Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman Peter Fields Neil Gaiman. Norse Mythology. New York & London: Norton, 2017. 299p. Neil Gaiman has been in the vanguard of what might be called—or dismissed as—young adult fantasy literature. Now read by all ages, this genre spans J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan, Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, C. S. Lewis’s Narnia Chronicles, and J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. With his Sandman graphic novel, Gaiman first caught the attention of a young audience and quickly moved to the forefront of what fantasy is doing in our time. Norse Mythology evidences his growth as a writer whose stories may be read aloud to children at bedtime, but whose resonance meets [End Page 324] the criteria of serious literature. He fully captures the outrageous and the awful, the hilarious and the poignant qualities of the Prose Edda and the Poetic Edda in a superbly paced style with telling detail and humorous dialogue. It is strikingly effective, both for young people whose minds are open to wonder or for college students alert to the Northern legacy that permeates the Early English tradition: Beowulf, the Exeter Book, the Vercelli Book, Caxton’s Mallory, or even (or especially) Milton’s Paradise Lost. This essential volume allows us to grasp—under one cover in a few sittings—the full power and range of what we sometimes call the “Northern” influence on English literature and popular culture. Indeed, what drew Gaiman’s interest to Norse mythology was the discrepancy between the latter day Norse heroes as depicted in Marvel comic books and their original forbears who were more complicated and idiosyncratic. One of the difficult things about the original stories is precisely their penchant for odd details, desultory adventures and journeys, and other disparate motifs that are handled with surprising grace. The author interprets as he retells the stories, highlighting the eccentric folklore details with a significance that feels true and authentic. The reader takes away an impression of a vast, tragic panorama of gods whose time in this world is cyclical. They will pass away: “In addition, I learned, the Norse gods came with their own doomsday: Ragnarok, the twilight of the gods, the end of it all. The gods were going to battle the frost giants, and they were all going to die” (12). Loki is especially galling—and compelling—as a character whose fraught relationship with fellow immortals appalls and fascinates in equal measures. His first act of mischief (apparently, for no particular reason) is to rob Thor’s wife of her beautiful brown-golden hair: “Her fingers reached up to her bare pink scalp and touched it, exploring it tentatively. She look at Thor, horrified” (51). Gaiman excels with visual cues and surgical detail, describing Loki’s comeuppance for destroying her hair. The dwarf who helped make Thor’s hammer does the deed with Odin’s permission: “Brokk grunted and produced an awl, a pointed spike used in leatherwork, and he jabbed it through the leather, punching holes through Loki’s lips. Then he took a strong thread and he sewed Loki’s lips together with it” (66). Importantly, the author takes his time culminating the history of the gods. We are reminded of impending destruction with increasing insistence, but we are treated along the way to a cumulative cornucopia of finely wrought moments of character and description. Neil Gaiman’s powerful prose is smooth and glassy, flowing gently from one sentence into another. Yet he knows just the right word to drive home the situation he is describing—like the awl that the dwarf jabs through Loki’s lips. We see, hear, and feel a completeness of sensorium—a flavor of [End Page 325] Northern tone and allusion—that we have experienced before in so many stories, but could not quite put our finger on. Norse Mythology restores the glory of the North, and we realize why these gods have never left our imagination. Peter Fields Midwestern State University Copyright © 2018 Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association