Norse Poetry and the Oral Tradition

[Gunnora Hallakarva]

Lyonel suggested that the Norse might be anal about retaining the exact form
of a poem or song for every performance as the work is passed down over
time.  Hmmm.  I think that Norse poetry stays the same because it is
composed in a strict metrical style, which means that if you change a word
here and there it sticks out as the allitteration or meter is changed badly
thereby.

But the Norse prided themselves on the ability to extemporize poetry.  They
were able to do this by learning kennings and typical halflines.  So if you
were extemporizing a poem about a battle, you would have "the war-play of
wound-wands" available as a ready-for-sue half line, that you could put into
your poem wherever you needed a line with "w" allitteration.  Some modern
experts suggest that an oral performer had thousands of "formulaic" poetry
chuncks memorized, plus some rules for stringing them together.  This meant
that you could tell the same basic tale, but it would vary a lot each time
you told it.

The point of all this is that the Norse could and did vary the way any story
was told (look at all the ways the story of Sigurdthe Volsung is
remembered!).  Their exceptional poets did end up having their poems passed
down verbatim, but only because the poems were outstanding, and because of
the metrical forms, hard to mess up in oral transmission.

SO, how should "Rising of the Star" be taught??  I think probably the verses
that are ancient and relate to folks unknown to modern audiences should end
up in the book, preserved for curiosity value.  But what should be taught
and sung are the verses that are current, but which most importantly speak
to people's hearts.  After all, if you do not touch the heart and soul of
your audience, you are not entertaining, you are masturbating, and that
doesn't need an audience!!

"Not many the joys the gods grant to mortals:
The joy of the springtime, summer's sweetness,
The time of the autumn, high and transparent,
To plow and to sow, to heap up the harvest, 
To find at last peace -- rest is labor's reward.
Not many the sorrows the gods grant to mortals:
Heartsore the first sorrow, subsistence second,
Death unexpected is ever the third,
False shall our friends prove, life, too shall leave us ---
Music's the hero's sole might and achievement.
Of what shall I sing then? Of what shall my heart speak,
Of any other joys or sorrows but these?
Tis' unskilled I am in the telling of starcourses.
I know naught of flowers, nor fish, nor fields.
Sing shall I then, what is given to sing of.
Knowledge and skill are not songs for the hero!
Present to the people these subjects in story:
Sing of the year-change, a song of the seasons,
The proud pagent of life, the procession of death!
But bright rainbow beams all else under heaven --
Glistening cat's gold, wave-ripple reflection.
Of men there are many, and many the minstrels:
One is the song shall rise above all!
Of man sing the song then! The ideal! the spirit!
Away shall pass peoples, but never the power of song, 
Nor the poet who sings the soul of his people."

---Vainamoinen's Song
Wassail,
::GUNNORA::

Gunnora Hallakarva
Herskerinde
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