

To hell with the playoffs, to hell with the Cup (I know, I know - blasphemy), and to hell with critics and cynics and, yes, to hell with fans who want it all right now. Don't be afraid! You're still you, the Washington Capitals! Work hard! Take control! Play your game! And don't forget to unleash the sprinklers!   

 

 

The Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, Denmark

The picturesque town of Roskilde was the center of the Danish kingdom at the end of the Viking Age.  Today busy shops line the cobblestone streets filled with pedestrians and cyclists, all centered around the Domkirche, (Les look up history) the cathedral where all the Danish monarchs since Sven Estridssen (dates) are buried.  The Domkirche sits at the highest point in the town, overlooking the head of the fjord which was the site of the royal harbor in viking times.

According to the Roskilde chronicles, recorded by the monks at the cathedral, in the year ___the harbor was in danger of attack by the Swedes or the Norwegians, and so the (soldiers?) took drastic measures, blocking the major shipping channels here with five sunken ships. In (year) they were recovered and their remains rest now in the main building of the Viking ship museum on the shore of the fjord. 

Unlike the Oseberg, gokstad and Tune Viking ships, which have been dramatically restored now reside in the Viking Ship Museum in Oslo, these five so-called Skuldelev ships (named for the location up the fjord from Roskilde where they rested for nearly 1000 years) are still in fragments, displayed on beautiful iron frames, giving them the impressions of ghosts.  In the words of curator Louise Henriksen,...they should be displayed as they were, the ones at Roskilde displayed how they are.  Philosophies of how to exhibit such things has changed over the years.  We can certainly imagine how they looked, now they are ghostly in their iron frames.  Louise showed us the bars on which the shields rested on the smaller longship, the distinctively Danish "staircase stem" and the 

Like sugar frosting, it's snowing tonight in Copenhagen

...but only after a wet, gray day.  Even in the middle of the day the winter sky here is as dark as I have seen, thick and wooly.  You've got to admire the Danes, though.  They have stuck it out here for millenia - more than stuck it out; they have made a home for themselves, marked by their strength and their sensitivities, and a very artistic sense of how to live.  Their antique buildings are grand but human in proportion and character, painted in the hopeful hues of apricot and peach and sunshine, roofed with terracotta, lovingly ornamented in stone and plaster, and topped by bronze statuary and soaring copper spires.  These architectural gems seem to look out onto the cobbles and canals through their brightened windows, gazing thoughtfully at their people who throng the sidewalks and squares despite the spitting wind.   Yes, the Danes have made a home for themselves here in the dark and cold, their shops strung with lights and their outdoor cafes boasting huge umbrellas, heaters, and a blankets hung on the back of every chair.  

Even on the wide thoroughfares, overseen only by sharp-angled modern buildings, the Danes bicycle fearlessly into the wind, present-day Vikings astride the small spit of windswept land that guards the gentle Baltic from the cold North Sea.

Dear Caps: On the occasion of your first reality show

Dear Caps,

So far I've been a pretty uncynical fan.  Which is something, considering my demographic profile.  And although this year ticket prices at the Verizon Center have become so very steep that I can no longer justify the expense (Hershey, here I come), I still love you.  I still watch your practices sometimes, and I was very excited when, last week, I had the opportunity to hold the door open for rookie prospect (since sent to the AHL Hershey Bears) Jake Hauswirth.  (He said, "thank you."  I said, "you're welcome.") 

And guys, technically I'm probably not qualified to judge on this matter because, although I aspire to reality in my everyday life, I've never actually watched a reality show.  I look forward to the time when a couple of TV writers might get together and write a show about a hockey team and their off-the-ice experiences. It wouldn't claim to be real, but if it was really good, it would show a heightened reality; it would show something of the humanity of the players and of the game.  My father served in the Army in Korea.  We'd always ask him if M*A*S*H was a realistic portrayal.  He'd say, no, M*A*S*H was actually more real than the real thing.  That's because it concerned itself with showing not the things, but the essence of things.  

Okay, sports fans.  If that's too Platonic (with a capital 'P') and, well, weird, for you, consider George Plimpton.  Did he just plant some cameras in those dressing rooms?  Hell, no.  He put something of himself on the line.  You might say, "wow, the ego of that guy!"  And you might say, "that wasn't a real look at the locker room, at the guys, because Plimpton interacted with them; he violated the prime directive!"  But if you really think about it, isn't that at least as natural a scenario as setting up cameras to record people's necessarily self-censored conversations?  After all, people have always interacted with one another.  Cameras - not so much.  We have far less experience deconstructing camera play than word play.  You can read Plimpton's accounts and decide for yourself what was what.  You know it is his perspective, and you know it is subjective.  And from a player's point of view, there was just one guy, and he was accountable.  If you didn't like him, you could fire the puck at him.  Hard.

In this case, I'm not sure what your recourse is, or mine.

Because the camera lens is a filter that is, paradoxically, much less transparent, much harder to explicate than George Plimpton's persona, or the writers of M*A*S*H and their socio-political/humanistic agendas.  The lens filters not only light, but also a bunch of other less tangible things that are tough to enumerate or describe.  In the hands of a master, it might be masterful.  But, last I heard, Ingmar Bergman is not working on this shoot.

And this is me, the uncynical fan speaking again:  Even though, I know, professional sports is a business, and yada yada yada, I like to believe, I want to believe, I have the god-given right to believe that there remains something primal and sacred in that locker room.  I don't know what it is exactly, but I imagine it's partly guys blowing steam and partly reporters asking dumb questions and partly jockstraps hanging from pegs in the wall and partly bloody birthplace of creativity.  What it is I'll probably never know for sure, but I'm pretty sure I prefer my own imagined version to the one on HBO.

But what's done is done and there's nothing you or I can do about it.  The cameras will be on you, boys.  I'm not sure whether I get HBO; if I do, I may be watching - unless actual reality intrudes.  But in any case I will surely be watching the real you - no, I'll be watching the you that's more real than you - the Washington Capitals on the ice.

Sincerely,

Your 4-ever uncynical fan

Go Caps!

 

 

Madeline Island

Here we are after many days of travel at the historical museum on Madeline Island, one of the Apostle Islands in Lake Superior. The museum is fantastic, with gorgeous Ojibwe beadwork among many other things. We had a wet night at our campsite but now it's clearing...after a delicious fish fry lunch on Lake Superior shore we're ready for action!

Stay tuned for more as I sort through the pictures and the thoughts!

Playoffs 2010: It's all a fan can do; or, a review of some favorite hockey clichés

So what's up with my home team?  What's up with my Capitals?

It's like this:  On a sunny day you think it'll never rain again.  The sky is the definition of blue from
horizon to horizon.  The sun is pulsing
with warmth and light, lavishing its love on the lush green earth.   But then the very next day you
wake up and the sun is gone. The sky is flat and gray, the rain is hard and drenching,
and sogginess permeates every molecule of the material world. 

That's the way it is with those guys.  Some games are ugly.  But I don't want to think about them
anymore.

I'm thinking about this instead:  They're moving their legs.  The ice is tilting and they're skating downhill, they're
playing THEIR game, they feel the power. 

Their hard work is being rewarded.  The hits, the grit, the battles, the board-smashing, the net-crashing, the teeth-bashing mingle with the sublime.

This most-creative-of-teams merges into the flowing creative
force of the universe.  Now they're rolling!

They're seeing the puck well. They're seizing every
chance.  They're at the right place
at the right time.  They are
CREATING SPACE. 

And it doesn't matter HOW many guys the other team has on
the ice!

There's a blind drop pass between the legs, or a nifty one
threaded through a pair of defenders, or a chippy one from behind the net, or
the long one traveling two-thirds the length of the ice, puck arriving, adhering
to the stick of our brave captain on a breakaway, deking, beating the goaltender, going top-shelf…

Visualize, visualize, visualize!

It's all a fan can do.

Putting the Caps on the Map

In a town long known for its southern efficiency and northern charm, we, in Washington, DC, finally have a team known for both:  efficiency (these guys can win!) and charm (yeah, that's right, charming hockey players).  

And, being a hockey team, they are northern.  Picture-perfect, poster-child northern, in fact, featuring talent and charisma from every slice of global boreality (if it's not a word, it should be), from Siberia to Vancouver (the long way).

Check it out (you should be able to click on the little hockey player icons to get names and hometowns of the players):

Efficiency, charm, plus that northern penchant for the battle.  My circumpolar passion fulfilled.

"What can I do? It's the Olympics!" -Alex Ovechkin, my new viking hero

Alexander Ovechkin, pre-"C." Photo from hfboards.com

Maybe you've been watching some Olympic hockey.  Maybe you've seen Ovie's stupendous hit on Jaromir Jagr in the Russia/Czech Republic game on Sunday. 

In the words of Mike Emrick "talk about dictating the terms!"

In Alexander Ovechkin's words, "I know it was a strong hit, but what can I do?  It's the Olympics."

In my words, "My hero!"  

 

Okay, I'm not saying that this is the way we should operate in everyday life in the twenty-first century. But in Scandinavia back in the day, life was hard, almost like the winter Olympics. The weather was cold. Winters were long and dark. You could expect famine, disease and/or injury, and it was only a matter of time before you would be attacked by others who were equally as desperate as you. Survival was a pressing issue in a way that isn't these days for most of us who are just watching the games on TV. 

Being a leader meant taking care of business. Your people had to know that, when the chips were down, you would defend them and their interests to the death. And if you wanted to remain a leader, you had to earn their trust again and again. "Turning the other cheek" meant catastrophe for you and yours. Showing mercy to your enemies could result in disaster for your friends or family.  

Your neighbor's sheep are grazing on your side of the fence? Get them out of there by any means necessary! And don't miss the opportunity to teach your neighbor a lesson while you're at it. You literally can not afford to let him think that he can get away with this sort of thing. Your life, your family's lives, the lives of your entire household depend on your sheep getting enough to eat. The other guy's flock is his own problem.

Jagr at a happier moment.  Possibly a viking hero as well.  His comment on the big hit: "Of course I saw [Ovechkin coming]. I wanted to make a play...The hit doesn't hurt. The mistake hurts because they scored a goal on that play...It was a horrible feeling.  I felt like I let the guys down. But that's the sport." Quote from interview by John Dellapina and NHL.com. Photo from Wikipedia Commons. 

If Ovie had let Jagr - five-time NHL leading point scorer, seven-time NHL all-star, winner of two Stanley Cups and various other trophies - waltz uncontested into Russia's defensive zone, to a one-on-one against his goaltender, Jagr might very well have tied the game. Ovie couldn't stand idly by and let that happen. This is the Olympics, for heaven's sake! Instead, he took drastic action and his hit led directly to a fabulous pass by Semin and a goal by Malkin which brought the score to 3-1 in favor of the Russians. The Czechs never recovered.

But it's Ovechkin's comment that says it all. "What can I do?  It's the Olympics!"  

It not only expresses the sense of obligation that he felt but also a necessity, indeed, an inevitability. Yes, the hit was hard, but it had to be. There was nothing else he could do. It's almost as if the fact of it exists outside of Ovechkin himself, as an entity unto itself.  Almost as if the man is just an agent for some requirement of fate.  

In hockey as in viking-era Scandinavia, it helps if a leader is in synch with the supernatural, with fate. In the words of Washington Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau, "there are certain individuals, that...good fortune follows them...but they [also] make their own good fortune..." He was speaking of young Washington prospect John Carlson after he scored a goal in sudden-death overtime to win the World Juniors championship earlier this year - but he could have been speaking of Ovechkin.

This link with fate in no way takes away from Ovechkin's own courage and initiative - on the contrary, these were the very qualities that allowed him to act. People who don't like The Man - and there are plenty of those - will say that it's just his bravado, or his arrogance or something like that. But of course - it takes a dose of arrogance, or we could call it self-confidence - to step outside of what is commonly done and to take fate into your own hands. To be the one who takes on the responsibility to lead is to call attention, both good and bad, to yourself. Ovechkin does it so often! The remarkable thing is that his "taking care of business"  so often seems to be laced with absolute joy and lightheartedness. Maybe that's part of what allows him to "synch up" with fate so regularly.

So what else do hockey players and vikings have in common?  

• Helmets (without horns). (Unless you count goal horns.)


• Habitat (cold and ice).  


• Beards (during the playoffs).


• Beer. (Vodka?)

Ovie's mom, Olympic basketball gold medalist Tatyana Ovechkina, knows a few things about bravery and strength.  She has been quoted as saying something to this effect: "To be a hockey player, you have to be both brave and strong. Alex is brave and strong." 

That's pretty Viking-like, too. 

What can I do? It's the Olympics!Alex Ovechkin, my new viking hero

Maybe you've been watching some Olympic hockey. Maybe you've seen Ovie's stupendous hit on Jaromir Jagr in the Russia/Czech Republic game on Sunday.

In the words of Mike Emrick "talk about dictating the terms!

In Alexander Ovechkin's words, "I know it was a strong hit, but what can I do? It's the Olympics."

In my words, "my hero!"

Okay, I'm not saying that this is the way we should operate in everyday life in the here-and-now. But in Scandinavia back in the day, life was hard, almost like the winter Olympics. The weather was cold. Winters were long and dark. You could expect famine, disease and/or injury, and it was only a matter of time before you would be attacked by others who were equally as desperate as you. Survival was a pressing issue in a way that isn't these days for most of us who are just watching the games on TV.

Being a leader meant taking care of business. Your people had to know that, when the chips were down, you would defend them and their interests against all comers. And if you wanted to remain a leader, you had to earn their trust again and again. "Turning the other cheek" meant catastrophe for you and yours. Showing mercy to your enemies could result in disaster for your friends or family.

Your neighbor's sheep are grazing on your side of the fence? Get them out of there by any means necessary! And don't miss the opportunity to teach your neighbor a lesson while you're at it. You literally can not afford to let him think that he can get away with this sort of thing. Your life, your family's lives, the lives of your entire household depend on your sheep getting enough to eat. Every blade of grass counts!

If Ovie had let Jagr - five-time NHL leading point scorer, seven-time NHL all-star, winner of two Stanley Cups and various other trophies - continue on into Russia's defensive zone, in a one-on-one against his goaltender, Jagr might very well have tied the game. Ovie wasn't about to stand idly by and let that happen. This is the Olympics! Instead, he took drastic action and his hit led directly to a fabulous pass by Semin and a goal by Malkin which brought the score to 3-1 in favor of the Russians. The Czechs never recovered.

But it's Ovechkin's comment that says it all. "What can I do? It's the Olympics!" It not only expresses the sense of obligation that he felt but also a necessity, indeed, an inevitability. Yes, the hit was hard, but it had to be. There was nothing else he could do. It's almost as if the fact of it exists outside of Ovechkin himself, an entity unto itself. Almost as if he is just an agent for some impulse of fate.

Because an effective leader has to be in synch with the supernatural, with fate. In the words of Washington Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau, "there are certain individuals, that...good fortune follows them...but they make their own good fortune..." He was speaking of Washington prospect John Carlson after he scored the winning goal in sudden death overtime to win the World Juniors championship earlier this year, but he could have been speaking of Ovechkin.

This link with fate in no way takes away from Ovechkin's own courage and initiative - to the contrary, it was these qualities that allowed him to act. People who don't like The Man - and there are plenty of those - will say that it's just his bravado, or his arrogance or something like that. But of course - it takes a dose of arrogance, or we could call it self-confidence - to step outside of what's commonly done (as Ovie so often does) and to reach for fate, to maneuver within its strong and unpredictable course. You could call it bravery, too. To be the one who takes on the responsibility to lead is to call attention, both good and bad, to yourself. He does it so often. The remarkable thing is that his "taking care of business" so often seems to be laced with absolute joy and lightheartedness. Maybe that's what allows him to "synch up" with fate.

So what else do hockey players and vikings have in common?

Helmets(without horns). (Except goal horns.)
Habitat (cold and ice).
Beards (during the playoffs).
Beer.
What else? You tell me.

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How I Came To Write <i>The Bear-Wife</i>

During one long, lonely February, I sat by my big picture window, day after day, hour after excruciating hour, watching rain pour down from the sky and feeding my insatiable infant son.  I survived the ordeal, but only thanks to The Greenlanders.  The Greenlanders is Jane Smiley's 584-page novel about the mysterious demise of the Norse Greenland colony.  In the light shed by Ms. Smiley's considerable insight, though, that demise becomes considerably less mysterious and considerably more inevitable.  More rooted in human ignorance and blindness and cruelty than the historians could ever surmise, much less portray.  Was it somehow perverse of me to become so absorbed in this tragic reconstruction of a failed human endeavor at the very time that I should have been celebrating the miraculous beginnings of my own little human endeavor?  Maybe so.  But I chalked it up to my northern temperament:  had Ingmar Bergman ever been required to nurse a baby, he probably would have found himself reading The Greenlanders, too.

Several years later I came across a new translation of some of the Icelandic sagas with a forward by Jane Smiley, and, feeling a connection both to her and to my Scandinavian roots, I picked it up.  Right away, I was captivated.  The characters were flesh-and-blood, eating, sleeping, thinking, planning, sentient beings, just like we are, but almost in the manner of humanoids from one of Star Trek's alien worlds, their motives occasionally wouldn't quite add up, or their actions would sometimes seem a bit "off."  You see, the sagas were written in Iceland about 800 years ago and set 200 years earlier than that.  Light-years away from our world.  And the sagas are sparse in style; many things are unstated, left between the lines.  A contemporary reader would have understood, but the modern reader is left to rely upon her own interpretive abilities and her own detective work.  And, indeed, after some investigating, many of the characters did become understandable to me, and even admirable – even those whom we modern folk might characterize as petty, vindictive, cruel or just plain disgusting!

That volume of stories reinvigorated a connection with the people that I only half jokingly call "my Viking ancestors."  This connection is, to me, a very tangible thing, and I treasure it.  When I'm at home in Sweden I can stand by the graves of my people going back to Viking times and then some.  I've always wanted to know them, but is that even remotely possible?

I continued my detective work, reading Old Norse classics like Snorri's Heimskringla and the Poetic Edda, along with books on Norse religion, law and society.  By far the most inspirational work of modern scholarship that I came across was Neil S. Price's The Viking Way:  Religion and War in Iron Age Scandinavia.  Price challenges us to allow those ancient people their peculiarities, to allow them their profound differences from us, to allow them their own stories.  Captain Kirk would be proud!  Of course, it's easy to honor the prime directive when you know that Scotty can beam you up at any time.  But how did things work on the ground?  Human and animal sacrifice, piracy, evil sorcery, killings for vengeance or just plain provocation:  few stories end – or begin - without blood spillage.  At the same time, though, those people were dependent upon each other and they lived at close quarters:  warriors and traders, farmers and kings, Christians and heathens, slaves and priestesses.  The Viking Age was a productive age of travel and trade, of human craft and expression of all sorts, and its society had a moral equilibrium, one that nurtured it and fueled it and, indeed, drove it, at high-speed, for several centuries.  What was it all about?

Characters started coming to me, and that's when The Bear-Wife began.  It is set in a transitional time, at the meeting between the old beliefs and Christianity, the old political order and the new medieval kingdoms.  It is set in a transitional place, where the rocky Swedish west coast, the open farmland of the south and the forestland of the interior come together.  And it is set amidst the most significant transitional condition of all: life itself, which the Norse saw as a state of constant becoming. 

Where then, is home - the state of physical and spiritual rest?  That is what The Bear-Wife seeks to explore.

The main characters are Geerta, the orphaned daughter of a trader, raised in a heathen household by a Christian servant woman; Helgi, a young Viking warrior groping to understand the spiritual aspect of his vocation; Ragnar, his father, anxious about the plight of his prosperous estate and his chiefdom as he confronts his son's indifference and his own mortality; Fardan, an English missionary priest who struggles to advance his faith in a sometimes hostile setting; and Svanhild, a sorceress and former war-maiden who struggles with the absence of her husband and the uncomfortable nature of her role in society, which is to serve as an intermediary between the human and spirit worlds.  And then, of course, there's the bear.

Geerta and Helgi, cast out from their respective worlds, meet at the threshold of the bear's den, a place where death and birth are merged, and where the very human concerns of finding one's place and of fulfilling one's role can begin to be sorted out.  Together they restore the bear to his rightful place and in doing so are ultimately able to assume their own "rightful places."

Of course, my characters also operate amidst external events - some historical, some fictional, and some that were hatched in my mind to address the mysterious archaeology of the fictional Ragnar's district.  I hope that my characters are not only true to the world-view(s) of the time and place in which they lived, but are also in some way illustrative of a universal human desire to go home in both a physical and spiritual sense, to be at peace with one's duties and one's fate.