(no subject)

[vyvyanx]

I've just finished Rhinegold by Stephan Grundy, after a couple of weeks (it's pretty long, and I've been busy). It's a novel-style retelling of the Nibelungenlied/Volsunga Saga, and I thought it was awesomely good. In particular, I couldn't fault the linguistics of it. TBH, though, I'd have been surprised if I could, since the author credits "Paul Bibire for his matchless friendship, inspiration and philological assistance". Paul Bibire taught me Old Norse language and literature and Germanic philology for three years when I was an undergraduate here at Cambridge, and he was matchless, IME, in his dedication to learning for its own sake, to the point where he gave complete lecture courses and sets of language classes which bore absolutely no relation to the exams which he himself set, invigilated and marked in the same subject. He was often reduced to tears in lectures and supervisions by discussion of the First Germanic Sound Shift and i-mutation, which he confessed to finding "profoundly moving". Even I'm not quite that into historical linguistics...

Comments

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

Paul was lovely, wasn't he? Did he tell you his joke about Balder?

[vyvyan.livejournal.com]

Probably - remind me about it?

[jholloway.livejournal.com]

Hmmm.

[vyvyan.livejournal.com]

Did you not like it then?

[jholloway.livejournal.com]

That was more of an interested "hmmm." I haven't read it, and having just read the Nibelungenlied for the first time, I bet it would be interesting.

[vyvyan.livejournal.com]

Oh, right! I had rather assumed that you would have read it, given the books you talk about on your lj. The description of the author reminded me vaguely of you also:

Stephan Grundy was born in New York City but grew up in Dallas, Texas. He has long been interested in the great body of myths and heroic tales shared by the Scandinavians, Germans and English. It was while listening to Wagner's Ring Cycle that he found himself wishing that there were novels of the great Northern epic in the same way that there were novels of the Arthurian works, and so he wrote Rhinegold. He is currently completing his Ph.D. at Cambridge University.

(though "currently" was 1994)

[jholloway.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Googling it I'm not quite sure how I missed it.

[keithlard.livejournal.com]

Ooh, that sounds quite good. I like Wagner, but I don't understand German, so I've no idea what it's about :D