Ormsby, Michael and Setr

Andy Robertson · 15 Jan 2005, 15:09 · from 2005-January.txt.gz

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From: andywrobertson at clara.co.uk (Andy Robertson)
Date: Sat Jan 15 15:09:36 2005
Subject: (urth) Ormsby, Michael and Setr
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James Wynn writes: 

> Hartshorn (seeming a bit cranky this afternoon) says:

I certainly didn't mean to be angry: I was trying to make a joke.   Gotta 
work on that.  I just like the Viking Answers Lady. :-) 

> 
> The last two humans are Lif and Lifthraser, and they repopulate the world.

I know that the restoration of the world after Ragnarok is part of the 
Eddas: I happen to believe, however, that it is a late Christian 
interpolation. 

Maybe I am allowing my own religious beliefs to obtrude too plainly here:  I 
am an Odinist and I take this seriously, not as old stories but as a 
primitive but accurate cosmology, one where the forces of good are 
authentically outgunned and the world really ends.  I don't believe in 
repeated big bangs or in a reversal of the laws of Themodynamics.

> 
>>Still, I suspect Wolfe may be trying to smuggle in something else.
>>What???
> 
> Yes. What, indeed.

The "world" Wolfe creates is very like the Norse universe, with its Overcyns 
(what genuine word is that BTW?)  The Norse universe also has nine realms, 
and some of them correspond pretty well by name and nature to the levels of 
Wolfe's world and some do not. 

The ones that correspond well are in the middle.  For example I have never 
seen a better description of the gods and what they are meant to be than I 
read in Wolfe's words about the Valfather, the Lady, and the other Overcyns. 
But the bits at the top and bottom of Wolfe's world are from other 
belief-structures and frankly they don't make as much sense in a Norse 
framework (no reason why they should, it's only a book). 

According to Wolfe's own explanations the Giants are the cast-offs from 
Kleos, and their genisis in the realm of Skai was formed by the death of 
Ymir.   So Setr is not a giant in this sense since he is in Muspel and is 
therefore of the residue of the residue of the residue of Skai - many layers 
of derivation below that.   Maybe the spelling of Setr is just meant as 
acknowledgment of this.   If it's more than that and a hint towards "Set" I 
have no suggestions.

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