WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:34.240 you Welcome everyone to Legends of Jorvik episode 00:00:34.240 --> 00:00:37.399 four in my bonus mini -series where I get to 00:00:37.399 --> 00:00:39.920 invite and talk to the many creatives and talented 00:00:39.920 --> 00:00:42.159 and skilled people who make the Jorvik Viking 00:00:42.159 --> 00:00:44.619 Festival the amazing event that it is every year. 00:00:45.140 --> 00:00:47.700 And this week's episode, I'm delighted to welcome 00:00:47.700 --> 00:00:50.299 Jason Buck, a professional storyteller. Welcome 00:00:50.299 --> 00:00:52.679 Jason. Hello, thank you very much. Thank you 00:00:52.679 --> 00:00:55.689 very much for asking me on. You're welcome. I 00:00:55.689 --> 00:00:58.049 really enjoyed your event and I cannot wait to 00:00:58.049 --> 00:01:00.409 start quizzing you on the stories you told because 00:01:00.409 --> 00:01:02.490 there's some wonderful ones. I wish I could tell 00:01:02.490 --> 00:01:04.489 all my friends about it. I can never do it just 00:01:04.489 --> 00:01:08.010 this like you did. So I guess we should touch 00:01:08.010 --> 00:01:10.510 base then on because many people don't know who 00:01:10.510 --> 00:01:13.269 or what a professional storyteller is or how 00:01:13.269 --> 00:01:15.450 someone would get into that profession. Would 00:01:15.450 --> 00:01:19.519 you mind telling us more? Yeah, sure. I mean, 00:01:19.879 --> 00:01:21.560 it's an interesting thing because you're absolutely 00:01:21.560 --> 00:01:23.680 right. I mean, storytelling is one of those things 00:01:23.680 --> 00:01:26.340 that we all do. We all do every day. We all tell 00:01:26.340 --> 00:01:28.560 stories about what we did yesterday or the film 00:01:28.560 --> 00:01:30.859 we saw or what's happening or some experience 00:01:30.859 --> 00:01:33.859 we have. We just do it quite naturally as people, 00:01:34.079 --> 00:01:39.019 as humans. But in Western Europe and Britain 00:01:39.019 --> 00:01:41.500 and certainly in England, in the United Kingdom, 00:01:42.040 --> 00:01:43.900 storytelling or performance storytelling really 00:01:43.900 --> 00:01:46.159 is something that people aren't aren't used to 00:01:46.159 --> 00:01:49.280 is something that's died away, less so in Wales 00:01:49.280 --> 00:01:51.799 and Ireland and Scotland where people know about 00:01:51.799 --> 00:01:54.920 storytelling a bit more. But the thing I'm always 00:01:54.920 --> 00:01:57.200 terrified that I think people always assume is 00:01:57.200 --> 00:01:59.519 that I'm someone sat in the corner of the children's 00:01:59.519 --> 00:02:02.180 library in a colourful coat on a tiny stool reading 00:02:02.180 --> 00:02:05.379 the Gruffalo upside down to a group of small 00:02:05.379 --> 00:02:10.689 people. But performance storytelling is... it's 00:02:10.689 --> 00:02:13.669 what we've done for our entire history since 00:02:13.669 --> 00:02:15.409 we could speak and understand our languages. 00:02:17.250 --> 00:02:19.289 In terms of the experience, it's a bit like going 00:02:19.289 --> 00:02:21.430 to a stand -up comedy gig. You have a storyteller 00:02:21.430 --> 00:02:24.550 who is standing there live, sometimes mic'd up, 00:02:24.669 --> 00:02:27.569 sometimes not usually, almost never with a handheld 00:02:27.569 --> 00:02:29.009 mic because it gets in the way of being able 00:02:29.009 --> 00:02:32.229 to point and gesticulate. You're telling stories 00:02:32.229 --> 00:02:34.150 to the audience, you're talking to the audience 00:02:34.150 --> 00:02:37.150 just like a stand -up comic would. But those 00:02:37.150 --> 00:02:38.810 stories, they could be modern recent stories, 00:02:38.870 --> 00:02:40.729 or they could be ancient myths and legends, especially 00:02:40.729 --> 00:02:43.250 things that we're going to talk today about Norse 00:02:43.250 --> 00:02:46.090 mythology or Viking legends. And so it's relaying 00:02:46.090 --> 00:02:49.210 those and creating a narrative that people can 00:02:49.210 --> 00:02:52.069 sit back and really lose themselves, immerse 00:02:52.069 --> 00:02:54.349 themselves in the pictures that the storyteller 00:02:54.349 --> 00:02:57.069 conjures in their minds as they listen to the 00:02:57.069 --> 00:02:59.909 story unfolding. And the storyteller is all the 00:02:59.909 --> 00:03:03.210 characters and describes everything that's going 00:03:03.210 --> 00:03:06.810 on. And it really is for all ages. from very 00:03:06.810 --> 00:03:09.789 small until they reach a point in the life where 00:03:09.789 --> 00:03:13.569 you can hear no more and then drift off to the 00:03:13.569 --> 00:03:17.009 next world. Thank you that's a really wonderful 00:03:17.009 --> 00:03:18.870 explanation and it certainly kind of reminded 00:03:18.870 --> 00:03:20.789 me because you performed to children as well 00:03:20.789 --> 00:03:22.629 during the Orbit Viking Festival didn't you? 00:03:23.050 --> 00:03:25.150 Well I did a bit of stuff out in the street dressed 00:03:25.150 --> 00:03:28.050 in proper Viking clover and I don't mean horned 00:03:28.050 --> 00:03:31.370 helmet and a double -headed axe you know in this 00:03:31.370 --> 00:03:33.449 sort of tunic and whatnots and things and the 00:03:33.449 --> 00:03:35.610 street performance stuff people naturally see 00:03:35.610 --> 00:03:38.689 a storyteller and parents often then wheel children 00:03:38.689 --> 00:03:44.569 over. At the beginning I think of my career as 00:03:44.569 --> 00:03:47.069 a full -time storyteller, I was very much against, 00:03:47.310 --> 00:03:49.729 I didn't want to be thought of as a children's 00:03:49.729 --> 00:03:51.750 entertainer, and so I very much sort of steered 00:03:51.750 --> 00:03:53.849 away from that. But since then, apart from it 00:03:53.849 --> 00:03:57.469 being very useful to pay the bills, telling stories 00:03:57.469 --> 00:04:00.469 to children are great. It's great because they're 00:04:00.469 --> 00:04:02.610 quite happy just to sit down and go, go on then, 00:04:02.870 --> 00:04:04.849 and just lose themselves, whereas adults are 00:04:04.849 --> 00:04:06.550 sort of a bit more, whilst they're terribly polite, 00:04:06.949 --> 00:04:09.389 and will sit and listen, you know, quietly. adults 00:04:09.389 --> 00:04:11.349 often are a little bit sort of more reserved 00:04:11.349 --> 00:04:13.750 and wondering oh oh god is he going to get me 00:04:13.750 --> 00:04:15.610 to do something am I going to be called out or 00:04:15.610 --> 00:04:17.350 I'm not quite sure what's happening here whereas 00:04:17.350 --> 00:04:19.389 the children just accept it and just kind of 00:04:19.389 --> 00:04:23.029 and get on with it but it's two related but sort 00:04:23.029 --> 00:04:25.490 of different different different styles of telling 00:04:25.490 --> 00:04:30.490 stories I think. So how did you as a storyteller 00:04:30.490 --> 00:04:33.750 first encounter experience or work with Norse 00:04:33.750 --> 00:04:36.709 mythology or Viking history as a story medium 00:04:36.709 --> 00:04:43.060 and matter? I think when I started telling stories 00:04:43.060 --> 00:04:49.740 as a storyteller, then somebody gave me, one 00:04:49.740 --> 00:04:51.500 of my audience gave me a present. It's a guy 00:04:51.500 --> 00:04:53.560 who'd come along to a couple of my shows and 00:04:53.560 --> 00:04:55.319 he turned up one day and he said, thank you very 00:04:55.319 --> 00:04:57.120 much, Jason. I'm really enjoying your storytelling. 00:04:57.500 --> 00:04:59.360 Would you mind if I gave you a present? Of course 00:04:59.360 --> 00:05:02.500 not, thank you very much. And he gave me a book. 00:05:02.579 --> 00:05:07.019 It was the Penguin. book of Norse mythology. 00:05:08.000 --> 00:05:09.620 It was a nice collection and inside was a very 00:05:09.620 --> 00:05:11.860 nice sort of note written about how he had stumbled 00:05:11.860 --> 00:05:15.139 across my storytelling shows and how whilst he 00:05:15.139 --> 00:05:17.180 was going on going through some stuff in his 00:05:17.180 --> 00:05:20.040 own life how actually he found that immersion 00:05:20.040 --> 00:05:23.980 in the stories awoke a sort of a something that 00:05:23.980 --> 00:05:26.720 he said he hadn't felt since since he was a child. 00:05:27.390 --> 00:05:29.790 and allowed himself to become immersed within 00:05:29.790 --> 00:05:33.009 a story. And so he gave me as a present. And 00:05:33.009 --> 00:05:34.129 for a while I just thought, well, that's very 00:05:34.129 --> 00:05:37.170 nice. I'll just put that on a shelf. And then 00:05:37.170 --> 00:05:39.610 one day I was thinking, I should really, I should 00:05:39.610 --> 00:05:42.750 do a new show soon, shouldn't I? And I thought 00:05:42.750 --> 00:05:44.670 I should start reading that book. And I hadn't 00:05:44.670 --> 00:05:49.370 really gone into Norse mythology much at the 00:05:49.370 --> 00:05:52.160 time. And so when I started reading that book 00:05:52.160 --> 00:05:53.560 and then, of course, reading other books and 00:05:53.560 --> 00:05:55.620 other references and watching videos and looking 00:05:55.620 --> 00:05:58.420 at various websites and articles and things, 00:06:00.019 --> 00:06:03.139 it suddenly opened up a world to me that I think 00:06:03.139 --> 00:06:06.839 I'd always assumed was a little bit probably 00:06:06.839 --> 00:06:08.920 tainted by Hollywood, I imagine. It was all a 00:06:08.920 --> 00:06:11.500 bit too much swords and sorcery as opposed to 00:06:11.500 --> 00:06:15.139 the depth of story and mythology and religion 00:06:15.139 --> 00:06:18.379 and history that's there. and then I think it 00:06:18.379 --> 00:06:20.339 helps that, you know, I'm six foot four and I've 00:06:20.339 --> 00:06:22.160 got a big, you know, curly moustache and beard, 00:06:22.300 --> 00:06:27.980 I'm terribly hairy and I can pronounce the Norse 00:06:27.980 --> 00:06:30.879 names, so I'm told by some of the people who 00:06:30.879 --> 00:06:33.879 either speak Old Norse or various modern versions 00:06:33.879 --> 00:06:35.860 of, you know, Scandinavian languages who said, 00:06:36.180 --> 00:06:38.379 wow, I can actually understand the words you 00:06:38.379 --> 00:06:40.459 were saying, you know, this name or that name, 00:06:40.579 --> 00:06:43.180 oh wow, it works great, and so I think a combination 00:06:43.180 --> 00:06:48.000 of those things. came together and I really liked 00:06:48.000 --> 00:06:50.360 the mythologies, I liked the Norse gods, like 00:06:50.360 --> 00:06:54.899 the Greek gods, they are imperfect and they are 00:06:54.899 --> 00:06:59.379 flawed like ourselves and it's not just a set 00:06:59.379 --> 00:07:04.079 of tales and rules of dogma about an unimpeachable 00:07:04.079 --> 00:07:06.879 deity who never arrives. These are kind of tales 00:07:06.879 --> 00:07:10.769 about us and tales about gods and monsters. where 00:07:10.769 --> 00:07:13.709 that needle is on the, is it a God, is it a person, 00:07:13.930 --> 00:07:16.649 and what's the experience kind of moves from 00:07:16.649 --> 00:07:18.189 side to side. And I think that's what really 00:07:18.189 --> 00:07:22.589 attracted me, that movement between our mortal 00:07:22.589 --> 00:07:25.329 experience and tales of gods and monsters. And 00:07:25.329 --> 00:07:26.949 there's sort of no barrier between the two of 00:07:26.949 --> 00:07:31.009 them. That is brilliant. And I absolutely chime 00:07:31.009 --> 00:07:33.430 well with that message about them being flawed 00:07:33.430 --> 00:07:37.850 and imperfect. I remember Back in my early days, 00:07:38.050 --> 00:07:40.129 back when I was just discovering how podcasting 00:07:40.129 --> 00:07:43.850 worked, I was able to be a guest on a podcast 00:07:43.850 --> 00:07:46.310 episode of the Yorvik Viking thing podcast back 00:07:46.310 --> 00:07:49.240 when it was active and round. with Joanne Harris 00:07:49.240 --> 00:07:51.879 and Jessica Simon and Professor Caroline Lowenton, 00:07:51.980 --> 00:07:55.339 who is a big Oxford expert in this area. And 00:07:55.339 --> 00:07:57.740 I was telling them what I think people get drawn 00:07:57.740 --> 00:08:00.100 to is their imperfectness. They're basically 00:08:00.100 --> 00:08:02.420 humans who just happen to have really magical 00:08:02.420 --> 00:08:04.720 toys, like they've got magical apples that help 00:08:04.720 --> 00:08:07.259 them live longer, but his gauntlets and his hammer 00:08:07.259 --> 00:08:10.720 and his belt and Odin's got all his trinkets 00:08:10.720 --> 00:08:14.480 and frayer hairs. And they squabble, they fight, 00:08:14.660 --> 00:08:17.319 they have jealousies. I mean, Loki, of course. 00:08:18.110 --> 00:08:21.110 is on the trickster to the underdog and the anti 00:08:21.110 --> 00:08:24.769 -hero in the way that modern perception has reinterpreted 00:08:24.769 --> 00:08:27.649 and revived and adapted and because we don't 00:08:27.649 --> 00:08:33.049 have a lot of core details about them because 00:08:33.049 --> 00:08:35.149 these sagas are all bits and pieces and they 00:08:35.149 --> 00:08:37.389 were written down centuries after Christianisation 00:08:37.389 --> 00:08:40.149 and they'll get me started on what stories might 00:08:40.149 --> 00:08:42.429 have been lost because there are probably hundreds. 00:08:43.820 --> 00:08:46.440 these gaps have actually enabled them to keep 00:08:46.440 --> 00:08:48.220 going, because they're malleable, because we 00:08:48.220 --> 00:08:51.200 can then adapt them to reflect whatever society 00:08:51.200 --> 00:08:53.480 and we as people are feeling at the time, which 00:08:53.480 --> 00:08:58.659 I might like about them. So yeah, just to add 00:08:58.659 --> 00:09:01.240 to that, I think that's what keeps the stories 00:09:01.240 --> 00:09:02.740 alive. That's a really good point, because I 00:09:02.740 --> 00:09:06.820 think once you have religions that have holy 00:09:06.820 --> 00:09:10.620 books that say this, this is the truth for our 00:09:10.620 --> 00:09:13.179 religion. You can't stray away from that. So 00:09:13.179 --> 00:09:15.080 all you're really doing is retelling. There's 00:09:15.080 --> 00:09:18.460 no idea. There's not much scope for interpretation 00:09:18.460 --> 00:09:22.779 or reflection about what the characters in the 00:09:22.779 --> 00:09:24.720 story might be doing or thinking and how that 00:09:24.720 --> 00:09:26.899 relates to us. It's all kind of rather clearly 00:09:26.899 --> 00:09:28.559 set out. Of course, you understand why people 00:09:28.559 --> 00:09:30.960 do that, so they can set down the rules and say, 00:09:31.240 --> 00:09:34.139 these are the definitive rules. But at the same 00:09:34.139 --> 00:09:35.860 time, yeah, I think you're absolutely right. 00:09:38.320 --> 00:09:41.379 It's interesting, I think, what modern culture 00:09:41.379 --> 00:09:43.159 has done to the Norse myths. When you look at 00:09:43.159 --> 00:09:47.820 things like the Marvel franchise, and a friend 00:09:47.820 --> 00:09:49.539 of mine's a head teacher at a school, and they 00:09:49.539 --> 00:09:52.059 had an open day, and they studied the Norse gods, 00:09:52.840 --> 00:09:55.519 I think it's on the general syllabus, Norse mythology 00:09:55.519 --> 00:09:58.919 anyway, and she overheard some child saying to 00:09:58.919 --> 00:10:00.539 their parents as they were going through, saw 00:10:00.539 --> 00:10:02.379 there was a picture of Thor, and he went, look, 00:10:02.379 --> 00:10:05.460 they study Marvel here? Amazing, we must come 00:10:05.460 --> 00:10:08.789 here. I kind of, it's very sweet at the same 00:10:08.789 --> 00:10:11.450 time, kind of, oh dear. And when I tell stories 00:10:11.450 --> 00:10:14.590 about Thor and his hammer to younger audiences, 00:10:14.649 --> 00:10:16.950 I have to say, you know, it's not like in the 00:10:16.950 --> 00:10:20.309 films, anyone can touch Thor's hammer. Anyone 00:10:20.309 --> 00:10:22.049 can use it. It's just that it's Thor's hammer. 00:10:22.350 --> 00:10:25.029 And Loki, he doesn't go, ooh, and he's not super, 00:10:25.090 --> 00:10:28.009 super powerful staff. You know, he's just a trickster 00:10:28.009 --> 00:10:31.230 because he fixes things as well as breaking things. 00:10:31.950 --> 00:10:33.889 And I have to sort of put them right on that. 00:10:33.929 --> 00:10:36.149 But again, with children, they're kind of like, 00:10:36.739 --> 00:10:41.019 Okay. All right, if you say so, carry on. So 00:10:41.019 --> 00:10:44.019 yeah, they'll take that and that elasticity is 00:10:44.019 --> 00:10:48.799 there. Yeah, it's, I mean, I guess it all reflects 00:10:48.799 --> 00:10:51.899 back to the fact that these were stories. They've 00:10:51.899 --> 00:10:54.340 always been stories. Of course, the Vikings weren't 00:10:54.340 --> 00:10:57.700 illiterate people. They could carve runes, but 00:10:57.700 --> 00:11:00.080 that came along later. They only ever used runes 00:11:00.080 --> 00:11:01.679 usually on rune stones in the morning for someone 00:11:01.679 --> 00:11:03.980 who'd gone off raiding or went sailing and just 00:11:03.980 --> 00:11:06.799 never came back. They didn't need to record these 00:11:06.799 --> 00:11:08.580 things because they were told and people like 00:11:08.580 --> 00:11:10.679 you were around at that time. They had scowls 00:11:10.679 --> 00:11:12.659 like professional storytellers. So you're carrying 00:11:12.659 --> 00:11:17.669 on a very fine heritage, Jason. And I like to 00:11:17.669 --> 00:11:19.889 think, certainly I nodded towards it in my own 00:11:19.889 --> 00:11:22.649 little independent research on representation 00:11:22.649 --> 00:11:25.590 and indeed interpretation of Valkyries in fantasy 00:11:25.590 --> 00:11:28.649 fiction as my humble debut article is going through 00:11:28.649 --> 00:11:30.830 peer review and I'm hoping they'll agree with 00:11:30.830 --> 00:11:33.570 anything, any of my nonsense and not tell me 00:11:33.570 --> 00:11:36.460 it's all honest. even the Scales probably about 00:11:36.460 --> 00:11:39.220 then probably omitted adapted or twisted things 00:11:39.220 --> 00:11:41.080 because certain people have heard things in different 00:11:41.080 --> 00:11:43.960 regions. I mean there's we've got the Saga of 00:11:43.960 --> 00:11:45.700 the Volsungs and then we've got the Ring of the 00:11:45.700 --> 00:11:48.259 Nibelungs and they both use the same set of characters 00:11:48.259 --> 00:11:50.960 but in a different set of circumstances slightly 00:11:50.960 --> 00:11:53.240 and yet they're like written centuries apart. 00:11:53.399 --> 00:11:57.919 It's incredible how stories I just they just 00:11:57.919 --> 00:12:01.220 last don't they? So I have this bracelet here 00:12:01.220 --> 00:12:05.840 which on it has, just so you can see there, there's 00:12:05.840 --> 00:12:13.220 the runes on it. And it is a quote from the scald, 00:12:14.679 --> 00:12:19.480 oh, his name's gone out my head. And what it 00:12:19.480 --> 00:12:24.279 says on it, the translation is, what is a skilled 00:12:24.279 --> 00:12:32.539 smith of verse? What is a scald but that? What 00:12:32.539 --> 00:12:34.960 is skald, name of that, in Old Norse, if you 00:12:34.960 --> 00:12:37.519 want it. And it doesn't say what is a skald, 00:12:37.519 --> 00:12:40.679 but a knowledgeable repeater of verse, a skilled 00:12:40.679 --> 00:12:44.340 smith of verse, Bragi, which is the name of the... 00:12:44.320 --> 00:12:47.720 oh yes the skull does the the skull god god skull 00:12:47.720 --> 00:12:50.779 deified skull depending where you put it um but 00:12:50.779 --> 00:12:53.620 that's attributed attributed attributed to him 00:12:53.620 --> 00:12:56.860 and it is talking about a skilled smith of verse 00:12:56.860 --> 00:12:59.320 so someone who creates things not someone who 00:12:59.320 --> 00:13:03.870 just can remember and reproduce. It's not just 00:13:03.870 --> 00:13:06.110 an actor who's learned all the works of Shakespeare 00:13:06.110 --> 00:13:09.629 and is able to quote, you know, anything at any 00:13:09.629 --> 00:13:11.710 point. There's that ability, but also the ability 00:13:11.710 --> 00:13:15.370 to craft and make and create and change. Indeed, 00:13:15.490 --> 00:13:17.870 we use the word malleable. So let's use that 00:13:17.870 --> 00:13:21.809 malleable Latin alias being changing, being a 00:13:21.809 --> 00:13:26.090 Smith and making and changing and shaping. Not 00:13:26.090 --> 00:13:29.080 fixed. Oh well I'm glad you agree with me and 00:13:29.080 --> 00:13:31.279 hopefully the peer reviews of my little article 00:13:31.279 --> 00:13:34.059 will agree with what nonsense I've typed up. 00:13:35.159 --> 00:13:37.120 So I guess in terms of, as you pointed out, kind 00:13:37.120 --> 00:13:39.620 of like shaping and creating and not necessarily 00:13:39.620 --> 00:13:42.440 just repeating stories, obviously when I attended 00:13:42.440 --> 00:13:45.600 your wonderful event at Yorvick this year we 00:13:45.600 --> 00:13:48.080 heard an amazing as well by the way thank you, 00:13:48.259 --> 00:13:50.100 not just my event but my wonderful event thank 00:13:50.100 --> 00:13:52.419 you. It is a wonderful event, I really really 00:13:52.419 --> 00:13:54.139 enjoyed it and I love how you were there to actually 00:13:54.139 --> 00:13:55.559 greet everyone in the room as well, I was like 00:13:55.559 --> 00:14:01.379 oh it's the guy who greeted me earlier. You told 00:14:01.379 --> 00:14:04.080 a wonderful tale about, I think it was around 00:14:04.080 --> 00:14:07.840 12th century Iceland of a young man getting involved 00:14:07.840 --> 00:14:10.440 in necromancy in a very long and winding tale 00:14:10.440 --> 00:14:12.519 and I loved how you explained about it, it's 00:14:12.519 --> 00:14:15.059 all like one step away from evil, no one's out 00:14:15.059 --> 00:14:16.960 right evil, it's all like gradual steps. And 00:14:16.960 --> 00:14:19.139 I really liked that as an introduction to the 00:14:19.139 --> 00:14:22.679 theme of the story. So is that one that you've 00:14:22.679 --> 00:14:25.519 sourced or read about and then revived, or is 00:14:25.519 --> 00:14:28.240 it one of your own creations using influences 00:14:28.240 --> 00:14:32.720 from that time? So there's now three stories 00:14:32.720 --> 00:14:34.960 in my head, in my collection, whatever, which 00:14:34.960 --> 00:14:37.500 I would class as my sort of dark Norse stories. 00:14:38.059 --> 00:14:40.759 And they're all original stories by me, but they're 00:14:40.759 --> 00:14:46.370 all um based around or using um um either history 00:14:46.370 --> 00:14:49.610 or folklore elements or folklore ideas and tropes 00:14:49.610 --> 00:14:53.429 so in that the uh the nábrok the uh the necropants 00:14:53.429 --> 00:14:55.929 as they're translated to usually into american 00:14:55.929 --> 00:14:59.590 english the necro trousers um and if people listening 00:14:59.590 --> 00:15:01.509 if you if you don't know what they are look look 00:15:01.509 --> 00:15:03.830 look it up but i've warned you now about what 00:15:03.830 --> 00:15:05.830 what you'll find out and especially they have 00:15:05.830 --> 00:15:08.330 a pair of them in the museum of witchcraft in 00:15:08.330 --> 00:15:13.710 iceland a reproduction pair of them, let's say. 00:15:14.769 --> 00:15:18.870 Yes, they're not real. But that was all, yeah, 00:15:18.889 --> 00:15:20.929 I came across this idea of these dead men's legs, 00:15:21.129 --> 00:15:22.929 the skins that people peel off one man's legs 00:15:22.929 --> 00:15:25.730 and peel onto their own and then bringing wealth. 00:15:25.789 --> 00:15:27.289 But of course, that's evil and wicked and evil. 00:15:28.110 --> 00:15:30.029 And it was only as I was starting to write the 00:15:30.029 --> 00:15:32.009 story and look into it and try and find out more 00:15:32.009 --> 00:15:37.399 about the nábrok that I was reading information 00:15:37.399 --> 00:15:43.559 about how it was suggested that there was a particular 00:15:43.559 --> 00:15:47.759 guy in Iceland who was doing very well and his 00:15:47.759 --> 00:15:49.820 farm did very well and he became very wealthy. 00:15:50.480 --> 00:15:53.039 And as often, you know, in communities when somebody's 00:15:53.039 --> 00:15:55.320 doing very well, somebody else gets jealous about 00:15:55.320 --> 00:15:57.409 it. And so that, you know, kind of... rumours 00:15:57.409 --> 00:15:59.350 and what -nots were created about, well, it must 00:15:59.350 --> 00:16:01.309 be black magic. You can't possibly just be because 00:16:01.309 --> 00:16:04.870 of hard work and talent and ability and everything 00:16:04.870 --> 00:16:07.450 else. It must be black magic. And so saying it 00:16:07.450 --> 00:16:09.730 was only black magic that made it possible for 00:16:09.730 --> 00:16:16.210 this guy to be prosperous, which is the explanation 00:16:16.210 --> 00:16:21.860 for the real Narbork necropants. But it was that 00:16:21.860 --> 00:16:23.639 idea of journey, and there's a number of things 00:16:23.639 --> 00:16:26.659 I happened to come across. The fact that the 00:16:26.659 --> 00:16:28.580 main character plays the langspiel, which is 00:16:28.580 --> 00:16:30.179 an Icelandic instrument or an instrument used 00:16:30.179 --> 00:16:33.899 in Iceland, which wasn't an instrument I'd come 00:16:33.899 --> 00:16:37.559 across before. Okay, yes, for those of you, for 00:16:37.559 --> 00:16:39.779 those people who don't know, a horizontal guitar, 00:16:39.960 --> 00:16:42.320 a walk horizontal violin or cello with a number 00:16:42.320 --> 00:16:44.909 of strings that you can either pluck. and you 00:16:44.909 --> 00:16:46.870 can alter the tone of the strings and you can 00:16:46.870 --> 00:16:49.490 bow. But I like the idea of this young man starting 00:16:49.490 --> 00:16:52.769 off and having a bad, you know, a bad start in 00:16:52.769 --> 00:16:54.730 life. He'd lost his father and his stepfather 00:16:54.730 --> 00:16:56.409 wasn't nice enough to lose his mother. And so 00:16:56.409 --> 00:16:58.389 then he has to go on a journey so he can classic 00:16:58.389 --> 00:17:01.230 hero's journey. You know, it may also may as 00:17:01.230 --> 00:17:03.210 well have been to frame the hand of the princess, 00:17:03.330 --> 00:17:07.180 but it wasn't, you know, for his. It's his beloved's 00:17:07.180 --> 00:17:09.140 father to give him permission to marry his beloved. 00:17:09.579 --> 00:17:11.539 And of course, as you know, as the story unfolds, 00:17:11.619 --> 00:17:14.160 yes, a little step, one more step into the shadows, 00:17:14.559 --> 00:17:16.339 one more step away from the light and into the 00:17:16.339 --> 00:17:19.200 darkness, bit by bit by bit, without him ever 00:17:19.200 --> 00:17:21.380 really doing anything particularly wicked or 00:17:21.380 --> 00:17:24.579 evil, except perhaps towards the end. But until... 00:17:24.359 --> 00:17:27.900 trying to be successful and trying to become 00:17:27.900 --> 00:17:30.599 prosperous so he can go back and demonstrate 00:17:30.599 --> 00:17:35.039 his ability to earn so that he can support his 00:17:35.039 --> 00:17:37.579 beloved and their children and family to be, 00:17:37.900 --> 00:17:40.319 that takes him into the shadows and into the 00:17:40.319 --> 00:17:44.480 darkness. But almost in a way that he doesn't 00:17:44.480 --> 00:17:47.140 really think that it's... wicked or evil he's 00:17:47.140 --> 00:17:50.839 not a kind of and now for the necromancy raise 00:17:50.839 --> 00:17:53.339 them it's none of that it's like oh wow yes this 00:17:53.339 --> 00:17:54.619 will this will help me that will help me this 00:17:54.619 --> 00:17:57.420 will help me and nobody gets hurt on along the 00:17:57.420 --> 00:17:59.740 way except perhaps right towards the end yeah 00:17:59.740 --> 00:18:04.160 yeah my story well it was it was really good 00:18:04.160 --> 00:18:07.690 really good and i love the way you really brought 00:18:07.690 --> 00:18:11.809 the audience into that medieval 12th century 00:18:11.809 --> 00:18:14.009 -ish Iceland because of course so many people 00:18:14.009 --> 00:18:16.210 think of Vikings think of Scandinavia but not 00:18:16.210 --> 00:18:18.069 many people think oh yes they did actually do 00:18:18.069 --> 00:18:20.849 anything north in Iceland and of course Iceland 00:18:20.849 --> 00:18:24.329 do have a thing even now for fairy mounds like 00:18:24.329 --> 00:18:27.009 they will I mean I believe it's true, unless 00:18:27.009 --> 00:18:29.230 it's an urban myth, that they'll direct a road 00:18:29.230 --> 00:18:31.150 around the fairy mound instead of bulldozing 00:18:31.150 --> 00:18:33.069 over the fairy mound. So they kind of had those 00:18:33.069 --> 00:18:35.890 superstitions and beliefs. I really like how 00:18:35.890 --> 00:18:38.190 you drew that in especially when you described 00:18:38.190 --> 00:18:40.529 the hero kind of like going into the wilder parts 00:18:40.529 --> 00:18:42.390 of Iceland away from where the people and the 00:18:42.390 --> 00:18:45.009 villagers are and encountering trolls and hearing 00:18:45.009 --> 00:18:47.509 the pipe and the flute and everything and the 00:18:47.509 --> 00:18:51.019 music. your your actual kind of vocal talent 00:18:51.019 --> 00:18:53.660 it was truly something to behold. I mean not 00:18:53.660 --> 00:18:55.380 just like doing the voices but doing the sound 00:18:55.380 --> 00:18:59.380 effects and the music and I mean going on to 00:18:59.380 --> 00:19:01.339 our next story which is because you told two 00:19:01.339 --> 00:19:03.160 that night the next one was about a shield maiden 00:19:03.160 --> 00:19:05.380 which of course got me up because of course women 00:19:05.380 --> 00:19:09.140 love stories about women and women heroes yeah 00:19:09.140 --> 00:19:11.160 and shield maidens are the flavour of the month 00:19:11.160 --> 00:19:15.200 when it comes with Vikings. That was also really 00:19:15.200 --> 00:19:17.079 interesting especially there's so few stories 00:19:17.369 --> 00:19:20.430 from the actual sources about the goddesses doing 00:19:20.430 --> 00:19:23.789 anything besides Freya crying tears of gold and 00:19:23.789 --> 00:19:25.569 sleeping with the dwarfs to get a necklace and 00:19:25.569 --> 00:19:27.690 Frigg telling everyone to stop hurting Balder 00:19:27.690 --> 00:19:29.950 and Eden turning into an acorn. That's about 00:19:29.950 --> 00:19:32.769 it really apart from hell. Hell is just hell. 00:19:33.029 --> 00:19:35.089 Blessed she just got cursed hell for being herself. 00:19:35.910 --> 00:19:37.650 That's it. There's no other stories about them 00:19:37.650 --> 00:19:39.690 whereas all the male gods have loads of adventures 00:19:39.690 --> 00:19:43.009 and so I was really excited to hear because obviously 00:19:43.009 --> 00:19:44.990 you didn't reveal it was Freya until the end. 00:19:45.029 --> 00:19:47.089 That was a beautiful kind of like pull -along. 00:19:47.750 --> 00:19:50.089 But I thought that was really well told, that 00:19:50.089 --> 00:19:52.150 one. And so I would just love to know more about 00:19:52.150 --> 00:19:57.970 how you came up with that story. So there's lots 00:19:57.970 --> 00:20:00.349 of different things in there. And I think that 00:20:00.349 --> 00:20:04.849 the main character was inspired by somebody I 00:20:04.849 --> 00:20:09.670 know, just sort of physically. And then, but 00:20:09.670 --> 00:20:11.980 then I don't know, I'm trying to remember about 00:20:11.980 --> 00:20:15.900 how she all sort of came together and all the 00:20:15.900 --> 00:20:18.819 things. I think what I wanted to do was, I wanted 00:20:18.819 --> 00:20:21.480 to have a strong female, I wanted this, I didn't 00:20:21.480 --> 00:20:24.500 set out to say, I want a strong female character 00:20:24.500 --> 00:20:26.460 and I'm going to do this. It was just, I was 00:20:26.460 --> 00:20:28.740 aware that there was this potential character 00:20:28.740 --> 00:20:32.460 there. And then, I've learned over the years, 00:20:32.480 --> 00:20:34.160 I think, quite a lot of my stories start off 00:20:34.160 --> 00:20:36.839 tragically. And they might end up happily, or 00:20:36.839 --> 00:20:39.319 they might end up tragically as well. And so 00:20:39.319 --> 00:20:42.220 both those stories I told that night is the young 00:20:42.220 --> 00:20:43.900 man finds it difficult, and his stepfather dies, 00:20:43.900 --> 00:20:45.680 and he's alone in the world with only a musical 00:20:45.680 --> 00:20:48.900 instrument and a small bank of money, and a denial 00:20:48.900 --> 00:20:50.839 from his potential father -in -law to marry his 00:20:50.839 --> 00:20:54.319 love. And then within the shield maiden, starting 00:20:54.319 --> 00:20:56.839 off with her seeing her husband being killed 00:20:56.839 --> 00:21:01.950 and seeing her child being killed. which is also, 00:21:03.809 --> 00:21:07.190 it can be a difficult sort of, a difficult story 00:21:07.190 --> 00:21:12.869 to start sometimes, because I'm not sure adults 00:21:12.869 --> 00:21:16.589 always understand that, that yes, of course, 00:21:16.589 --> 00:21:18.009 you know, stories can start, lots of stories, 00:21:18.309 --> 00:21:20.829 films, books, plays, whatever, TV series, start 00:21:20.829 --> 00:21:23.269 off with something awful. But when somebody is 00:21:23.269 --> 00:21:26.769 standing there and describing, how you know a 00:21:26.769 --> 00:21:29.470 little child is killed by some oracle raiders 00:21:29.470 --> 00:21:34.009 by some awful vikings um uh and that kicks the 00:21:34.009 --> 00:21:37.089 story off i can because i can see the audience 00:21:37.089 --> 00:21:40.210 i can see sometimes there's a kind of a you know 00:21:40.210 --> 00:21:41.890 no he's not going to do this sure he's not he's 00:21:41.890 --> 00:21:43.670 not he's not going to kill the kill the child 00:21:43.670 --> 00:21:45.910 as oh oh god he has oh god he's dead and you 00:21:45.910 --> 00:21:49.500 can see sort of early on people are And there's 00:21:49.500 --> 00:21:51.259 a little bit of, and I have to be very careful 00:21:51.259 --> 00:21:54.200 to manage that. So it's not done in an offensive 00:21:54.200 --> 00:21:57.380 or titillating way that people kind of feel. 00:21:57.740 --> 00:21:59.500 And especially, of course, with people who have 00:21:59.500 --> 00:22:03.079 lost loved ones or lost children or young siblings. 00:22:03.839 --> 00:22:06.539 I have to be gentle with that and carry them 00:22:06.539 --> 00:22:09.779 on to the next part so that they see there is, 00:22:09.779 --> 00:22:11.660 OK, here's a doorway to the next part of the 00:22:11.660 --> 00:22:14.119 story. And this is part of the story. This is 00:22:14.119 --> 00:22:18.349 not just gratuitous. murder of everyone because 00:22:18.349 --> 00:22:21.329 there is also a bit where in that very beginning 00:22:21.329 --> 00:22:22.990 after the husband has been killed and the child 00:22:22.990 --> 00:22:26.029 has been killed in which these raiders um how 00:22:26.029 --> 00:22:28.509 do I put this one of them forces himself upon 00:22:28.509 --> 00:22:31.269 her and I have to get the audience to understand 00:22:31.269 --> 00:22:36.630 that without getting into detail which no one 00:22:36.630 --> 00:22:40.009 wants to hear and would make everybody feel very 00:22:40.009 --> 00:22:43.460 uncomfortable and also as a man telling it, it 00:22:43.460 --> 00:22:46.940 becomes extra difficult. And so I have to kind 00:22:46.940 --> 00:22:50.079 of make it, make sure the audience understand 00:22:50.079 --> 00:22:52.059 what's going on, what's about to happen or what 00:22:52.059 --> 00:22:54.660 could happen. And then she kills him and there's 00:22:54.660 --> 00:22:56.440 a moment of, and I've actually had people in 00:22:56.440 --> 00:23:00.299 the audience go, she kills him as a kind of like, 00:23:00.319 --> 00:23:03.180 you know, that's a kind of a steam release of 00:23:03.180 --> 00:23:07.240 the release valve of everything that's happened 00:23:07.240 --> 00:23:11.069 then. And then things become sort of drawn out. 00:23:13.009 --> 00:23:15.230 There's lots of bits of folklore in there. I 00:23:15.230 --> 00:23:18.710 also wanted her to not be a sort of wailing widow, 00:23:19.009 --> 00:23:22.990 sort of dragging herself through the through 00:23:22.990 --> 00:23:25.109 the badlands of the world. And so when she turns 00:23:25.109 --> 00:23:28.970 up at the nobleman's house and she wins the wrestling 00:23:28.970 --> 00:23:31.490 competition because she fights part. And at the 00:23:31.490 --> 00:23:32.630 end of the evening, because he sort of said, 00:23:32.650 --> 00:23:34.630 well, why did you stay here and keep me warm? 00:23:34.670 --> 00:23:36.829 And all the adults, anybody over the room could 00:23:36.829 --> 00:23:39.019 understand what he means. And at the end, he 00:23:39.019 --> 00:23:40.680 does sleep at the bottom of the bed because he's 00:23:40.680 --> 00:23:42.519 lost. But then they keep each other warm late 00:23:42.519 --> 00:23:44.059 in the night. And it's a way of kind of like, 00:23:44.299 --> 00:23:46.640 yes, she's lost the love of her life. But her 00:23:46.640 --> 00:23:48.359 life hasn't ended. And her life hasn't ended 00:23:48.359 --> 00:23:51.279 as a woman, as an individual, as a loving, caring 00:23:51.279 --> 00:23:53.900 person with needs and passions. And that can 00:23:53.900 --> 00:23:56.259 be OK. And then she goes off on her journey. 00:23:56.299 --> 00:23:58.579 And that's just a kind of a little kind of bit. 00:23:59.380 --> 00:24:01.819 So I wanted her to be able to, again, this is 00:24:01.819 --> 00:24:03.539 me so perhaps retrospectively thinking, I didn't 00:24:03.539 --> 00:24:06.200 step south to say these are the points to hit. 00:24:06.680 --> 00:24:09.359 But I felt that her character was strong enough 00:24:09.359 --> 00:24:13.619 so that when she had to got over the grief and 00:24:13.619 --> 00:24:15.460 made the decision to go out into the world and 00:24:15.460 --> 00:24:17.559 to go and die gloriously in battle so she could 00:24:17.559 --> 00:24:21.960 find her husband and daughter, then she was allowed 00:24:21.960 --> 00:24:25.119 to do all sorts of things of fighting, feasting, 00:24:26.579 --> 00:24:31.160 and the other one that she could enjoy the third, 00:24:31.380 --> 00:24:35.329 frolicking, let's say, and enjoy. enjoy her life 00:24:35.329 --> 00:24:39.710 as well as being a strong character. Well, you 00:24:39.710 --> 00:24:42.910 did tell it and handled those delicate subjects 00:24:42.910 --> 00:24:46.470 really, really well. I mean, it's interesting. 00:24:46.880 --> 00:24:48.779 now that you've talked about it kind of like 00:24:48.779 --> 00:24:51.180 when we think back to some of the North stories 00:24:51.180 --> 00:24:53.980 are quite dark. I mean Odin gets off with a lot 00:24:53.980 --> 00:24:57.779 of giantesses on his way and Loki does his thing 00:24:57.779 --> 00:25:01.799 as a horse. Yes, yeah. And Freya she sleeps around 00:25:01.799 --> 00:25:04.099 with dwarves but kind of like there's also kind 00:25:04.099 --> 00:25:06.079 of like beheadings like I remember learning about 00:25:06.079 --> 00:25:09.819 the story where Odin tricks a load I think the 00:25:09.819 --> 00:25:13.950 giants or at least some kind of dumb hype. characters 00:25:13.950 --> 00:25:16.150 in a field with and he gives them a magic whetstone 00:25:16.150 --> 00:25:18.029 and makes them all super sharp and then they 00:25:18.029 --> 00:25:20.750 all accidentally behead each other as they're 00:25:20.750 --> 00:25:22.390 sheathing the weak kind of thing and I thought 00:25:22.390 --> 00:25:25.349 that's actually really cruel. Yeah absolutely. 00:25:26.170 --> 00:25:28.710 But that's just too old it is and I think that's 00:25:28.710 --> 00:25:32.150 something that Marvel has definitely taken out 00:25:32.150 --> 00:25:34.630 of. They've taken a lot of the darkness out because 00:25:34.630 --> 00:25:37.190 they want their classic superhero, they want 00:25:37.190 --> 00:25:40.049 the classical villain which is why it irks me 00:25:40.049 --> 00:25:41.930 still that they've given Loki horns than Hella 00:25:41.930 --> 00:25:46.789 horns. Yeah. So that kind of like symbolism of 00:25:46.789 --> 00:25:50.509 evilness. But then in a way, kind of like when 00:25:50.509 --> 00:25:53.410 I think back to Beowulf, that's got lots of dark 00:25:53.410 --> 00:25:55.890 stuff in it. And yet that was being told probably 00:25:55.890 --> 00:25:59.829 around the fires for ages. So it's almost like 00:25:59.829 --> 00:26:04.349 stories help us look at these dark things and 00:26:04.349 --> 00:26:07.589 confront them or accept them or learn to understand 00:26:07.589 --> 00:26:10.990 why they are that dark perhaps. Or almost like 00:26:10.990 --> 00:26:13.640 learn a lesson from them. as as you say kind 00:26:13.640 --> 00:26:15.579 of like with your first story about the man kind 00:26:15.579 --> 00:26:17.859 of like always one step from evil there's always 00:26:17.859 --> 00:26:20.240 like some kind of like a lesson and a message 00:26:20.240 --> 00:26:23.359 behind each story which it's probably been universally 00:26:23.359 --> 00:26:25.900 true for most stories I think because they help 00:26:25.900 --> 00:26:28.700 us all empathize with another they help us put 00:26:28.700 --> 00:26:30.740 ourselves in those places in those shoes and 00:26:30.740 --> 00:26:33.839 these times because these stories are set in 00:26:33.839 --> 00:26:36.680 times if not worlds very much different to our 00:26:36.680 --> 00:26:39.220 own. I think I read an article a little while 00:26:39.220 --> 00:26:41.619 back in the New Scientist magazine, and that 00:26:41.619 --> 00:26:45.640 was talking about how reading fiction helps with 00:26:45.640 --> 00:26:48.279 empathy and understanding and human communication, 00:26:48.680 --> 00:26:51.980 because precisely that. So that engaging with 00:26:51.980 --> 00:26:58.140 fiction can safely take us to places that we 00:26:58.140 --> 00:27:00.680 perhaps should never and hopefully will never 00:27:00.680 --> 00:27:03.680 go. But it does prepare us for those things. 00:27:05.089 --> 00:27:07.650 And it is that, we've become a little bit sort 00:27:07.650 --> 00:27:10.789 of, I think, since the, oh, I don't know, it's 00:27:10.789 --> 00:27:12.410 probably throughout history, but I think of things 00:27:12.410 --> 00:27:14.130 like the Grimm's fairy tales, where the Brothers 00:27:14.130 --> 00:27:18.970 Grimm collected them from lots of different people, 00:27:19.029 --> 00:27:20.869 and actually a lot of them from the woman who 00:27:20.869 --> 00:27:22.250 lived next door, and then one of the brothers 00:27:22.250 --> 00:27:24.269 married her, and she still doesn't get a mention 00:27:24.269 --> 00:27:29.150 as was the Brothers Grimm. But some of the earlier 00:27:29.150 --> 00:27:31.109 cuts of those, the earlier ones, even though 00:27:31.109 --> 00:27:34.099 they're still tidied up are still pretty gruesome 00:27:34.099 --> 00:27:38.200 and then they get less gruesome as people's sensibilities 00:27:38.200 --> 00:27:41.039 and that very sort of 19th century Victorian 00:27:41.039 --> 00:27:44.460 morality comes in even though it may well be 00:27:44.460 --> 00:27:47.680 a double morality of this is what we say we do 00:27:47.680 --> 00:27:49.819 and actually this is what we really do in private 00:27:49.819 --> 00:27:53.119 or you know to the poor or to women or whatever 00:27:53.119 --> 00:27:56.559 but you know this public morality. And then, 00:27:56.619 --> 00:27:57.859 of course, coming into the first part of the 00:27:57.859 --> 00:27:59.900 20th century, and then Disney took them and polished 00:27:59.900 --> 00:28:02.819 them even further. We've stepped away from a 00:28:02.819 --> 00:28:05.299 lot of those things. And when I tell stories 00:28:05.299 --> 00:28:10.059 to children, if they are gruesome or horrible, 00:28:10.619 --> 00:28:12.480 it's usually the adults who are looking at their 00:28:12.480 --> 00:28:13.720 child, and looking at me, and looking at the 00:28:13.720 --> 00:28:14.819 child, and looking at me, and looking at the 00:28:14.819 --> 00:28:16.480 child, and looking at me. Whereas the child is 00:28:16.480 --> 00:28:19.039 just quite happily sitting there. And it's like 00:28:19.039 --> 00:28:22.559 the cartoon violence. It's not real. um understand 00:28:22.559 --> 00:28:24.299 what's happening and yes there are moralities 00:28:24.299 --> 00:28:26.920 and there are lessons but it is that point when 00:28:26.920 --> 00:28:30.299 if we can face the darkness in our imagination 00:28:30.299 --> 00:28:33.359 that helps us to deal with the darkness in our 00:28:33.359 --> 00:28:36.779 real life should we encounter any um otherwise 00:28:36.779 --> 00:28:39.339 we've got nothing to call on we've got no no 00:28:39.339 --> 00:28:42.920 examples no points of reference to do that with 00:28:49.879 --> 00:28:51.660 researching some stories for a show I'm going 00:28:51.660 --> 00:28:54.980 to be doing in a couple of weeks with my big 00:28:54.980 --> 00:28:56.700 sister, especially on the 18th of May, online 00:28:56.700 --> 00:28:59.140 or watch later, if you want to. And it's called 00:28:59.140 --> 00:29:02.579 Tales from the Haunted Bakery. And it should 00:29:02.579 --> 00:29:06.259 be a nice sort of slightly kind of funny, dark 00:29:06.259 --> 00:29:10.819 sort of dark fairy tales, sort of light horror 00:29:10.819 --> 00:29:14.559 sort of thing with quite a lot of comedy in it. 00:29:14.980 --> 00:29:17.359 But I came across, I was looking for stories 00:29:17.359 --> 00:29:21.069 and I came across a Grimm's collected fairy tale 00:29:21.069 --> 00:29:23.349 that was in the first edition of their collection, 00:29:23.609 --> 00:29:26.309 but didn't make it to any of the others. And 00:29:26.309 --> 00:29:29.410 it's called something like The Two Brothers Who 00:29:29.410 --> 00:29:33.130 Played at Slaughter. And in the story, two brothers 00:29:33.130 --> 00:29:35.690 see a butcher slaughtering a pig and they decided 00:29:35.690 --> 00:29:39.750 that they will have a go at this. And there are 00:29:39.750 --> 00:29:41.769 a few different versions, but basically one is 00:29:41.769 --> 00:29:44.890 the butcher and one is the pig. And the mother 00:29:44.890 --> 00:29:46.769 looks out of the window as she's bathing the 00:29:46.769 --> 00:29:49.690 baby and sees one of the boys cutting the throat 00:29:49.690 --> 00:29:52.069 of the other one. And so she immediately rushes 00:29:52.069 --> 00:29:53.809 down to try and stop this. It's too late, he's 00:29:53.809 --> 00:29:56.170 cut his brother's throat. And so she hangs her 00:29:56.170 --> 00:29:59.009 other son, hangs him, the other boy for cutting 00:29:59.009 --> 00:30:01.109 his brother's throat, only of course then to 00:30:01.109 --> 00:30:03.589 realize that the baby left back in the house 00:30:03.589 --> 00:30:08.579 has drowned in the bathwater. Yeah, that's basically 00:30:08.579 --> 00:30:11.440 the story. But this is a folktale, a fairy tale. 00:30:12.299 --> 00:30:14.140 And it hasn't made it past the first edition, 00:30:14.160 --> 00:30:17.380 because obviously it's far too gruesome. And 00:30:17.380 --> 00:30:19.220 to be honest, it's not much of a story beyond 00:30:19.220 --> 00:30:22.079 the, if you happen to see your children slitting 00:30:22.079 --> 00:30:23.680 each other's throats, make sure you don't leave 00:30:23.680 --> 00:30:26.519 the baby in the bath when you go to hang the 00:30:26.519 --> 00:30:32.920 other one. But that's a particularly gruesome 00:30:32.920 --> 00:30:37.470 version. Some of the fairy tales, Charles Perot 00:30:37.470 --> 00:30:40.349 who wrote or collected Red Riding Hood and Cinderella 00:30:40.349 --> 00:30:48.130 and Sleeping Beauty. At the end of... to leaping 00:30:48.130 --> 00:30:49.910 beauty. The bit where she marries the prince 00:30:49.910 --> 00:30:53.670 is only half the story. She stays in the castle 00:30:53.670 --> 00:30:55.829 as a sort of secret wife until eventually his 00:30:55.829 --> 00:30:58.890 father dies. He becomes king. His wife and two 00:30:58.890 --> 00:31:01.589 children go and join them. But his mother is 00:31:01.589 --> 00:31:04.250 an ogre. And so when he goes off to war, he has 00:31:04.250 --> 00:31:06.609 to hide his wife and children because she wants 00:31:06.609 --> 00:31:10.509 to eat them. She then finds them and then instructs 00:31:10.509 --> 00:31:13.609 a servant. to kill one of the children and to 00:31:13.609 --> 00:31:16.170 cook it. He, of course, does. He hides the child 00:31:16.170 --> 00:31:19.710 and cooks some venison instead. And goes to the 00:31:19.710 --> 00:31:22.529 second one. And then she thinks she's eaten both 00:31:22.529 --> 00:31:26.049 children and what was Sleeping Beauty, only to 00:31:26.049 --> 00:31:28.269 discover them, of course, as they're arguing 00:31:28.269 --> 00:31:30.690 one day. And she's about to lower them into a 00:31:30.690 --> 00:31:34.630 cauldron full of poisonous snakes and toads and, 00:31:34.630 --> 00:31:38.509 sorry, venomous snakes and toads and whatnot. 00:31:38.650 --> 00:31:41.190 When the prince turns up, sees it's his mother, 00:31:41.529 --> 00:31:43.390 she's horrified at being caught out and jumps 00:31:43.390 --> 00:31:46.029 into the cauldron killing herself with venomous 00:31:46.029 --> 00:31:48.869 snakes and toads. And then, and only then, does 00:31:48.869 --> 00:31:51.210 the prince, sleeping beauty and their two children 00:31:51.210 --> 00:31:53.490 live happily ever after. But, you know, that's 00:31:53.490 --> 00:31:57.759 been totally... Wow. Yeah, yeah, you don't see 00:31:57.759 --> 00:32:00.819 that one in Disney. No, even I don't. I mean, 00:32:00.960 --> 00:32:02.619 I've got a four -year -old, well, four and a 00:32:02.619 --> 00:32:04.619 half year old now going on 13 with the level 00:32:04.619 --> 00:32:07.000 of sass and attitude I got this morning. Very 00:32:07.000 --> 00:32:11.000 good. And I remember kind of like her Harrymore 00:32:11.000 --> 00:32:12.940 from the Tooth Fairy for giving up her dummies 00:32:12.940 --> 00:32:15.519 two years plus ago was a nice collection of fairy 00:32:15.519 --> 00:32:18.980 tales. And it was only upon reading them to Naomi 00:32:18.980 --> 00:32:21.400 that kind of like a lot of the bad guys were 00:32:21.400 --> 00:32:24.259 either witches. or evil setmothers, there's not 00:32:24.259 --> 00:32:28.359 many bad men, there's always princes or nice 00:32:28.359 --> 00:32:33.839 kings, but yeah it's interesting because I've 00:32:33.839 --> 00:32:36.079 certainly been doubling myself, oh I might say 00:32:36.079 --> 00:32:39.799 doubling, I've been reading some Norse folk tales, 00:32:39.799 --> 00:32:41.859 I don't know if I've come across this book before. 00:32:42.640 --> 00:32:44.559 I know it, I've not read it, I've seen it but 00:32:44.559 --> 00:32:47.700 I've not read it, yes. It's interesting, it's 00:32:47.700 --> 00:32:54.150 certainly interesting, it fairies and pixies 00:32:54.150 --> 00:32:56.529 and elves and gnomes and dwarves and it has, 00:32:56.769 --> 00:32:59.529 it makes me think that yes it's reminiscent of 00:32:59.529 --> 00:33:01.549 English folklore and fairy tales but it's very 00:33:01.549 --> 00:33:03.829 distinctly different. I mean the last story I 00:33:03.829 --> 00:33:08.789 read was called Prince Lindworm which was, it 00:33:08.789 --> 00:33:11.769 was strangely reminiscent of Rapunzel in that 00:33:11.769 --> 00:33:14.269 the Queen had to eat some flowers in order to 00:33:14.269 --> 00:33:16.170 have a baby because she wasn't conceiving naturally 00:33:16.170 --> 00:33:19.660 for whatever reason. Yes. and she meets an old 00:33:19.660 --> 00:33:21.819 hag as you do in the woods and the old hag says 00:33:21.819 --> 00:33:23.460 you eat this one for a girl this one for a boy 00:33:23.460 --> 00:33:26.799 but don't eat two and she of course picks one 00:33:26.799 --> 00:33:29.200 after a lot of thought and decides it's quite 00:33:29.200 --> 00:33:31.460 tasty she might as well eat the other one yeah 00:33:31.460 --> 00:33:34.940 as you do um and so nine months went by she gives 00:33:34.940 --> 00:33:37.000 birth first to the lindenworm but he slithers 00:33:37.000 --> 00:33:39.259 out so quick and out of the room and beyond that 00:33:39.259 --> 00:33:41.839 no one sees him apart from the mum so she thinks 00:33:41.839 --> 00:33:44.440 she's just hallucinating in the midst of childbirth 00:33:44.440 --> 00:33:46.960 and produced the second son yeah but then when 00:33:46.960 --> 00:33:50.279 the second son wants to get married they keep 00:33:50.279 --> 00:33:51.980 finding that the Lindworm who's a lot bigger 00:33:51.980 --> 00:33:54.099 now keeps blocking off all the roads preventing 00:33:54.099 --> 00:33:56.599 him going to see any princess goes no I'm the 00:33:56.599 --> 00:33:59.039 first born you need to find a wife for me and 00:33:59.039 --> 00:34:01.819 the king's like oh all right then um I'll write 00:34:01.819 --> 00:34:03.619 to this far off land they'll send me their daughter 00:34:03.619 --> 00:34:05.539 if I don't tell them it's a Lindworm she'll come 00:34:05.539 --> 00:34:09.079 they don't she comes they'll probably never notice 00:34:09.079 --> 00:34:12.239 yeah I know, she discovers him at the wedding, 00:34:12.340 --> 00:34:14.460 doesn't flee, she goes through with it and the 00:34:14.460 --> 00:34:16.179 Lindwurm eats her. And then this keeps happening 00:34:16.179 --> 00:34:18.179 and eventually all the other kings say, no, we're 00:34:18.179 --> 00:34:19.699 not sending you our daughters now because I've 00:34:19.699 --> 00:34:21.400 heard so -and -so's daughter never came back 00:34:21.400 --> 00:34:23.760 and so -and -so's daughter never came back. So 00:34:23.760 --> 00:34:26.960 the king is bereft, he goes to a goat's herd 00:34:26.960 --> 00:34:28.760 and says, look, I will give you all the wealth 00:34:28.760 --> 00:34:30.579 I have in my kingdom if your daughter will just 00:34:30.579 --> 00:34:32.260 go and marry this Lindwurm so it will just leave 00:34:32.260 --> 00:34:35.300 us alone so we can get my son a nice wife. The 00:34:35.300 --> 00:34:37.920 daughter, of course, gets bereft, or about her 00:34:37.920 --> 00:34:40.780 fate to be because her father is lured and pressured 00:34:40.780 --> 00:34:43.659 by the king and she meets the same hag in the 00:34:43.659 --> 00:34:45.559 woods and he goes oh I can solve your problem 00:34:45.559 --> 00:34:49.420 for you too. She tells her to wear 10 shifts 00:34:49.420 --> 00:34:52.739 like snake skins for the n -worm so on their 00:34:52.739 --> 00:34:56.219 wedding night she goes through with it so the 00:34:56.219 --> 00:34:58.239 n -worm says will you get into bed and he goes 00:34:58.239 --> 00:35:00.420 I'll get into bed if you shed one of your skins 00:35:00.420 --> 00:35:03.320 and so they do and so they keep going through 00:35:03.320 --> 00:35:05.579 the cycle of shedding skins together and then 00:35:05.579 --> 00:35:07.860 when he's basically stripped bare she has to 00:35:08.190 --> 00:35:10.110 thrash him with a whip and then bathe him in 00:35:10.110 --> 00:35:12.570 milk and then she can cuddle him in bed and then 00:35:12.570 --> 00:35:14.750 the next day he's a beautiful prince and then 00:35:14.750 --> 00:35:16.590 she's happy because she's got two prints and 00:35:16.590 --> 00:35:18.489 she can have all the wealth and she's now a princess 00:35:18.489 --> 00:35:20.909 and everyone's happy and thought that's really 00:35:20.909 --> 00:35:22.610 rather gruesome actually kind of like honestly 00:35:22.610 --> 00:35:24.650 having to shed the skin and then thrash a giant 00:35:24.650 --> 00:35:27.829 lynn worm. It's not like they're ever going to 00:35:27.829 --> 00:35:29.409 get better it's kind of like oh okay basically 00:35:29.409 --> 00:35:36.489 I've changed now I've stopped my matricidal cannibalistic 00:35:36.489 --> 00:35:41.949 ways um is it matricide is that right yeah i 00:35:41.949 --> 00:35:45.389 don't know i'm rubbish with words between killings 00:35:45.389 --> 00:35:47.110 and mothers i think what what spouse i call them 00:35:47.110 --> 00:35:49.070 the spouses but yes um but yeah obviously i've 00:35:49.070 --> 00:35:51.230 stopped i've stopped eating my wives now and 00:35:51.230 --> 00:35:53.949 uh uh yeah okay all right we'll we'll be happy 00:35:53.949 --> 00:35:56.010 but again this yeah there's a number that's like 00:35:56.039 --> 00:36:02.139 the Arabian Nights, the Sultan who marries and 00:36:02.139 --> 00:36:04.420 then after the wedding night kills his wife in 00:36:04.420 --> 00:36:06.300 the morning every day. And it's only Scheherazade 00:36:06.300 --> 00:36:08.860 who says, well, let me tell you a story. And 00:36:08.860 --> 00:36:10.440 he says, oh, I want to know the ending of that. 00:36:10.460 --> 00:36:13.239 Well, I'll tell you tomorrow. And she's spinning 00:36:13.239 --> 00:36:18.739 it out for 1 ,001 nights every night. And eventually 00:36:18.739 --> 00:36:20.980 he goes, all right, I won't murder you then. 00:36:21.000 --> 00:36:26.119 I'll keep you. Oh, how lovely. yeah there's a 00:36:26.119 --> 00:36:27.719 lot of those things you mentioned earlier by 00:36:27.719 --> 00:36:30.119 the way about stepmothers in a lot of the earlier 00:36:30.119 --> 00:36:33.820 recordings of fairy tales it's not stepmothers 00:36:33.820 --> 00:36:37.460 it's just mothers what makes it even worse but 00:36:37.460 --> 00:36:39.239 then i think yes it kind of got cleaned up and 00:36:39.239 --> 00:36:41.699 we can't possibly say that mothers do this mothers 00:36:41.699 --> 00:36:43.900 would never do that step stepmother there we 00:36:43.900 --> 00:36:47.059 go wicked stepmother so before that yeah it's 00:36:47.059 --> 00:36:51.559 it's women basically women There is certainly 00:36:51.559 --> 00:36:54.719 an issue of what some academics have called kind 00:36:54.719 --> 00:36:57.309 of like the male gaze and kind of like stories 00:36:57.309 --> 00:37:00.329 being decided and determined by men. I mean I 00:37:00.329 --> 00:37:02.349 think this is one thing I've certainly learnt 00:37:02.349 --> 00:37:05.090 in my research on Valkyrie is that some scholars 00:37:05.090 --> 00:37:07.349 have a big chip on the shoulder of Tim with story 00:37:07.349 --> 00:37:09.750 stills and because he's the most famous one of 00:37:09.750 --> 00:37:12.210 all for writing down these Norse myths but he 00:37:12.210 --> 00:37:14.610 was a Christian and he was a man and he chose 00:37:14.610 --> 00:37:16.730 what he chose he didn't write all of them down 00:37:16.730 --> 00:37:18.969 by any means he selected it was a compilation 00:37:18.969 --> 00:37:22.650 article collection and it was of a purpose because 00:37:22.650 --> 00:37:25.130 he was writing as a book to give to a certain 00:37:25.130 --> 00:37:27.110 prints I think to help him learn the ways of 00:37:27.110 --> 00:37:29.449 being king and connect with his heritage so it 00:37:29.449 --> 00:37:34.929 had that whole agenda behind it yeah. It was 00:37:34.929 --> 00:37:36.510 certainly that's what made me interesting when 00:37:36.510 --> 00:37:39.590 kind of like of course Disney slash Marvel decided 00:37:39.590 --> 00:38:10.800 to retail. the the Snow White's evil queen with 00:38:10.800 --> 00:38:14.199 some kind of backstory to help justify her evilness. 00:38:15.880 --> 00:38:18.579 I've not brought myself to see it. No, nor have 00:38:18.579 --> 00:38:21.099 I. I just saw a lot of people going, woke, woke, 00:38:21.199 --> 00:38:24.960 woke, woke, and I just didn't know. Again, in 00:38:24.960 --> 00:38:28.820 Snow White, it's become, Disney cleaned it up 00:38:28.820 --> 00:38:30.320 to this idea of, you know, the prince coming 00:38:30.320 --> 00:38:32.519 along and finding her and falling in love with 00:38:32.519 --> 00:38:34.440 her and then seeing her dead in the coffin and 00:38:34.440 --> 00:38:35.880 giving her a magic kiss to bring her back to 00:38:35.880 --> 00:38:40.809 life. In some of the earlier versions, the evil 00:38:40.809 --> 00:38:44.429 queen is her mother and who is jealous of her 00:38:44.429 --> 00:38:47.349 daughter's beauty and poisons her with the apple, 00:38:47.570 --> 00:38:49.070 which gets lodged in her throat and she dies. 00:38:49.170 --> 00:38:51.349 The dwarves put her in a crystal coffin and they're 00:38:51.349 --> 00:38:52.809 determined to look after her because she was 00:38:52.809 --> 00:38:54.150 wonderful and lived with them and looked after 00:38:54.150 --> 00:38:58.329 them. A prince turns up, sees a beautiful corpse 00:38:58.329 --> 00:39:00.590 in a glass coffin and thinks, oh, I'd like that. 00:39:01.009 --> 00:39:03.170 And then he says, can I have it? And they say, 00:39:03.230 --> 00:39:05.130 no, no, no, no, we're the caretakers of this. 00:39:05.289 --> 00:39:06.869 You can't possibly have it. He says, what about 00:39:06.869 --> 00:39:09.289 a lot of money? And they go, OK, you can have 00:39:09.289 --> 00:39:11.630 it. And he takes the glass coffin. And it's only 00:39:11.630 --> 00:39:16.429 when, on the way back to his homeland, the cart 00:39:16.429 --> 00:39:19.849 bumps or breaks, and the coffin falls off, and 00:39:19.849 --> 00:39:22.750 the lid slides off, that he then thinks, do you 00:39:22.750 --> 00:39:24.690 know what? I think I'll just kiss this corpse 00:39:24.690 --> 00:39:30.579 because it's a very beautiful corpse. purely 00:39:30.579 --> 00:39:32.360 incidental, or he doesn't know that she's going 00:39:32.360 --> 00:39:36.679 to wake up. So it's just a prince kissing the 00:39:36.679 --> 00:39:39.380 dead body of a beautiful young woman. And then 00:39:39.380 --> 00:39:42.119 she wakes up, coughs out the bit of poison apple. 00:39:42.539 --> 00:39:44.800 Then he says, oh, how lovely, you're alive. That's 00:39:44.800 --> 00:39:48.179 a bonus. quite clear, quite happy when she was 00:39:48.179 --> 00:39:50.659 dead. Will you marry me? Yes, I'd love to marry 00:39:50.659 --> 00:39:52.219 you. Let's get married. Well, we should invite 00:39:52.219 --> 00:39:54.800 everybody. Why don't we invite my mother, stepmother, 00:39:55.059 --> 00:39:57.000 and they do, and she comes along to the wedding 00:39:57.000 --> 00:40:00.579 party and then is put in red hot iron shoes and 00:40:00.579 --> 00:40:04.780 they watch as she dances herself to death. Yeah, 00:40:04.820 --> 00:40:06.699 that's not in my daughter's story. The choking 00:40:06.699 --> 00:40:09.840 apple, well, the apple choking bit is, which 00:40:09.840 --> 00:40:11.480 is what my daughter picked up. She goes, that 00:40:11.480 --> 00:40:13.360 doesn't happen in the film though, does it, mama? 00:40:13.900 --> 00:40:16.039 No, she doesn't choke. She swallows the apple, 00:40:16.300 --> 00:40:17.639 darling, and it's the spell that puts her to 00:40:17.639 --> 00:40:20.880 sleep. But yeah, when you think about it so starkly 00:40:20.880 --> 00:40:23.280 as an adult, yeah, he's just walking around and 00:40:23.280 --> 00:40:25.119 then kissing a beautiful woman dead or alive, 00:40:25.199 --> 00:40:27.500 which doesn't make him happy at all. That's right. 00:40:27.639 --> 00:40:29.019 Yeah, she seems to be quite well -preserved. 00:40:29.079 --> 00:40:30.960 Why not? I'll have a snog with a corpse, as in 00:40:30.960 --> 00:40:32.920 along with that. Here's a large amount of money 00:40:32.920 --> 00:40:34.780 for me to take that corpse off your hand. And 00:40:34.780 --> 00:40:39.280 the doors go, yeah, right, go on then. And yeah, 00:40:39.280 --> 00:40:44.619 so it's very weird. I think one of the things 00:40:44.619 --> 00:40:48.960 about stories and the more magical they get is 00:40:48.960 --> 00:40:52.699 sometimes things are just bizarre in the stories 00:40:52.699 --> 00:40:55.460 and it just helps to plot along and sometimes 00:40:55.460 --> 00:40:57.860 you have to sort of let go of the don't pull 00:40:57.860 --> 00:41:00.539 at the thread, don't kind of go why did the prince 00:41:00.539 --> 00:41:03.360 want a dead woman and why is he kissing a dead 00:41:03.360 --> 00:41:07.019 woman in the knowledge that she's dead, not that 00:41:07.019 --> 00:41:09.420 there's a magic spell that will wake her. but 00:41:09.420 --> 00:41:11.719 that she's just, don't pull at that, don't pull 00:41:11.719 --> 00:41:14.800 at that thread. There is an element of, I just 00:41:14.800 --> 00:41:17.179 have to accept this as the story goes on and 00:41:17.179 --> 00:41:19.760 it's helping the story move from place to place. 00:41:20.739 --> 00:41:23.059 And again, quite possibly because the original 00:41:23.059 --> 00:41:25.960 storytellers, the original, the bards, the writers, 00:41:26.500 --> 00:41:29.559 the chroniclers, even though it was, you know, 00:41:29.960 --> 00:41:31.860 mouth to ear to mouth to ear, would have kind 00:41:31.860 --> 00:41:35.380 of gone, how do I get from here to there? So 00:41:35.380 --> 00:41:39.320 we'll just do that. uh and yeah and everyone's 00:41:39.320 --> 00:41:42.320 yeah okay we'll just we'll just accept that we 00:41:42.320 --> 00:41:44.559 will suspend our disbelief and our criticisms 00:41:44.559 --> 00:41:48.960 and just go with all right that happened we've 00:41:48.960 --> 00:41:53.210 got to the next part of the story. Well, I think 00:41:53.210 --> 00:41:55.150 you and possibly some of our viewers and listeners 00:41:55.150 --> 00:41:56.989 might appreciate this book if they just like 00:41:56.989 --> 00:41:58.969 some short stories that are very different to 00:41:58.969 --> 00:42:01.849 English folk and fairy tales. It's Viking Folk 00:42:01.849 --> 00:42:05.030 and Fairy Tales from Flame Tree Press, their 00:42:05.030 --> 00:42:10.030 fables, folklore and ancient stories. I got this 00:42:10.030 --> 00:42:15.710 in Norway last year. Lovely. It's certainly interesting. 00:42:15.869 --> 00:42:17.650 I'm only kind of like even a third of the way 00:42:17.650 --> 00:42:19.929 through it because there's lots of stories. There's 00:42:19.929 --> 00:42:21.750 one so far that I've come across that matches 00:42:21.750 --> 00:42:23.469 kind of like with the pantheon of characters 00:42:23.469 --> 00:42:25.730 from the mythology, but the rest have all been 00:42:25.730 --> 00:42:28.630 very much about princes or kings or princesses 00:42:28.630 --> 00:42:32.170 and trolls and ogres and all sorts of wicked 00:42:32.170 --> 00:42:35.789 dealings and curses of three or breaking things. 00:42:36.170 --> 00:42:38.030 It's interesting, but I wonder if you've ever 00:42:38.030 --> 00:42:40.650 come across the Cursed Sword of Tiefing Tale. 00:42:43.960 --> 00:42:46.940 It's a wonderful tale. I haven't actually got 00:42:46.940 --> 00:42:49.280 like a book version of it, but I know it must 00:42:49.280 --> 00:42:52.739 be written down somewhere. Because our previous 00:42:52.739 --> 00:42:55.579 guests on the Legends of Yorvik mini -series, 00:42:55.739 --> 00:42:57.760 the Timetel Theatre did a wonderful dramatisation 00:42:57.760 --> 00:43:01.570 of that as the finale show for the Yorvik. festival 00:43:01.570 --> 00:43:04.469 this year and it's all about a king who finds 00:43:04.469 --> 00:43:06.469 some dwarves prevents them from going home says 00:43:06.469 --> 00:43:08.349 you want to make me a brilliant sword so that 00:43:08.349 --> 00:43:10.889 can kill anyone and anything and it must be gold 00:43:10.889 --> 00:43:13.630 and have a ruby in the hilt lovely okay okay 00:43:13.630 --> 00:43:15.289 we'll go do it and they secretly do it but put 00:43:15.289 --> 00:43:17.630 curses into it that it will that it must always 00:43:17.630 --> 00:43:19.610 taste blood when it's unsheathed and it will 00:43:19.610 --> 00:43:23.639 do three evil deeds in its lifetime and there's 00:43:23.639 --> 00:43:25.699 a wonderful female shieldmaiden character in 00:43:25.699 --> 00:43:28.300 the entire arc because it travels through generation 00:43:28.300 --> 00:43:30.320 after generation this sword and into all sorts 00:43:30.320 --> 00:43:32.820 of hands of families causing all sorts of tragedy 00:43:32.820 --> 00:43:35.539 trauma and mischief and lots of bloodshed as 00:43:35.539 --> 00:43:40.099 part of the curse but it's full of draugr and 00:43:40.099 --> 00:43:43.420 spells and curses and brother betraying brother 00:43:43.420 --> 00:43:46.920 or that kind of thing and there is actually one 00:43:46.920 --> 00:43:51.289 element that features a bit of kind of a storytelling 00:43:51.289 --> 00:43:55.750 within the story in that one prince well one 00:43:55.750 --> 00:43:57.550 guy who then becomes a king once he gets the 00:43:57.550 --> 00:44:02.289 sword decides to dispense justice by way of people 00:44:02.289 --> 00:44:05.010 proving their innocence and this one guy had 00:44:05.010 --> 00:44:06.610 done something so horribly wrong he had to prove 00:44:06.610 --> 00:44:09.050 his innocence but he couldn't work out how so 00:44:09.050 --> 00:44:11.210 he prayed to Odin for a miracle and Odin said 00:44:11.210 --> 00:44:15.679 all right I'll go in your stead. I'll prove my 00:44:15.679 --> 00:44:17.760 innocence by giving you a riddle you cannot solve, 00:44:17.820 --> 00:44:20.119 dear king." And he gives him riddle after riddle. 00:44:20.280 --> 00:44:22.320 The king proves clever and answers some of them. 00:44:22.739 --> 00:44:24.480 And then, of course, Odin does what Odin does, 00:44:24.519 --> 00:44:26.000 which is a bit of a show off, which is say, what 00:44:26.000 --> 00:44:29.260 does Odin whisper into his dead son Baldr's ear 00:44:29.260 --> 00:44:31.340 on his funeral pyre? And the king thinks long 00:44:31.340 --> 00:44:33.500 and hard. He goes, aha! Only Odin knows that, 00:44:33.519 --> 00:44:36.619 which means you're Odin. And then he curses him 00:44:36.619 --> 00:44:39.099 again over, because he tried to then kill Odin 00:44:39.099 --> 00:44:43.420 in the attack of Revelation. What's that story 00:44:43.420 --> 00:44:46.260 called again? What's it called again? The cursed 00:44:46.260 --> 00:44:53.199 sword tear thing. Cursed sword tear thing. It's 00:44:53.199 --> 00:44:56.739 definitely an Old Norse saga somewhere, definitely 00:44:56.739 --> 00:44:59.059 an Old Norse story and it was beautifully adapted. 00:44:59.139 --> 00:45:02.460 I've only come across it in one element that 00:45:02.460 --> 00:45:04.719 deals with a shield maiden, Hervor, who discovers 00:45:04.719 --> 00:45:07.139 that she is a shield maiden by birth because 00:45:07.139 --> 00:45:10.369 she was a a slave labor work begin with because 00:45:10.369 --> 00:45:12.530 her dad got cursed and killed by the sword originally 00:45:12.530 --> 00:45:14.590 so she goes right i'm going to claim my heritage 00:45:14.590 --> 00:45:17.030 she goes into his burial mound and touches the 00:45:17.030 --> 00:45:19.289 sword he rises up all and says no don't take 00:45:19.289 --> 00:45:20.989 the sword dear daughter it'll bring bloodshed 00:45:20.989 --> 00:45:23.369 and horror she goes no i'm going to do my heritage 00:45:23.369 --> 00:45:25.110 do you proud daddy and i'm going to go off with 00:45:25.110 --> 00:45:27.949 this so and and of course things happen to her 00:45:27.949 --> 00:45:30.010 later family later on that of course the result 00:45:30.010 --> 00:45:33.409 of her taking the sword um but I came across 00:45:33.409 --> 00:45:36.349 her character because I read a book about the 00:45:36.349 --> 00:45:39.030 forgotten history of Worry Women by Nancy Marie 00:45:39.030 --> 00:45:41.590 Brown called The Real Valkyrie, and she uses 00:45:41.590 --> 00:45:43.630 her as a kind of a narrative figure to explore 00:45:43.630 --> 00:45:47.630 all this evidence that she finds of Worry Women 00:45:47.630 --> 00:45:50.690 in North Society up and down, kind of like the 00:45:50.690 --> 00:45:53.269 Nipah and Burka and that journey towards Constantinople. 00:45:53.630 --> 00:45:55.090 But there was much more to the story that I did 00:45:55.090 --> 00:45:58.210 not know, so it was wonderfully told. And you 00:45:58.210 --> 00:46:00.349 can actually go watch it all on YouTube, Jason. 00:46:00.510 --> 00:46:04.369 And they recorded it all. And it's on the YouTube 00:46:04.369 --> 00:46:06.130 channel. I will put the link in the below. And 00:46:06.130 --> 00:46:09.150 I'll email it to you, Jason. Yeah, fantastic. 00:46:10.989 --> 00:46:12.849 Great. Yeah, that sounds great. It reminds me 00:46:12.849 --> 00:46:16.769 also of a lot of those thinking about the sword. 00:46:16.909 --> 00:46:20.690 It reminds me of lots of the cursed sword idea. 00:46:20.849 --> 00:46:23.769 And particularly, I don't know if he writes so 00:46:23.769 --> 00:46:27.010 much now, but certainly during the 60s and 70s, 00:46:27.969 --> 00:46:32.349 an author called Michael Moorcock. who wrote 00:46:32.349 --> 00:46:35.849 prolifically. He was one of those guys who was 00:46:35.849 --> 00:46:38.429 sort of the editor of Tarzan comic magazine when 00:46:38.429 --> 00:46:40.449 he was, I don't know, five years old, he was 00:46:40.449 --> 00:46:42.849 very young anyway, and then was constantly churning 00:46:42.849 --> 00:46:45.250 stuff out. And then he wrote lots of stuff. I 00:46:45.250 --> 00:46:49.039 think... I think certain enhancements were used 00:46:49.039 --> 00:46:51.659 during his writing process, shall we say, to 00:46:51.659 --> 00:46:54.699 encourage his imagination. But it was the 60s 00:46:54.699 --> 00:46:57.079 and the 70s. But there is, and in it, there's 00:46:57.079 --> 00:46:59.099 a lot of stuff to do with law and chaos. Those 00:46:59.099 --> 00:47:01.219 are two big sort of things. And in fact, that 00:47:01.219 --> 00:47:03.940 eight -pointed chaos star comes from his books 00:47:03.940 --> 00:47:05.559 that we now kind of see everywhere, the eight 00:47:05.559 --> 00:47:11.190 -pointed chaos star. And a lot of it. is characters 00:47:11.190 --> 00:47:13.510 and people overlapping this idea of the eternal 00:47:13.510 --> 00:47:15.909 champion and so in lots of different planes and 00:47:15.909 --> 00:47:17.989 lots of different times there's this person and 00:47:17.989 --> 00:47:19.829 they are all aspects of the same thing and there's 00:47:19.829 --> 00:47:23.949 one particular one called Elric and he is uh 00:47:23.980 --> 00:47:27.199 they're called Melniboneans in the stories, but 00:47:27.199 --> 00:47:30.280 basically they're like dark elves. They are beautiful, 00:47:30.500 --> 00:47:34.199 but wicked and evil, and there's only this last 00:47:34.199 --> 00:47:36.019 little island left of them. And once upon a time, 00:47:36.139 --> 00:47:38.119 they rode dragons through the skies. George R 00:47:38.119 --> 00:47:39.659 .R. Martin, where did you get that from? They 00:47:39.659 --> 00:47:42.400 rode dragons through the skies, and they dealt 00:47:42.400 --> 00:47:44.940 with the gods of chaos, and now they just sort 00:47:44.940 --> 00:47:51.960 of devolved into a sort of... indulgent, decadent 00:47:51.960 --> 00:47:55.039 society. But one of them, one of their emperors, 00:47:55.300 --> 00:47:59.480 Elric is born albino and with a blood deficiency 00:47:59.480 --> 00:48:01.119 that means he's very weak and he has to be taking 00:48:01.119 --> 00:48:03.480 potions to keep him enough energy and everybody 00:48:03.480 --> 00:48:05.739 thinks he's not really right for emperor because 00:48:05.739 --> 00:48:08.380 he's not strong enough. And then eventually he 00:48:08.380 --> 00:48:10.179 summons the great chaos god that gives him a 00:48:10.179 --> 00:48:13.079 sword called Stormbringer. And Stormbringer, 00:48:13.920 --> 00:48:15.699 every time it is unsheathed, it wants to taste 00:48:15.699 --> 00:48:20.619 blood. If it cuts or kills, then it drains the 00:48:20.619 --> 00:48:22.860 life force and passes some of that on to Elric. 00:48:23.219 --> 00:48:25.059 And of course, what starts off as a wonderful 00:48:25.059 --> 00:48:26.940 sword in battle, oh, suddenly I'm terribly strong 00:48:26.940 --> 00:48:29.219 and even wearing Stormbringer by my side gives 00:48:29.219 --> 00:48:31.780 me strength, means that at some point it will 00:48:31.780 --> 00:48:36.199 leap into his hand. and kill because it is thirsty 00:48:36.199 --> 00:48:38.619 and of course it kills friends and relatives 00:48:38.619 --> 00:48:41.099 and lovers and it all goes horribly wrong and 00:48:41.099 --> 00:48:42.860 yes at some point he gets involved in a battle 00:48:42.860 --> 00:48:45.340 where the more he kills the more energy he has 00:48:45.340 --> 00:48:47.139 and the more energy he has the more he can kill 00:48:47.139 --> 00:48:49.380 and so it becomes this impossible killing machine 00:48:49.380 --> 00:48:53.239 but it is this this double -edged sword I was 00:48:53.239 --> 00:48:56.579 going to say, the curse of the swords where it 00:48:56.579 --> 00:48:59.619 gives you great power but at the same time it 00:48:59.619 --> 00:49:03.460 has its own agendas or its own life or its own 00:49:03.460 --> 00:49:07.260 curses or its own direction and you are not the 00:49:07.260 --> 00:49:11.800 master of that magical weapon. You are given 00:49:11.800 --> 00:49:14.920 privileges and gifts by it but it is in control 00:49:14.920 --> 00:49:17.500 of you ultimately and chooses where and when 00:49:17.500 --> 00:49:23.699 to act to properly plop on your life. yeah cursed 00:49:23.699 --> 00:49:26.920 objects yeah that's a whole other yeah I mean 00:49:26.920 --> 00:49:29.539 that's making me think obviously back to the 00:49:29.539 --> 00:49:31.659 star of the balsam and the ring of the nibblungs 00:49:31.659 --> 00:49:34.260 with the ring of Fafnir's Hoard the cursed ring 00:49:34.260 --> 00:49:36.400 which I'm actually going to go see the second 00:49:36.400 --> 00:49:41.670 opera of on Wednesday night this week All 16 00:49:41.670 --> 00:49:44.349 hours of it or just a kind of part of it? Well 00:49:44.349 --> 00:49:47.110 it's five hours and 45 minutes is the Valkyrie 00:49:47.110 --> 00:49:49.190 part of the cycle and of course it's the Valkyrie 00:49:49.190 --> 00:49:53.849 which is my catnip and as I've spent months in 00:49:53.849 --> 00:49:56.750 the Valkyrie headspace I need to honor it by 00:49:56.750 --> 00:49:58.489 going actually seeing it see me i've written 00:49:58.489 --> 00:50:02.909 so much about how it all started off with well 00:50:02.909 --> 00:50:05.190 not just Wagner but primarily his overlooked 00:50:05.190 --> 00:50:07.610 costume designer Emil Doppler who really set 00:50:07.610 --> 00:50:10.309 the whole image of the Valkyrie up and then that's 00:50:10.309 --> 00:50:15.440 just stuck ever since curly things and horned 00:50:15.440 --> 00:50:17.579 helmets. The winged helmets, they're kind of 00:50:17.579 --> 00:50:20.000 like the breasts, female breast plates, the spears, 00:50:20.139 --> 00:50:22.980 the shields, the flowing cloaks. I mean the winged 00:50:22.980 --> 00:50:24.980 helmets is the one motif that's really stuck 00:50:24.980 --> 00:50:26.599 with them, just like the horned helmets are really 00:50:26.599 --> 00:50:28.780 stuck with the Vikings and again it was just 00:50:28.780 --> 00:50:30.940 a costume design, it was a piece at that time, 00:50:31.219 --> 00:50:37.969 just romanticisation. I do have the things to 00:50:37.969 --> 00:50:41.050 agree, ladies and gents, I just can't speak it 00:50:41.050 --> 00:50:45.170 at all. Romanticisation. I can't say it either. 00:50:45.610 --> 00:50:47.789 Yeah, they've made it romantic. Romanticised. 00:50:48.269 --> 00:50:50.429 Because of course, in some of the sagas, like 00:50:50.429 --> 00:50:57.840 there's Nyal's saga, which is about a man either 00:50:57.840 --> 00:51:01.480 traveling to or going from a battling clan taff 00:51:01.480 --> 00:51:04.139 in Ireland and he finds a cottage and he sees 00:51:04.139 --> 00:51:06.639 three women and riders ride into that cottage 00:51:06.639 --> 00:51:09.039 and then stop and they go in and he peeks in 00:51:09.039 --> 00:51:11.059 and they're definitely Valkyries because they're 00:51:11.059 --> 00:51:14.300 weaving on a loom made of men's guts and weighted 00:51:14.300 --> 00:51:18.559 with men's skulls and the shuttle is like a spearhead 00:51:18.559 --> 00:51:21.019 or a saw blade and they're saying oh we're going 00:51:21.019 --> 00:51:22.920 to take that one and this one and this is all 00:51:22.920 --> 00:51:24.500 going to happen the battle of clan taff and then 00:51:24.500 --> 00:51:26.119 they decide what they're going to do with it 00:51:26.119 --> 00:51:29.449 and then they ride off with it and go to that 00:51:29.449 --> 00:51:31.269 battle and do their choosing. And that is such 00:51:31.269 --> 00:51:34.829 a really dark, gritty, gruesome, dirty depiction 00:51:34.829 --> 00:51:38.070 of Valkyries compared to how people imagine them 00:51:38.070 --> 00:51:44.650 as stupid. Exactly, kind of like large breasted 00:51:44.650 --> 00:51:46.489 women, flowing hair, beautiful, kind of like 00:51:46.489 --> 00:51:48.929 no sign of blood or grim or dirt on them at all. 00:51:49.309 --> 00:51:52.409 Which is why I'm slightly excited to see this. 00:51:53.680 --> 00:51:56.079 latest iteration of the cycle especially the 00:51:56.079 --> 00:51:57.719 Valkyrie because I've seen some preview shots 00:51:57.719 --> 00:51:59.639 coming up through kind of like from previews 00:51:59.639 --> 00:52:02.360 and reviewers. and it is kind of like in a present 00:52:02.360 --> 00:52:04.900 -day type setting so there's no there's no winged 00:52:04.900 --> 00:52:06.920 helmet or anything there's in fact no armor but 00:52:06.920 --> 00:52:09.679 they are definitely not clean they look like 00:52:09.679 --> 00:52:11.880 they've been through a wildfire because that's 00:52:11.880 --> 00:52:14.559 the kind of setting of the battle is like a wildfire 00:52:14.559 --> 00:52:17.460 burnt landscape so they're collecting ashes more 00:52:17.460 --> 00:52:20.260 than actual bodies which is that's what i've 00:52:20.260 --> 00:52:22.860 heard so hopefully i might put together a little 00:52:22.860 --> 00:52:25.559 review on that once i've been the scene and lived 00:52:25.559 --> 00:52:27.420 through all five hours and thought five minutes 00:52:27.420 --> 00:52:30.539 of it. They are streaming it, thankfully, the 00:52:30.539 --> 00:52:32.840 Royal British Opera to lots of cinemas around 00:52:32.840 --> 00:52:34.340 up and down the country. So as long as you can 00:52:34.340 --> 00:52:36.059 afford a cinema ticket, you can go and see it 00:52:36.059 --> 00:52:37.699 without having to travel all the way down to 00:52:37.699 --> 00:52:40.460 the Royal British Opera House, which I can't 00:52:40.460 --> 00:52:44.440 afford to, so. No, quite. But there is, I think, 00:52:44.599 --> 00:52:46.820 you're right, there is that romantic, I want 00:52:46.820 --> 00:52:50.119 to get that word out now, romantic. There is 00:52:50.119 --> 00:52:55.429 a kind of a... There's that, it's that polishing 00:52:55.429 --> 00:52:58.150 idea. We've kind of got away from the sort of, 00:52:58.210 --> 00:53:00.489 I mean, more recently, probably the last sort 00:53:00.489 --> 00:53:02.389 of 20 odd years, I suppose, you've kind of got 00:53:02.389 --> 00:53:06.469 depictions of warfare, melee war, hand -to -hand 00:53:06.469 --> 00:53:10.570 combat warfare, which are, which have moved away 00:53:10.570 --> 00:53:14.849 from Errol Flynn. Where you're kind of saber 00:53:14.849 --> 00:53:18.369 fencing and then, or under the arm and someone 00:53:18.369 --> 00:53:20.269 falls over and there's a bit of tomato sauce 00:53:20.269 --> 00:53:23.769 on the end of the sword. kind of heading towards 00:53:23.769 --> 00:53:28.210 more and more visceral depictions of what it's 00:53:28.210 --> 00:53:30.349 actually like and more archaeological evidence 00:53:30.349 --> 00:53:32.630 being sort of commonly shown, you know, here's 00:53:32.630 --> 00:53:34.150 a skull, this person must have died in battle 00:53:34.150 --> 00:53:36.530 because you can see that their nose is missing 00:53:36.530 --> 00:53:38.710 and in fact what we can see here was they were 00:53:38.710 --> 00:53:42.159 hit in the face with a battle axe. Yep. not cleanly 00:53:42.159 --> 00:53:44.480 beheaded or stuck under the arm or poked in the 00:53:44.480 --> 00:53:46.440 chest, the person was smashed in the face with 00:53:46.440 --> 00:53:49.400 an axe, which would have probably, which may 00:53:49.400 --> 00:53:51.320 well have killed them instantly, or may well 00:53:51.320 --> 00:53:53.480 have put them on their back as they slowly bled 00:53:53.480 --> 00:53:56.019 to death, you know, these awful things, war is 00:53:56.019 --> 00:53:59.039 awful. And it is, and of course, we say that 00:53:59.039 --> 00:54:01.019 war is glorious. And of course, we have to tell 00:54:01.019 --> 00:54:03.739 people we want to go, who we want to go and fight 00:54:03.739 --> 00:54:07.279 wars at war is glorious. Because if we said You 00:54:07.279 --> 00:54:09.239 can end up with your guts hanging out in the 00:54:09.239 --> 00:54:12.280 desert and it will take you days to die. Nobody 00:54:12.280 --> 00:54:13.820 really wants to hear that side of thing. And 00:54:13.820 --> 00:54:17.480 you need that idea of a heroic culture if you 00:54:17.480 --> 00:54:20.619 want people to stand up and go out and fight 00:54:20.619 --> 00:54:25.360 and be prepared to die. So when you've got this, 00:54:25.380 --> 00:54:26.960 you're talking about the Valkyries and covered 00:54:26.960 --> 00:54:31.460 in ash and from the smoke of battle, absolutely 00:54:31.460 --> 00:54:33.860 people to be covered in all sorts of things. 00:54:34.239 --> 00:54:37.360 come out of people's bodies being poked out and 00:54:37.360 --> 00:54:39.159 yeah and the and the trophies they would have 00:54:39.159 --> 00:54:41.920 taken as well and it's not always a stab under 00:54:41.920 --> 00:54:43.860 the arm awful things people would have done to 00:54:43.860 --> 00:54:46.519 each other so that they would have finished that 00:54:46.519 --> 00:54:50.300 person or made sure they survived because if 00:54:50.300 --> 00:54:52.599 it's between the two of you and you've got to 00:54:52.599 --> 00:54:54.780 grab hold of something and pull it off or pull 00:54:54.780 --> 00:54:57.639 it out or bite it off or gouge it up you know 00:54:57.639 --> 00:55:02.309 you'll do that It's something I've certainly 00:55:02.309 --> 00:55:05.329 noticed when I first started reading historical 00:55:05.329 --> 00:55:08.130 fiction set in the Viking Age that especially 00:55:08.130 --> 00:55:09.989 starting off with Bernard Cornwall who is a legend 00:55:09.989 --> 00:55:12.309 in his own right in terms of what he's done for 00:55:12.309 --> 00:55:14.210 the Viking Age in terms of historical fiction 00:55:14.210 --> 00:55:17.809 with his Uhtred series. They've always made it 00:55:17.809 --> 00:55:19.889 really clear that kind of like being in the shield 00:55:19.889 --> 00:55:24.130 wall, yes it was an honor of prize and some bravery 00:55:24.130 --> 00:55:26.670 but it was also the worst position to be in because 00:55:26.670 --> 00:55:28.670 you're there where all the blades are and you're 00:55:28.670 --> 00:55:30.889 chipping over your goodies and you've got your 00:55:30.889 --> 00:55:33.630 friends lying around you and there's arrows they 00:55:33.630 --> 00:55:35.730 just like you are with your storytelling they 00:55:35.730 --> 00:55:37.710 really kind of like bring it to the fore like 00:55:37.710 --> 00:55:40.210 okay this is what's happening but because it's 00:55:40.210 --> 00:55:43.409 in a book and it's long ago and we don't do shield 00:55:43.409 --> 00:55:47.139 wall warfare anymore we kind of as readers we're 00:55:47.139 --> 00:55:49.139 okay to that but I guess it's possibly why so 00:55:49.139 --> 00:55:51.000 many people like to read crime fiction where 00:55:51.000 --> 00:55:52.920 there are horrible murders going on and there's 00:55:52.920 --> 00:55:56.000 like blood all over the crime scene. It's kind 00:55:56.000 --> 00:55:59.059 of like filling in that gap almost that we have 00:55:59.059 --> 00:56:03.380 lost from other forms of storytelling. I think 00:56:03.380 --> 00:56:09.469 people enjoy that the thrill of danger and horror 00:56:09.469 --> 00:56:11.650 as Christopher Lee talking about horror a little 00:56:11.650 --> 00:56:13.989 while back talking in his very fruity voice about 00:56:13.989 --> 00:56:15.969 saying yes because of course we can enjoy that 00:56:15.969 --> 00:56:18.110 and understand that it is a story and we can 00:56:18.110 --> 00:56:20.889 be part of that story and yet that story is distant 00:56:20.889 --> 00:56:26.289 from us um uh and we can we can dip into those 00:56:26.289 --> 00:56:30.309 things there's a slight sort of there's a voyeuristic 00:56:30.309 --> 00:56:33.030 element to it, that we can enjoy the crime, we 00:56:33.030 --> 00:56:36.170 can enjoy the murders, we can enjoy the brutality 00:56:36.170 --> 00:56:38.949 of war. I find myself more and more watching 00:56:38.949 --> 00:56:41.889 stuff when I'm watching a TV or watching a film, 00:56:42.369 --> 00:56:46.429 and the older I get now going, ooh, response 00:56:46.429 --> 00:56:49.449 upon a time, I would have been, yeah, hey, ooh, 00:56:49.730 --> 00:56:51.750 and I'm still enjoying it, but I'm like, oh dear, 00:56:51.909 --> 00:56:57.110 oh no, oh no. Watching some awful wound being 00:56:57.110 --> 00:57:00.079 inflicted on someone. um and maybe it is that 00:57:00.079 --> 00:57:03.000 we're you know we uh this is someone's phd of 00:57:03.000 --> 00:57:04.539 course but you know we need to understand that 00:57:04.539 --> 00:57:06.480 as when we are younger we are much more open 00:57:06.480 --> 00:57:10.380 and thrilled by the by the idea of of damage 00:57:10.380 --> 00:57:12.920 warfare and wounding because those are the people 00:57:12.920 --> 00:57:15.340 we need to get up and fight we need fighters 00:57:15.340 --> 00:57:17.820 we need fit young people to stand up and fight 00:57:17.820 --> 00:57:20.219 there's no point some old geezer like me standing 00:57:20.219 --> 00:57:22.900 up and fighting then some 20 year old leaping 00:57:22.900 --> 00:57:26.199 around like a flea zipping around me um by this 00:57:26.199 --> 00:57:27.880 point i should have bought an enormous suit of 00:57:27.880 --> 00:57:29.619 armor or have an army standing in front of me 00:57:29.619 --> 00:57:31.019 you know i don't do the fighting anymore i do 00:57:31.019 --> 00:57:35.159 the pointing uh at my age but we need the ability 00:57:35.159 --> 00:57:36.880 of the younger people who are more willing to 00:57:36.880 --> 00:57:38.800 engage in those things i don't know that's just 00:57:38.800 --> 00:57:43.840 pure off the top of my head um speculation um 00:57:43.840 --> 00:57:47.380 but it is it's one of those things being as a 00:57:47.380 --> 00:57:49.280 as a performance storyteller telling stories 00:57:49.280 --> 00:57:52.500 to people because you're sort of acting acting 00:57:52.500 --> 00:57:58.559 it out and uh without hamming it up um i don't 00:57:58.559 --> 00:58:00.360 know if you've ever seen the very early buffy 00:58:00.360 --> 00:58:03.159 the vampire slayer film with donald southerlanders 00:58:03.159 --> 00:58:05.739 the big evil vampire there's a great vampire 00:58:05.739 --> 00:58:07.400 death scene that goes on for about five or ten 00:58:07.400 --> 00:58:11.469 minutes with the vampires going oh ah, ee, oh, 00:58:11.730 --> 00:58:14.130 hoo, um, oh. And it goes through lots of our 00:58:14.130 --> 00:58:15.750 actions. It cuts back to the beginning. You still 00:58:15.750 --> 00:58:18.989 go, oh, hoo, ah. But without having it up and 00:58:18.989 --> 00:58:22.710 making it ridiculous, there are things that you're 00:58:22.710 --> 00:58:27.090 describing to people. And because people are 00:58:27.090 --> 00:58:29.769 sitting down and listening to stories and listening 00:58:29.769 --> 00:58:33.010 to someone talking to them, if it's someone who 00:58:33.010 --> 00:58:34.809 has managed to capture the audience, and there 00:58:34.809 --> 00:58:37.849 are a lot of or storytellers who are very good 00:58:37.849 --> 00:58:39.590 at remembering stories, but not very good at 00:58:39.590 --> 00:58:42.170 telling them and engaging people to different 00:58:42.170 --> 00:58:47.210 but related parts. Then by that point, people 00:58:47.210 --> 00:58:51.230 are willing to collude with you. and listen to 00:58:51.230 --> 00:58:53.989 what you say and just take it on board. Because 00:58:53.989 --> 00:58:56.030 they have gone, brilliant, this is a story. I'm 00:58:56.030 --> 00:58:58.449 not being convinced to do anything. I'm not at 00:58:58.449 --> 00:59:03.250 personal risk. So I can open up my mind and allow 00:59:03.250 --> 00:59:08.969 myself to become suggestible in this space, in 00:59:08.969 --> 00:59:12.989 this theatrical space and time. But those are 00:59:12.989 --> 00:59:15.670 the bits where you can talk about somebody dying 00:59:15.670 --> 00:59:17.849 or being wounded. And you can watch the audience 00:59:17.849 --> 00:59:20.820 going. Just without, they probably don't know 00:59:20.820 --> 00:59:23.679 they're doing it. You know, that the face of 00:59:23.679 --> 00:59:25.739 the, you know, empathizing with the character 00:59:25.739 --> 00:59:28.880 who's being wounded or whatever, or either that 00:59:28.880 --> 00:59:31.539 or yes, you know, and people you would perhaps 00:59:31.539 --> 00:59:34.039 normally think wouldn't have gone, go on, yeah, 00:59:34.119 --> 00:59:38.219 go on. You can see people really nodding and 00:59:38.219 --> 00:59:41.800 becoming, you know, part of the, the, the sort 00:59:41.800 --> 00:59:45.599 of the, the narrative experience. I suppose it's 00:59:45.599 --> 00:59:47.860 a bit like I often sort of. think sometimes when 00:59:47.860 --> 00:59:49.980 I'm telling stories and if I'm talking and I 00:59:49.980 --> 00:59:51.719 do this and I start nodding and like you're doing 00:59:51.719 --> 00:59:53.679 now you're nodding back because I'm not yeah 00:59:53.679 --> 00:59:56.059 you're mirroring me because we're chatting but 00:59:56.059 --> 00:59:58.380 when I do it with an audience and I can see people 00:59:58.380 --> 01:00:00.460 doing it and I think if I were a stage hypnotist 01:00:00.460 --> 01:00:03.679 I'd pick you you you and you um those are the 01:00:03.679 --> 01:00:05.980 people who really you know they're listening 01:00:05.980 --> 01:00:07.940 they're in they're suggestible they're properly 01:00:07.940 --> 01:00:11.079 deeply in there and whether they're particularly 01:00:11.079 --> 01:00:13.880 suggestible or whether they have allowed themselves 01:00:13.880 --> 01:00:17.510 to open up you know uh given themselves permission 01:00:17.510 --> 01:00:21.190 to do that um but it changes the kind of the 01:00:21.190 --> 01:00:27.989 psychological uh experience um and i often hear 01:00:27.989 --> 01:00:30.449 when people come out of storytelling shows for 01:00:30.449 --> 01:00:32.269 start they kind of say i didn't know what to 01:00:32.269 --> 01:00:34.130 expect well i thought it was going to be a talk 01:00:34.130 --> 01:00:40.030 um and um uh so i could see i could see all the 01:00:40.030 --> 01:00:41.989 pictures i could see you know and they could 01:00:41.989 --> 01:00:46.679 see that I suggest the pictures to people. And 01:00:46.679 --> 01:00:49.280 so long as I don't conflict with what they're 01:00:49.280 --> 01:00:52.300 thinking or what their references are, if I were 01:00:52.300 --> 01:00:54.579 able to see the projections, you know, out of 01:00:54.579 --> 01:00:58.019 someone's forehead style, I would see slightly 01:00:58.019 --> 01:01:00.519 different pictures from everybody, but similar 01:01:00.519 --> 01:01:03.260 things and people bringing in their own references 01:01:03.260 --> 01:01:07.179 to. colour in the edges and supply the details 01:01:07.179 --> 01:01:09.719 for things because it's the audience that actually 01:01:09.719 --> 01:01:13.659 produces the pictures that a storyteller describes. 01:01:15.559 --> 01:01:18.000 If someone invented a machine that could project 01:01:18.000 --> 01:01:20.780 our imaginations, I'd worry for you as a profession 01:01:20.780 --> 01:01:23.900 because it's almost like our best kept secret. 01:01:24.099 --> 01:01:26.059 It's like no one can use our imagination, it's 01:01:26.059 --> 01:01:29.760 only us. yeah certainly why i'm interested in 01:01:29.760 --> 01:01:32.000 a new game that's come out called split fiction 01:01:32.000 --> 01:01:36.000 which is about a sci -fi universe hijacking well 01:01:36.000 --> 01:01:38.760 not hijacking it's capturing the imaginations 01:01:38.760 --> 01:01:41.980 from writers in some kind of virtual reality 01:01:41.980 --> 01:01:45.559 bubble and then making it into a virtual world 01:01:45.559 --> 01:01:48.219 so have a virtual story sort of a readable story 01:01:48.219 --> 01:01:52.250 yeah but these two things excuse me Two characters 01:01:52.250 --> 01:01:54.369 get crossed up, so then they each experience 01:01:54.369 --> 01:01:57.389 their own stories. It's a co -op player. It looks 01:01:57.389 --> 01:01:59.409 really fun. It's got some great reviews. One's 01:01:59.409 --> 01:02:01.969 selling a fantasy, one's selling a sci -fi, and 01:02:01.969 --> 01:02:03.789 they're both very distinctly different characters, 01:02:03.849 --> 01:02:05.769 but they've all got their own messages and issues 01:02:05.769 --> 01:02:09.849 hidden behind their own stories. I want to play 01:02:09.849 --> 01:02:11.550 it. I just need someone to play it with. And 01:02:11.550 --> 01:02:14.110 hi, I need time to play it as well. Is that a 01:02:14.110 --> 01:02:16.869 computer game or a board game? A computer game 01:02:16.869 --> 01:02:20.300 called Split Fiction. It's on Steam. I think 01:02:20.300 --> 01:02:22.860 it's also on the console and it also works on 01:02:22.860 --> 01:02:25.500 cross -platform. So if you had a console and 01:02:25.500 --> 01:02:27.960 I have my gaming laptop, you could still play 01:02:27.960 --> 01:02:30.599 it, provided one of us had the friends pass that 01:02:30.599 --> 01:02:35.099 enables the other one to show up. But yeah, it 01:02:35.099 --> 01:02:38.179 looks really good and I like how the actual... 01:02:38.880 --> 01:02:41.099 imagination part and the storytelling part has 01:02:41.099 --> 01:02:44.099 been explored in the very visual sense and through 01:02:44.099 --> 01:02:46.380 a co -op game of all things. Because of course 01:02:46.380 --> 01:02:49.599 games themselves are stories we just have to 01:02:49.599 --> 01:02:53.139 play complete levels through. But in terms of 01:02:53.139 --> 01:02:55.699 retelling stories it's also made me think of 01:02:55.699 --> 01:02:58.639 the Netflix film Damsel. I don't know if you've 01:02:58.639 --> 01:03:03.300 ever seen it? No. That's a really interesting 01:03:03.300 --> 01:03:07.179 take on A, the damsel of being a maiden, but 01:03:07.179 --> 01:03:09.739 also an issue of the king and queen having a 01:03:09.739 --> 01:03:12.400 problem with the dragon and having to send princesses 01:03:12.400 --> 01:03:14.880 off to the dragon. But then the princess learns 01:03:14.880 --> 01:03:17.639 why the dragon is the way she is, because it's 01:03:17.639 --> 01:03:20.199 not a he dragon, it's a she dragon. And there's 01:03:20.199 --> 01:03:23.159 this whole kind of issue of revenge, both from 01:03:23.159 --> 01:03:25.099 the human side and the dragon side. And it's 01:03:25.099 --> 01:03:27.780 a nice twist at the end, I think. And that sees 01:03:27.780 --> 01:03:30.860 both the princess and the dragon get their rightful. 01:03:32.159 --> 01:03:35.199 ending I suppose. It's not quite fairy tale but 01:03:35.199 --> 01:03:39.059 it certainly it's dark in places because the 01:03:39.059 --> 01:03:40.639 character who played, well the woman who plays 01:03:40.639 --> 01:03:44.920 there is the woman who plays Eleven in Stranger 01:03:44.920 --> 01:03:48.719 Things. Yes, yes she does really well, I mean 01:03:48.719 --> 01:03:51.510 she's also in like the Sherlock. home spin -off, 01:03:51.530 --> 01:03:53.610 which I never actually got to see either. But 01:03:53.610 --> 01:03:55.269 she does really well in that because a lot of 01:03:55.269 --> 01:03:57.590 it's basically, she's almost like a fantasy version 01:03:57.590 --> 01:04:00.170 of Lara Croft in that she's shoved into a place 01:04:00.170 --> 01:04:01.809 where she's got to survive by her own wit and 01:04:01.809 --> 01:04:04.170 will and cunning and cleverness. And it turns 01:04:04.170 --> 01:04:09.110 out she's not too bad as a survivalist. But yeah, 01:04:09.110 --> 01:04:13.010 it was really, really interesting how that came 01:04:13.010 --> 01:04:15.090 out. So I do recommend people, if they want to 01:04:15.090 --> 01:04:17.849 explore how people are trying to retell these 01:04:17.849 --> 01:04:20.570 tales and almost like different points of view, 01:04:20.750 --> 01:04:22.449 which is the other thing about story telling 01:04:22.449 --> 01:04:24.730 is just different points of view. All of it is 01:04:24.730 --> 01:04:27.969 just different points of view. So yeah, I really 01:04:27.969 --> 01:04:31.110 like that one because I love dragons. Damsel, 01:04:31.250 --> 01:04:33.369 lovely. Damsel. And I like Millie Bobby Brown 01:04:33.369 --> 01:04:35.829 as well. I like certainly Millie Bobby Brown 01:04:35.829 --> 01:04:38.809 as well. Very satisfying name to say. Millie 01:04:38.809 --> 01:04:42.550 Bobby Brown. In terms of you just talked about 01:04:42.550 --> 01:04:44.829 different perspectives and different viewpoints, 01:04:44.929 --> 01:04:46.309 is one of the things that I sometimes come across 01:04:46.309 --> 01:04:49.360 in the performance storytelling world is that 01:04:49.360 --> 01:04:51.199 people sort of saying well that's not that's 01:04:51.199 --> 01:04:53.280 not that's not the story or why are you telling 01:04:53.280 --> 01:04:55.960 that or how why did you say that what did you 01:04:55.960 --> 01:04:59.500 do that with the story or um this story is it 01:04:59.500 --> 01:05:02.260 one of yours is it a new one so it's not a it's 01:05:02.260 --> 01:05:05.760 not a not an old story and it's kind of like 01:05:05.760 --> 01:05:11.000 this in some quarters or some people of course 01:05:11.000 --> 01:05:13.820 people are people and some people are great idiots 01:05:13.820 --> 01:05:17.309 wherever you go um but there is I think with 01:05:17.309 --> 01:05:20.269 some people, there's a difficulty of separating 01:05:20.269 --> 01:05:25.250 the difference between curating folklore and 01:05:25.250 --> 01:05:27.130 stories and myth and legend, which is one thing. 01:05:27.329 --> 01:05:30.190 Yes, we must record these things. But also the 01:05:30.190 --> 01:05:32.809 idea that stories didn't stop. There wasn't a 01:05:32.809 --> 01:05:34.730 point when someone said, all right, we've finished. 01:05:34.929 --> 01:05:36.309 Brothers Grimm are dead, are they? Right. Well, 01:05:36.389 --> 01:05:41.210 that's canon. And so I think some people find 01:05:41.210 --> 01:05:45.980 it difficult to to or challenging when you take 01:05:45.980 --> 01:05:48.340 a story and you either change it or adapt it 01:05:48.340 --> 01:05:52.860 or completely rethink it. In June this year I'm 01:05:52.860 --> 01:05:54.599 going to be collaborating with a storyteller 01:05:54.599 --> 01:05:56.619 called Dave Tong who's a brilliant bloke, he 01:05:56.619 --> 01:06:00.460 does loads of medieval Tudor tales and his background, 01:06:01.179 --> 01:06:05.539 he went back to academia as an adult. um uh and 01:06:05.539 --> 01:06:07.860 uh partly through his story and he does lots 01:06:07.860 --> 01:06:10.019 of you know he got all the kind of the kit and 01:06:10.019 --> 01:06:12.780 the costume and had to go to the college of heralds 01:06:12.780 --> 01:06:15.739 uh in london for them to sign off that it was 01:06:15.739 --> 01:06:17.420 the right stuff and things and apparently he 01:06:17.420 --> 01:06:20.119 walked yeah he said he walked into this room 01:06:20.119 --> 01:06:21.980 and you know he had all the bits and pieces and 01:06:21.980 --> 01:06:23.980 there with him and he's ready for this interview 01:06:23.980 --> 01:06:26.539 and to tell people that and the guy went yeah 01:06:26.539 --> 01:06:33.230 that was good anti -climax But he and I are doing 01:06:33.230 --> 01:06:35.889 a version of the Canterbury Tales, so medieval 01:06:35.889 --> 01:06:40.849 English stories. And because there's certainly, 01:06:40.889 --> 01:06:42.710 the reference is there, it's a bunch of people 01:06:42.710 --> 01:06:45.170 talking and talking about their own experiences. 01:06:45.289 --> 01:06:50.250 And whilst people are millers or summoners, things 01:06:50.250 --> 01:06:52.710 that don't exist or aren't trades that we would 01:06:52.710 --> 01:06:55.090 easily recognise these days, knights, someone 01:06:55.090 --> 01:07:00.050 whose trade is a knight. The stories are just 01:07:00.050 --> 01:07:04.199 of of ordinary people and and they're funny as 01:07:04.199 --> 01:07:06.000 well they've got loads of bum jokes and it's 01:07:06.000 --> 01:07:08.260 absolutely full of bum jokes and people don't 01:07:08.260 --> 01:07:09.880 kind of think well it's always medieval stuff 01:07:09.880 --> 01:07:12.039 it'll all be holier than thou no there's just 01:07:12.039 --> 01:07:14.940 loads of bum and fart jokes in it so we our show 01:07:14.940 --> 01:07:19.179 is called uh pound of retails reshod piety pokers 01:07:19.179 --> 01:07:22.420 and posteriors um and uh we've had sort of you 01:07:22.420 --> 01:07:24.280 know put a little kind of um you know warning 01:07:24.280 --> 01:07:26.639 in there that it's not yes yes this is culture 01:07:26.639 --> 01:07:29.820 yes this is high culture reinterpretation of 01:07:29.820 --> 01:07:32.480 medieval literature with plenty of bum jokes 01:07:32.480 --> 01:07:34.360 in it because that's what Chaucer put in there 01:07:34.360 --> 01:07:37.179 because people then found them funny and people 01:07:37.179 --> 01:07:40.920 find them funny today it's the same absolutely 01:07:40.920 --> 01:07:45.539 yeah i mean there is there is humor i think probably 01:07:45.539 --> 01:07:47.920 of a different kind found within the Norse mythology 01:07:47.920 --> 01:07:49.719 stories. I mean my favourite of course has to 01:07:49.719 --> 01:07:53.619 be Delay of Thrym when Thor has to go in bridal 01:07:53.619 --> 01:07:56.039 gown to get his hammer back and look in disguises 01:07:56.039 --> 01:07:58.360 per themself because they can change gender as 01:07:58.360 --> 01:08:01.159 well as the bridal maid and of course there's 01:08:01.159 --> 01:08:03.980 other ones. I've talked about a number of weddings 01:08:03.980 --> 01:08:06.019 because I'm also a celebrant and so I do funerals 01:08:06.019 --> 01:08:08.059 and I do weddings and so when people ask for 01:08:08.059 --> 01:08:11.630 a wedding story most still a lot of wedding stories 01:08:11.630 --> 01:08:14.329 in general sort of myth are awful because it's 01:08:14.329 --> 01:08:16.130 usually someone dies horribly at the end of it 01:08:16.130 --> 01:08:18.029 or they've been coerced into it because that's 01:08:18.029 --> 01:08:19.649 the point of the story rather than two people 01:08:19.649 --> 01:08:21.270 met they fell in love and they got married and 01:08:21.270 --> 01:08:23.670 it was all perfectly normal and uninteresting 01:08:23.670 --> 01:08:26.189 whereas yeah that story is great it's great to 01:08:26.189 --> 01:08:27.930 tell and there's lots of there's a lot of humor 01:08:27.930 --> 01:08:33.659 in there and it's a lovely one to tell And, of 01:08:33.659 --> 01:08:36.359 course, the ridiculous of Thrin, the giant, not 01:08:36.359 --> 01:08:39.020 seeing Thor, who's an enormous thunder god, and 01:08:39.020 --> 01:08:41.579 isn't just what's his name, the terribly handsome 01:08:41.579 --> 01:08:44.000 Australian guy from Marvel with the hair and 01:08:44.000 --> 01:08:47.699 the beard. Supposed to be huge and dressed as, 01:08:47.739 --> 01:08:50.119 and it suddenly becomes a sort of slightly 1970s 01:08:50.119 --> 01:08:52.239 carry on thing of this enormous thunder god. 01:08:52.670 --> 01:08:55.170 uh and of course it's well known that as soon 01:08:55.170 --> 01:08:57.449 as you place a veil over a man's head then he 01:08:57.449 --> 01:09:00.630 becomes completely indistinguishable uh his gender 01:09:00.630 --> 01:09:04.010 and through just not getting it to the point 01:09:04.010 --> 01:09:06.899 where he lifts up the veil and tries to kiss 01:09:06.899 --> 01:09:09.840 Thor, misses the enormous red bushy beard, red 01:09:09.840 --> 01:09:12.319 hair, and says, her eyes, her eyes are all glowing 01:09:12.319 --> 01:09:16.720 like coals. And Loki, who again is, he's swapped 01:09:16.720 --> 01:09:19.260 into this ambiguous gendered person who then 01:09:19.260 --> 01:09:22.840 becomes a young woman, a bridesmaid, who says, 01:09:22.859 --> 01:09:24.880 you know, well, she's been crying with excitement, 01:09:24.899 --> 01:09:29.399 and that's why her eyes are raw. A very plausible 01:09:29.399 --> 01:09:33.699 explanation. Let's move on, yeah. But also, just 01:09:33.699 --> 01:09:35.800 to that point, there's a big, with the kind of 01:09:35.800 --> 01:09:41.800 the co -opting of Norse mythology by very right 01:09:41.800 --> 01:09:45.479 -wing groups. And again, like a lot of things 01:09:45.479 --> 01:09:49.819 that people with... very fixed ideologies, have 01:09:49.819 --> 01:09:52.020 cherry -picked things. And just because Thor 01:09:52.020 --> 01:09:56.739 and Odin are blokes most of the time, not all 01:09:56.739 --> 01:09:58.619 the time, but most of the time they're blokes 01:09:58.619 --> 01:10:00.100 and they're warriors and they're big and tough 01:10:00.100 --> 01:10:01.800 and they're like, right, so that's what men must 01:10:01.800 --> 01:10:03.439 mean. And Loki, what about Loki? Because sometimes 01:10:03.439 --> 01:10:05.439 he's a woman, sometimes he's a horse, sometimes 01:10:05.439 --> 01:10:08.939 he's a fly, sometimes he does this. And yes, 01:10:09.060 --> 01:10:11.640 Freya, she's a goddess of love and magic and 01:10:11.640 --> 01:10:14.720 war and death. And yes, she sleeps with, simultaneously, 01:10:15.279 --> 01:10:19.260 a number of dwarves. And I have a storytelling 01:10:19.260 --> 01:10:22.159 colleague called Amy Douglas, who does a lovely 01:10:22.159 --> 01:10:26.239 retelling of that. And it's all about, it's, 01:10:26.239 --> 01:10:28.399 you know, from Freya's perspective, rather than, 01:10:28.800 --> 01:10:31.439 isn't she a bit slutty? And how warped is the 01:10:31.439 --> 01:10:34.600 necklace? It's, to quote her final words to the 01:10:34.600 --> 01:10:37.260 story, sometimes all a goddess needs is a good 01:10:37.260 --> 01:10:41.579 worshipping. And, you know, it's a very sexy 01:10:41.579 --> 01:10:45.340 version of the story, which Freya is tie upon 01:10:45.340 --> 01:10:47.340 her, you know, her terms, even though the dwarves 01:10:47.340 --> 01:10:49.119 are saying, you know, that we've got plenty of, 01:10:49.220 --> 01:10:51.039 we've got plenty of jewels, we don't want that. 01:10:51.319 --> 01:10:56.560 What we want is some time with you. It's a perfectly 01:10:56.560 --> 01:11:00.300 sort of consensual and mutually enjoyable experience 01:11:00.300 --> 01:11:03.619 for all of them. Because she's goddess of love. 01:11:04.020 --> 01:11:06.119 So she can do that sort of thing. She can do 01:11:06.119 --> 01:11:09.500 what she likes with that. She's not the goddess 01:11:09.500 --> 01:11:13.850 of monogamy. No. I mean Odin sleeps around a 01:11:13.850 --> 01:11:17.090 lot so it's yeah I mean I don't know how Frank 01:11:17.090 --> 01:11:23.090 puts up with him personally. Yeah oh absolutely 01:11:23.090 --> 01:11:25.689 yeah and it's and he never sort of really I mean 01:11:25.689 --> 01:11:28.289 Zeus keeps getting in Greek mythology Zeus often 01:11:28.289 --> 01:11:31.350 gets told off or his or his lovers or their children 01:11:31.350 --> 01:11:36.229 are often cursed or what not but Odin seems to 01:11:36.229 --> 01:11:40.989 get away with it a bit more. what happens in 01:11:40.989 --> 01:11:44.609 Jotunheim stays in Jotunheim kind of theory. 01:11:45.029 --> 01:11:46.569 But yeah, you're absolutely right. These are 01:11:46.569 --> 01:11:49.109 people jumping in and out of bed with each other, 01:11:49.409 --> 01:11:51.850 changing gender, changing species, doing all 01:11:51.850 --> 01:11:54.649 sorts of wonderful magical things. You can't 01:11:54.649 --> 01:11:59.210 pin them down with a narrow ideology to say it 01:11:59.210 --> 01:12:02.909 is this and this alone and is a fixed way. If 01:12:02.909 --> 01:12:04.430 you want to do that, then the only way to make 01:12:04.430 --> 01:12:07.649 it fixed is to say they are all changeable and 01:12:07.649 --> 01:12:11.460 do what they wish to do. Yeah, I mean they must, 01:12:12.180 --> 01:12:15.020 some part of ancient society must have reflected 01:12:15.020 --> 01:12:18.359 these parts to then be interposed on these gods 01:12:18.359 --> 01:12:22.199 and goddessing characters. I certainly, there's 01:12:22.199 --> 01:12:25.500 a guy who's just set up his own Viking lore and 01:12:25.500 --> 01:12:27.899 legend podcast. He's mainly active on threads 01:12:27.899 --> 01:12:30.720 so I think he's active on other platforms. His 01:12:30.720 --> 01:12:34.100 is more kind of a narrative spelling of his interpretation 01:12:34.100 --> 01:12:36.619 and standing of different elements of history 01:12:36.619 --> 01:12:40.039 and thankfully it's not too far to the right 01:12:40.039 --> 01:12:42.640 and it's not quite based on signers but it's 01:12:42.640 --> 01:12:44.640 it always interesting to hear people how people 01:12:44.640 --> 01:12:47.239 relate and understand different things yeah and 01:12:47.239 --> 01:12:48.840 i know i was talking to him and he goes well 01:12:48.840 --> 01:12:50.500 what's your opinion on fray and i said well fray 01:12:50.500 --> 01:12:53.180 is awesome she's always overlooked she takes 01:12:53.180 --> 01:12:55.619 half the debt it's not all though she takes half 01:12:55.619 --> 01:12:58.020 the day it's best choice oh my gosh i did not 01:12:58.020 --> 01:13:01.079 know so yes people do not know Freya takes half 01:13:01.079 --> 01:13:03.220 the dead yeah i mean that's why i loved your 01:13:03.220 --> 01:13:05.460 story so much especially because it really honoured 01:13:05.460 --> 01:13:07.699 the fact that families might want to go to folk 01:13:07.699 --> 01:13:09.659 van they might not want to go to Valhalla i mean 01:13:09.659 --> 01:13:11.359 where do the children go when they die do they 01:13:11.359 --> 01:13:14.699 get recruited and booted up to own heart i can 01:13:14.699 --> 01:13:18.399 never say that word own heart nope the worthy 01:13:18.399 --> 01:13:22.260 dead basically you see how i struggle with illness 01:13:22.260 --> 01:13:26.140 i can't even say that word um kind of thing and 01:13:26.140 --> 01:13:30.220 of course But yes, I really get that. I really 01:13:30.220 --> 01:13:32.720 get that. But a lot, as you kind of mentioned 01:13:32.720 --> 01:13:35.079 earlier about Snorri Sturluson, a lot of the 01:13:35.079 --> 01:13:37.699 Norse mythology has come down to us through a 01:13:37.699 --> 01:13:41.920 Christianization of stuff. And of course, without 01:13:41.920 --> 01:13:46.920 putting any sort of pejorative spin on it, the 01:13:46.920 --> 01:13:50.960 Abrahamic religions, that's Islam, Christianity, 01:13:51.199 --> 01:13:56.140 and Judaism, are all from a patriarchal deity, 01:13:56.439 --> 01:13:58.979 an omnipotent patriarchal deity. And there are 01:13:58.979 --> 01:14:01.880 books of law for each different version of the 01:14:01.880 --> 01:14:04.380 religion that you may or may not subscribe to. 01:14:04.539 --> 01:14:07.180 And then, of course, all the other off -splits 01:14:07.180 --> 01:14:10.140 that people have created since then. So when 01:14:10.140 --> 01:14:12.640 somebody says, yes, this is Odin, you can kind 01:14:12.640 --> 01:14:14.460 of think of him a bit like God, if you want. 01:14:14.880 --> 01:14:16.779 And then you can think of so. And maybe they're 01:14:16.779 --> 01:14:18.300 a bit like somebody or other. You know, you get 01:14:18.300 --> 01:14:20.439 this synchronisation. Of course, that happened 01:14:20.439 --> 01:14:27.319 in the pagan heathen world of Western Europe, 01:14:28.600 --> 01:14:30.060 where people came in and went, no, you've got 01:14:30.060 --> 01:14:32.579 to get rid of that. Why? You've just got this 01:14:32.579 --> 01:14:34.319 one god and he's dead and his son arrived and 01:14:34.319 --> 01:14:36.500 he's dead. Oh, but he rose from the dead. Oh, 01:14:36.520 --> 01:14:40.420 well, like Balder. Yes, if you like, just like 01:14:40.420 --> 01:14:45.279 Balder. And then syncretizing saints with goddesses, 01:14:45.300 --> 01:14:47.699 you know, you've got... Brite or Bridget in Ireland 01:14:47.699 --> 01:14:50.159 and Saint Bridget and the combination those are 01:14:50.159 --> 01:14:54.319 the Celtic gods and all those because it works 01:14:54.319 --> 01:14:56.600 diplomatically when you're trying to convert 01:14:56.600 --> 01:15:00.640 an entire population from the culture that they 01:15:00.640 --> 01:15:04.399 have only ever known and see as their culture 01:15:04.399 --> 01:15:07.460 to something entirely new when you're sort of 01:15:07.460 --> 01:15:10.340 saying yeah we've got this off spin of a Jewish 01:15:10.340 --> 01:15:13.159 subcult from the Middle East that doesn't sell 01:15:13.159 --> 01:15:15.970 quite as well. as saying, well, no, it's about 01:15:15.970 --> 01:15:18.550 eternal life, and there's a thing here, and all, 01:15:18.550 --> 01:15:20.010 do you know what, your bits in your feast days 01:15:20.010 --> 01:15:23.229 are very similar, they're kind of the same. Maybe 01:15:23.229 --> 01:15:26.590 this is just a refreshed version. And so, you 01:15:26.590 --> 01:15:29.130 know, all the, and the Christianized, or the 01:15:29.130 --> 01:15:31.710 Christian copying down a recording, or the copying 01:15:31.710 --> 01:15:34.130 down a recording of Christian, by Christians, 01:15:34.590 --> 01:15:37.949 of the Norse myths, even if they, were trying 01:15:37.949 --> 01:15:40.250 to be as objective as possible. It would be very 01:15:40.250 --> 01:15:42.649 difficult for them not to add when you have a 01:15:42.649 --> 01:15:44.470 number of different sources or a number of different 01:15:44.470 --> 01:15:46.930 versions to pick one that you have a natural 01:15:46.930 --> 01:15:49.189 affinity towards. And I think you've kind of 01:15:49.189 --> 01:15:53.310 read some other versions of myths written down 01:15:53.310 --> 01:15:56.649 by other monks who are not snorri, and some of 01:15:56.649 --> 01:16:01.109 them feel very Christianized, which of course 01:16:01.109 --> 01:16:02.609 is what would have happened to them. It wouldn't 01:16:02.609 --> 01:16:03.850 be what they originally would have been, but 01:16:03.850 --> 01:16:06.470 it was what gradually would and has happened 01:16:06.470 --> 01:16:08.439 to them. which is why you have people who now 01:16:08.439 --> 01:16:10.579 sort of co -opt things and they'll go this fits 01:16:10.579 --> 01:16:15.000 my ideology because it's like that without understanding 01:16:15.000 --> 01:16:18.760 the bigger world and the more elastic world and 01:16:18.760 --> 01:16:22.119 how people used and shaped and bent stories to 01:16:22.119 --> 01:16:24.180 their needs and to the cultures and to the people 01:16:24.180 --> 01:16:26.520 and a lot of the time storytellers would have 01:16:26.520 --> 01:16:29.060 gone what will go down well in front of these 01:16:29.060 --> 01:16:32.779 people? well in front of this nobleman or king 01:16:32.779 --> 01:16:35.539 or yarl or whatever he'll pay more if i say something 01:16:35.539 --> 01:16:38.720 brilliant about whatever um so i'll do that and 01:16:38.720 --> 01:16:41.579 i'll keep my head and i might get you know so 01:16:41.579 --> 01:16:44.159 these aren't true and accurate representation 01:16:44.159 --> 01:16:46.600 representations they're filtered through human 01:16:46.600 --> 01:16:49.800 experience and culture uh and just the individual 01:16:49.800 --> 01:16:52.020 storyteller going oh i've got a good idea let's 01:16:52.020 --> 01:16:55.340 do that here because that's what we yeah that's 01:16:55.340 --> 01:16:58.170 a very very good point of course as well as performed 01:16:58.170 --> 01:17:00.630 to the royalty and the powers that be, not just 01:17:00.630 --> 01:17:03.289 the common folk. Of course there's loads of praise 01:17:03.289 --> 01:17:06.449 poems, Cnut, King Canute, bless him, had loads 01:17:06.449 --> 01:17:09.529 of good praise poems written by other people. 01:17:09.630 --> 01:17:11.510 There was of course the famous poet Eagle Scallows 01:17:11.510 --> 01:17:14.149 Crimson, who was the famous enemy of Eric Bloodaxe 01:17:14.149 --> 01:17:16.949 and his wife Ben Hilda, the witch queen kind 01:17:16.949 --> 01:17:19.210 of thing, and he wrote a poem that saved his 01:17:19.210 --> 01:17:22.180 head. Yeah, absolutely. Yes, you would. If you 01:17:22.180 --> 01:17:23.939 can either die, you can say something favorable. 01:17:24.359 --> 01:17:25.939 Well, my Lord, let me tell you about a heroic 01:17:25.939 --> 01:17:29.579 thing that's just like you. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. 01:17:30.220 --> 01:17:31.579 Of course, people do that. Yeah, again, there's 01:17:31.579 --> 01:17:34.939 a romanticization. Was that it? Romanticization? 01:17:34.960 --> 01:17:37.260 That was it. I think you said it correctly, right? 01:17:38.100 --> 01:17:39.300 It just popped out accidentally there. Yeah, 01:17:39.300 --> 01:17:40.819 there we go. I wasn't looking at it, and there 01:17:40.819 --> 01:17:47.140 it was. Of how storytellers, bards, skulls, all 01:17:47.140 --> 01:17:49.300 the kind of the storytelling, wandering storytellers, 01:17:49.600 --> 01:17:53.680 jobbing storytellers, And it's this idea of sitting 01:17:53.680 --> 01:17:55.560 around a campfire somewhere and telling people 01:17:55.560 --> 01:17:58.180 the truth, the ancient legends, or sitting at 01:17:58.180 --> 01:18:01.180 the end of a long table in an inn with people 01:18:01.180 --> 01:18:03.739 quietly sitting there with their pints and their 01:18:03.739 --> 01:18:07.699 pipes. And of course, those are instances and 01:18:07.699 --> 01:18:10.699 how people do it. It's the equivalent of me turning 01:18:10.699 --> 01:18:12.640 up to a pub theater today. The only difference 01:18:12.640 --> 01:18:17.729 is now because it's a less heard of. a less familiar 01:18:17.729 --> 01:18:22.130 type of art then you know people come along and 01:18:22.130 --> 01:18:23.829 they buy their drinks and they all sit down quietly 01:18:23.829 --> 01:18:25.630 and look at me because that's what you do in 01:18:25.630 --> 01:18:28.949 a theatre and they all sit politely for a while 01:18:28.949 --> 01:18:31.569 and they clap in the middle bit and then they 01:18:31.569 --> 01:18:34.229 come back after a wee and a drink and they sit 01:18:34.229 --> 01:18:35.850 down and they watch again and they clap in the 01:18:35.850 --> 01:18:39.229 end bit you know and I'm sure some people just 01:18:39.229 --> 01:18:41.909 don't get it or don't like it it's just not their 01:18:41.909 --> 01:18:45.439 thing you know and other people really love it, 01:18:45.500 --> 01:18:48.579 because it's, you know, that we all do. But that 01:18:48.579 --> 01:18:50.939 romanticization, and it doesn't feel right now, 01:18:51.060 --> 01:18:53.800 I think I said it right the first time, that 01:18:53.800 --> 01:18:56.239 somehow everyone would sit down, it would be 01:18:56.239 --> 01:18:57.840 the same experience for everyone, and it would 01:18:57.840 --> 01:18:59.399 be the same stories told over and over again. 01:18:59.680 --> 01:19:02.479 No, you had good storytellers, bad storytellers, 01:19:02.840 --> 01:19:05.279 well -known stories, little -known stories, stories 01:19:05.279 --> 01:19:07.840 they made up on the spur of the moment, something 01:19:07.840 --> 01:19:09.720 that changed, something that in the room inspired 01:19:09.720 --> 01:19:12.659 them and meant they changed the story, audiences 01:19:12.659 --> 01:19:15.510 who were half -cut three sheets of the wind on 01:19:15.510 --> 01:19:17.689 their ale, some who were nice and jubilant, all 01:19:17.689 --> 01:19:19.289 those different things come together to mean 01:19:19.289 --> 01:19:23.710 that the stories, and by that I also mean the 01:19:23.710 --> 01:19:27.090 myths and legends of people, religions and cultures, 01:19:27.350 --> 01:19:29.989 all the years, the stuff that we have written 01:19:29.989 --> 01:19:33.789 down now is just what the last person wrote down. 01:19:34.090 --> 01:19:35.890 And that has to go down. And then everyone went 01:19:35.890 --> 01:19:38.350 and said, well, because that's written down there, 01:19:38.710 --> 01:19:40.989 that must be the real one, and we'll go with 01:19:40.989 --> 01:19:46.300 that. I know I've made a series of little short 01:19:46.300 --> 01:19:49.560 shorts as YouTube calls them because Instagram 01:19:49.560 --> 01:19:51.119 calls them real so they can't call them that 01:19:51.119 --> 01:19:53.420 so YouTube calls them shorts showcasing a couple 01:19:53.420 --> 01:19:59.000 of my Viking -y books including some nice illustrated 01:19:59.000 --> 01:20:02.220 editions of Norse myths and I know one of the 01:20:02.220 --> 01:20:05.619 most popular ones is my Neil Gaiman's one with 01:20:05.619 --> 01:20:08.979 art by Levi Pinfold and I had a comment just 01:20:08.979 --> 01:20:11.960 yesterday saying hi is this the same story as 01:20:12.960 --> 01:20:16.420 as Neil Gaiman's has, because I've read his paperback, 01:20:16.460 --> 01:20:18.479 hairback version of his retelling of Norse mythology. 01:20:18.659 --> 01:20:20.479 Yes, it is the same stories. I don't think all 01:20:20.479 --> 01:20:22.640 of them are there. And then the same person commented 01:20:22.640 --> 01:20:24.960 on another book, which I've got by Kevin Cossie 01:20:24.960 --> 01:20:27.020 Holland, which is his illustrated version. It's 01:20:27.020 --> 01:20:28.619 done with liner print. It's gorgeous. I must 01:20:28.619 --> 01:20:30.779 confess I've not read it yet. I've had it for 01:20:30.779 --> 01:20:32.939 a very long time. It's signed, but I've not read 01:20:32.939 --> 01:20:35.460 it yet. And they said, are these the same stories 01:20:35.460 --> 01:20:38.380 that Neil Gaiman tells of? And I'm like, yes 01:20:38.380 --> 01:20:41.920 and no. Any book on Norse mythology is always 01:20:41.920 --> 01:20:44.039 the retelling. and I had to say these stories 01:20:44.039 --> 01:20:46.220 are written 200 years after christianization 01:20:46.220 --> 01:20:50.760 and the characters will be there but their story 01:20:50.760 --> 01:20:52.720 arcs might be slightly different they might have 01:20:52.720 --> 01:20:55.359 different features different hair colors kind 01:20:55.359 --> 01:20:57.520 of thing I know I was speaking in the last episode 01:20:57.520 --> 01:21:01.239 to Katie Smith an illustrator from Your Carchaeology 01:21:01.239 --> 01:21:03.600 and she made the one and only your Victoc Trump 01:21:03.600 --> 01:21:09.399 card set and she's depicted Loki as blonde which 01:21:09.399 --> 01:21:11.500 I actually find really refreshing because so 01:21:11.500 --> 01:21:14.199 often he's depicted as a red head just to stand 01:21:14.199 --> 01:21:17.319 out differently from a usually blonde Thor or 01:21:17.319 --> 01:21:20.960 a brown Thor or sometimes he's red but I've always 01:21:20.960 --> 01:21:23.340 seen Loki as red I've never seen him blonde anywhere 01:21:23.340 --> 01:21:25.699 else and I thought that was really nice to see. 01:21:26.659 --> 01:21:28.800 So it's just really interesting to see how some 01:21:28.800 --> 01:21:31.460 people do as you say think across one book they 01:21:31.460 --> 01:21:33.619 think that that's it that's all I need to read 01:21:33.619 --> 01:21:36.180 so this other book is exactly the same. they're 01:21:36.180 --> 01:21:39.000 not but it's that beautiful difference that variation 01:21:39.000 --> 01:21:41.560 that helps these stories keep living so well 01:21:41.560 --> 01:21:43.159 and of course through your beautiful skill of 01:21:43.159 --> 01:21:46.819 a storyteller they go even further yeah it's 01:21:46.819 --> 01:21:52.960 very much that um and i think um uh it's the 01:21:52.960 --> 01:21:55.380 idea of um things like when we have things like 01:21:55.380 --> 01:21:59.140 the bible we have a thing there that i sure not 01:21:59.140 --> 01:22:02.729 a lot of people a little rather I'm saddened 01:22:02.729 --> 01:22:05.510 to see more and more people sort of think that 01:22:05.510 --> 01:22:09.810 these were the words that Jesus and the apostles 01:22:09.810 --> 01:22:12.770 wrote down, as opposed, again, to sort of saying, 01:22:12.949 --> 01:22:15.609 no, no, no, these were written down hundreds 01:22:15.609 --> 01:22:18.689 of years after the event, and not by the people 01:22:18.689 --> 01:22:22.689 who originally said them or spoke them, but by 01:22:22.689 --> 01:22:25.750 people who had been told by ear to mouth and 01:22:25.750 --> 01:22:27.350 ear to mouth and ear to mouth and ear to mouth 01:22:27.350 --> 01:22:29.689 over those hundreds of years, and then they were 01:22:29.689 --> 01:22:34.779 written down. and then they were edited by the 01:22:34.779 --> 01:22:37.979 Romans. And then, but because it's in a book 01:22:37.979 --> 01:22:40.399 and people refer to things like the Bible or 01:22:40.399 --> 01:22:42.319 the Torah or the Quran, people say, well, that 01:22:42.319 --> 01:22:45.500 must be the word, the literal word of people. 01:22:46.760 --> 01:22:49.579 Whereas I think it is unhealthy to think about 01:22:49.579 --> 01:22:53.239 that because then it becomes law and reality. 01:22:54.100 --> 01:22:57.539 And the same with, yeah, the Norse. Because Snorri 01:22:57.539 --> 01:22:59.680 Sturluson wrote down a thing of all, we've got 01:22:59.680 --> 01:23:02.479 one record of it. Yeah, this is what happened. 01:23:02.779 --> 01:23:05.699 But I think that's just people's lack of experience 01:23:05.699 --> 01:23:10.279 and understanding with that there are many different 01:23:10.279 --> 01:23:14.550 sources for cultural items. What we do is, and 01:23:14.550 --> 01:23:17.069 what we do as entertainers or authors or writers, 01:23:17.189 --> 01:23:18.489 whatever, is to say, well, I'm going to write 01:23:18.489 --> 01:23:21.270 one down and I'm going to do this. I have my 01:23:21.270 --> 01:23:24.069 own version of the Viking story, illustrated 01:23:24.069 --> 01:23:27.710 Viking stories as well, which is my retelling 01:23:27.710 --> 01:23:30.770 of those. And I wouldn't say it was the right 01:23:30.770 --> 01:23:35.220 one, but it's the copy. and the transcription 01:23:35.220 --> 01:23:38.460 of how I tell the stories and how I, as a storyteller, 01:23:38.699 --> 01:23:40.659 am comfortable telling those stories and how 01:23:40.659 --> 01:23:43.220 they have been received. And I have changed the 01:23:43.220 --> 01:23:45.460 telling of those stories over time. And the ones 01:23:45.460 --> 01:23:47.060 I wrote down will have changed from the first 01:23:47.060 --> 01:23:49.159 time I told those stories, which would have been 01:23:49.159 --> 01:23:51.819 researched from a whole number of inputs. But 01:23:51.819 --> 01:23:53.939 yet again, you kind of think, well, that's the 01:23:53.939 --> 01:23:57.439 answer. Yeah. But it's not. We have all these 01:23:57.439 --> 01:23:59.199 different kind of things. And it's healthy, I 01:23:59.199 --> 01:24:01.539 think, to understand that we have these. this 01:24:01.539 --> 01:24:05.420 cross -pollination and numerous sources for things 01:24:05.420 --> 01:24:08.359 because then we should be able to look and understand 01:24:08.359 --> 01:24:10.760 and analyse that information and those stories 01:24:10.760 --> 01:24:13.920 ourselves to come across our own understanding 01:24:13.920 --> 01:24:19.159 of meaning. Yeah, it's not always evident, as 01:24:19.159 --> 01:24:21.140 you say, it's almost deliberately hidden that 01:24:21.140 --> 01:24:24.840 these stories aren't taken straight from the 01:24:24.840 --> 01:24:26.720 word of the person who first invented the story. 01:24:26.859 --> 01:24:30.079 For example, were part of my Valkyrie research. 01:24:30.239 --> 01:24:33.340 I was looking at different stories of Valkyries, 01:24:33.500 --> 01:24:35.340 especially the build -up to the Saga of the Volsons, 01:24:35.399 --> 01:24:37.880 which is my main focus. And there is an early 01:24:37.880 --> 01:24:41.520 tale of Prince Helgi, Hunding's Bane, his second 01:24:41.520 --> 01:24:43.600 poem, because he's got three about him. But I 01:24:43.600 --> 01:24:45.680 was looking at the second one. And in the second 01:24:45.680 --> 01:24:49.939 one, he finds a Valkyrie. She gets his victory 01:24:49.939 --> 01:24:51.960 in battle, but she's betrothed to someone else. 01:24:52.340 --> 01:24:55.250 So he goes killed at someone else. some one of 01:24:55.250 --> 01:24:57.770 his friends betrays him and he dies and then 01:24:57.770 --> 01:24:59.489 she dies from grief because she's like oh well 01:24:59.489 --> 01:25:01.649 I've got no purpose to be here now as you do 01:25:01.649 --> 01:25:04.630 yeah yeah but in the end in the edict poem itself 01:25:04.630 --> 01:25:07.029 in the translation that I've got I think it's 01:25:07.029 --> 01:25:08.829 in the poetic edda that's it I've got the poetic 01:25:08.829 --> 01:25:12.409 edda by Caroline Larrington and it says in the 01:25:12.409 --> 01:25:18.539 words of the scribe in a later story I was told 01:25:18.539 --> 01:25:20.920 in Pagan times, which is the biggest red flag 01:25:20.920 --> 01:25:28.899 you could find, these two characters were reincarnated. 01:25:29.340 --> 01:25:31.399 He was known as Hafdan something and she was 01:25:31.399 --> 01:25:35.750 known as Favars. Kara, Kara Haftan's daughter, 01:25:36.050 --> 01:25:37.970 and she too was a Valkyrie. And I'm like, where 01:25:37.970 --> 01:25:40.350 is that? And that was it. So they say it's known 01:25:40.350 --> 01:25:42.449 as the Song of Kara. And I'm like, where is the 01:25:42.449 --> 01:25:44.909 Song of Kara today? That is missing. That is 01:25:44.909 --> 01:25:46.789 lost. That has not been chosen to put in. It's 01:25:46.789 --> 01:25:49.329 got a little footnote. That's all we have. And 01:25:49.329 --> 01:25:52.369 it's sad to see that there were more stories 01:25:52.369 --> 01:25:55.970 about these female characters, Valkyries, mythical 01:25:55.970 --> 01:25:59.689 or semi -shield maiden in roles. And that we've 01:25:59.689 --> 01:26:02.949 just lost them. Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yes, it's 01:26:02.949 --> 01:26:04.609 interesting the whole, the number of, when you 01:26:04.609 --> 01:26:05.789 talk about, there seems to be a bit of a sort 01:26:05.789 --> 01:26:09.630 of a crossover between Valkyries and shield maidens 01:26:09.630 --> 01:26:14.050 and things. Yeah, in the ball songs and when 01:26:14.050 --> 01:26:18.550 Sigurd comes across Brynhildr and, you know, 01:26:18.550 --> 01:26:20.510 she says, you know, I'm a Valkyrie, you know, 01:26:20.770 --> 01:26:25.189 and Odin cursed me and popped me with a sleepthorn 01:26:25.189 --> 01:26:30.090 because I didn't, you know, I beat the side that 01:26:30.090 --> 01:26:33.149 he wanted to win in battle. um but yet she has 01:26:33.149 --> 01:26:36.010 a lineage and she has a parentage you know a 01:26:36.010 --> 01:26:37.869 mortal parentage which she refers to there's 01:26:37.869 --> 01:26:41.680 a brother um uh uh isn't that brother something 01:26:41.680 --> 01:26:44.119 like a till of the hun or something i think so 01:26:44.119 --> 01:26:47.020 yes but it's a strange kind of like mishmash 01:26:47.020 --> 01:26:50.399 of history mixing with the mythological parts 01:26:50.399 --> 01:26:53.039 i think also in that because it comes out of 01:26:53.039 --> 01:26:56.140 scandinavia we always think oh vikings and sagas 01:26:56.140 --> 01:26:59.100 or that's got to be norway could be sweden and 01:26:59.100 --> 01:27:01.460 then yeah maybe iceland at a at a kind of a third 01:27:01.460 --> 01:27:03.779 not finland that's completely different uh oh 01:27:03.779 --> 01:27:06.220 could be denmark um but you suddenly realize 01:27:06.220 --> 01:27:08.600 that this they're in um what's it called, Francia, 01:27:08.680 --> 01:27:12.279 which of course is Germany. Oh, they've come 01:27:12.279 --> 01:27:16.180 down the Rhine. And so actually it's happening 01:27:16.180 --> 01:27:19.359 down there, not up in the wilds of Norway, not 01:27:19.359 --> 01:27:23.300 even in Denmark. And so yeah, it is a hotspot 01:27:23.300 --> 01:27:26.880 of all sorts of things that you come across. 01:27:27.039 --> 01:27:29.640 But yeah, so that these, again, these sort of 01:27:29.640 --> 01:27:34.989 supernatural characters have ill -defined boundaries. 01:27:35.829 --> 01:27:37.369 And you can talk about the Valkyries who, yes, 01:27:37.510 --> 01:27:39.369 who ride down from the skies and collect the 01:27:39.369 --> 01:27:43.510 souls of the glorious dead. You know, the angelic 01:27:43.510 --> 01:27:45.069 side of them. Oh, that's a nice thing as well. 01:27:45.189 --> 01:27:46.569 We can blend that with other religions. They're 01:27:46.569 --> 01:27:49.229 like angels. That's it. Just think angels. Yep. 01:27:49.590 --> 01:27:51.149 Don't get me started on where people are giving 01:27:51.149 --> 01:27:52.890 them wings from in imagery. I don't know where 01:27:52.890 --> 01:27:55.149 people are getting that from yet. I haven't quite 01:27:55.149 --> 01:27:57.970 pinned it down. No, I suppose, you know, it'll 01:27:57.970 --> 01:28:03.300 be, again, a romanticization. of something probably 01:28:03.300 --> 01:28:05.880 from a Victorian inspired things, winged helmets 01:28:05.880 --> 01:28:09.260 and what not, which comes from the idea of angels 01:28:09.260 --> 01:28:11.619 having wings, whereas only a few types of angels 01:28:11.619 --> 01:28:14.619 have wings. Some of them are absolutely bonkers, 01:28:15.020 --> 01:28:17.020 swirling balls of light with a thousand eyes. 01:28:17.539 --> 01:28:19.420 But we see fewer of those in the stained glass 01:28:19.420 --> 01:28:20.779 windows because they're not as pretty as the 01:28:20.779 --> 01:28:26.560 things that look like us. But yes, there's ill 01:28:26.560 --> 01:28:28.399 -defined boundaries. So yes, sometimes they are 01:28:28.399 --> 01:28:32.819 these angels. Sometimes they are the cup bearers 01:28:32.819 --> 01:28:37.119 of Odin who wait on his table. And he would, 01:28:37.319 --> 01:28:40.899 if he were an important person, sorry, like any 01:28:40.899 --> 01:28:42.319 important person in the early medieval period 01:28:42.319 --> 01:28:44.899 and before, if you're important, you have servants 01:28:44.899 --> 01:28:46.859 and you have people who wait on you. So part 01:28:46.859 --> 01:28:50.029 of that is just. That's the culture today. And 01:28:50.029 --> 01:28:52.609 yes, you may well have had women wait on you, 01:28:52.890 --> 01:28:54.729 but warrior women as well. That would be even 01:28:54.729 --> 01:28:58.449 cooler if you are a warrior and a heroic culture. 01:28:58.789 --> 01:29:00.289 And you have these other things between basically 01:29:00.289 --> 01:29:05.270 someone who's a waiter, someone who's a psychopomp 01:29:05.270 --> 01:29:08.729 escorting the souls of the dead off to shield 01:29:08.729 --> 01:29:11.649 maidens. And they're somewhere between kind of 01:29:11.649 --> 01:29:15.819 strange spirit woman warrior and just a woman 01:29:15.819 --> 01:29:18.319 who's a warrior, a warrior who happens to be 01:29:18.319 --> 01:29:22.039 a woman, which is unusual and therefore defined 01:29:22.039 --> 01:29:27.319 as a shield maiden. I don't know, I was going 01:29:27.319 --> 01:29:28.960 with that, but yes, lots of ill -defined values. 01:29:29.000 --> 01:29:31.720 It's fine, it's all really, really good. I mean, 01:29:31.779 --> 01:29:34.479 I could quite happily talk to you for ages, but 01:29:34.479 --> 01:29:36.520 I am aware of the time because I am doing this 01:29:36.520 --> 01:29:38.319 during my working day and I know you've probably 01:29:38.319 --> 01:29:41.100 got your own plans. So we do sadly have to try 01:29:41.100 --> 01:29:44.319 and wrap this episode up to a close. But gosh, 01:29:44.319 --> 01:29:46.220 I could talk to you about all these things for 01:29:46.220 --> 01:29:48.779 absolutely hours because I just have that many 01:29:48.779 --> 01:29:50.640 ideas and views. And it's lovely to find someone 01:29:50.640 --> 01:29:52.479 who connects on the same level as well, which 01:29:52.479 --> 01:29:54.439 is why I do this podcasting because I don't have 01:29:54.439 --> 01:29:57.829 anyone in my modern life. does understands my 01:29:57.829 --> 01:29:59.609 connection i mean one of my mum friends and i've 01:29:59.609 --> 01:30:02.270 said this before in previous episodes i won't 01:30:02.270 --> 01:30:03.930 name her because i know she doesn't listen but 01:30:03.930 --> 01:30:05.789 i might embarrass her she says like like who 01:30:05.789 --> 01:30:08.170 is thor and how do we know about him and like 01:30:08.170 --> 01:30:11.149 those are two very good but very big questions 01:30:11.149 --> 01:30:14.470 yeah how do we know about thor i said i don't 01:30:14.470 --> 01:30:16.130 know how to begin with that one darling because 01:30:16.130 --> 01:30:18.609 you don't know marvel so that's often the starting 01:30:18.609 --> 01:30:21.859 point for most people You should meet her on 01:30:21.859 --> 01:30:23.880 a Thursday and ask her about that and say how 01:30:23.880 --> 01:30:26.279 do you know that because it's Thor's day today. 01:30:27.619 --> 01:30:33.659 I wrote that in junior school. I will try that 01:30:33.659 --> 01:30:36.699 with her when I see her later this week. Thank 01:30:36.699 --> 01:30:38.800 you so much but before we go please do let our 01:30:38.800 --> 01:30:41.039 viewers in the snow where they can hear your 01:30:41.039 --> 01:30:44.119 stories or see you perform in person. Yes, indeed. 01:30:44.180 --> 01:30:46.979 So I'm based in the UK, based in the West Midlands 01:30:46.979 --> 01:30:49.539 of England, but I do perform all over the UK. 01:30:49.640 --> 01:30:52.180 I also perform online as well, quite a lot. So 01:30:52.180 --> 01:30:54.359 if you can sit in your pajamas with a cup of 01:30:54.359 --> 01:30:56.840 coffee or a can of beer and you can either watch 01:30:56.840 --> 01:31:00.779 live online or you can watch later. All my online 01:31:00.779 --> 01:31:03.340 shows are recorded and then just the story bit 01:31:03.340 --> 01:31:06.560 is available later if you can't make the thing. 01:31:06.619 --> 01:31:08.899 But the best way, the easiest places to find 01:31:08.899 --> 01:31:11.680 me are either on Facebook or on my website or 01:31:11.680 --> 01:31:14.260 Instagram or even Blue Sky. and if you just search 01:31:14.260 --> 01:31:18.699 for Jason Buck Storyteller, don't just search 01:31:18.699 --> 01:31:22.840 for Jason Buck, you'll get a Texan politician 01:31:22.840 --> 01:31:25.159 and an American football player and all sorts 01:31:25.159 --> 01:31:27.399 of other things. But yeah, Jason Buck Storyteller, 01:31:27.500 --> 01:31:30.079 you can find me there. Yeah, and I regularly 01:31:30.079 --> 01:31:34.319 perform live in person and also online. So you 01:31:34.319 --> 01:31:37.319 can find me in those places. Brilliant, well 01:31:37.319 --> 01:31:40.180 I will also put the links down below to the two 01:31:40.180 --> 01:31:42.079 episode recording you did of your Shield main 01:31:42.079 --> 01:31:44.659 story because I read to watch that in the build 01:31:44.659 --> 01:31:48.500 -up to this recording and I still loved it, even 01:31:48.500 --> 01:31:51.119 though it was a couple of years ago, which shows 01:31:51.119 --> 01:31:53.890 how stories still retain such power. no matter 01:31:53.890 --> 01:31:57.510 how long ago they were told. I was also like, 01:31:57.649 --> 01:31:59.250 final question, do you think you'll be back at 01:31:59.250 --> 01:32:02.210 Jorvik in 2026? I believe I will, I've sort of 01:32:02.210 --> 01:32:05.510 snuck into the edge of Jorvik, both back in 2020 01:32:05.510 --> 01:32:09.750 when I snuck into the edge last minute into the 01:32:09.750 --> 01:32:12.869 Jorvik fringe and as I did this time, I think 01:32:12.869 --> 01:32:16.250 it was only because I did a bit more of my own 01:32:16.250 --> 01:32:19.109 publicity and gave them links to events and things, 01:32:19.109 --> 01:32:20.510 and they thought, oh, okay, this bloke seems 01:32:20.510 --> 01:32:23.029 to, he seems to be all right in sort of self 01:32:23.029 --> 01:32:25.710 -promotion. So we'll put him in on the thing 01:32:25.710 --> 01:32:27.329 as well. So I just kind of snuck in the back 01:32:27.329 --> 01:32:30.689 door. But I think after I did some of the street 01:32:30.689 --> 01:32:32.229 storytelling, I did the show and the show sold 01:32:32.229 --> 01:32:35.340 out. Lovely, lovely. often that show does at 01:32:35.340 --> 01:32:37.579 Dark Norse, they sort of said, oh yeah, give 01:32:37.579 --> 01:32:40.619 us a shout out next year. So in what form I'll 01:32:40.619 --> 01:32:42.979 be back, I don't know, but I would like to think 01:32:42.979 --> 01:32:45.420 that absolutely, yes, I will be back at Jorvik 01:32:45.420 --> 01:32:49.689 in 2026. Brilliant. Well, I hope to see you again 01:32:49.689 --> 01:32:52.869 in person in 2026, if not attend one of your 01:32:52.869 --> 01:32:55.289 online storytelling sessions maybe one day, all 01:32:55.289 --> 01:32:57.069 being well with getting the kid to bed and that 01:32:57.069 --> 01:33:01.710 whole circus. Thank you very much for inviting 01:33:01.710 --> 01:33:03.909 me on. Yeah, it's been great, Chats. The time 01:33:03.909 --> 01:33:07.760 has zoomed past. It has. It's a shame I can't 01:33:07.760 --> 01:33:10.060 make these episodes too long or people may well 01:33:10.060 --> 01:33:13.279 need them into their own day. It's been a real 01:33:13.279 --> 01:33:15.960 pleasure, Jason. Thank you so much for being 01:33:15.960 --> 01:33:18.619 a willing and happy guest. It's been a wonderful 01:33:18.619 --> 01:33:21.079 conversation. And for viewers and listeners, 01:33:22.300 --> 01:33:24.140 stay tuned. Do hit subscribe wherever you're 01:33:24.140 --> 01:33:25.539 listening and viewing. There'll be the usual 01:33:25.539 --> 01:33:27.619 Valhalla Conversations episodes coming up. I've 01:33:27.619 --> 01:33:29.680 got a guest planned for every month right up 01:33:29.680 --> 01:33:33.029 until October. Even November, it's only December 01:33:33.029 --> 01:33:35.430 I need to fill in. But I am still trying to see 01:33:35.430 --> 01:33:39.390 if I can recruit any more Yorvik festival members, 01:33:39.630 --> 01:33:42.649 events, persons to make this mini series a bit 01:33:42.649 --> 01:33:44.329 longer. But that's why I've always used the word 01:33:44.329 --> 01:33:47.310 mini, because everyone's busy and everyone's 01:33:47.310 --> 01:33:49.189 doing things. But thank you very much for listening 01:33:49.189 --> 01:33:51.090 and being wherever you are. And thank you very 01:33:51.090 --> 01:33:53.649 much, Jason. My pleasure. Thanks all. Bye bye.