What I feel most is not the grandeur of Nordic mythology, nor how powerful the gods are, but that someone restored that distant story and told it so vividly and interestingly that it really happened in our world.
Some myths, deliberately recorded by people, have been preserved despite losing some authenticity; Another part of the myth, influenced by irresistible factors such as war and natural disasters, was finally lost.
This made neil gaiman, the master of fantasy literature, feel very sad. Yes, neil gaiman was the author and screenwriter of last year's popular fantasy American drama American Gods. I saw a photo of him secretly signing his book in Weibo the other day.
So he wrote a book about Nordic fairy tales, called Nordic Gods. He wrote on the title page: These old stories are for children.
Yes, young people, if we don't deliberately look for books related to myths and pay attention to movies (TV plays) adapted from myths, these cultural treasures are likely to be gradually submerged by the long river of history and forgotten.
Now, let's follow neil gaiman's footsteps, go back to the beginning of chaos, when the world has not really been established, and look at the birth of the gods, their daily life, and their final demise and rebirth.
One day long ago, the flame melted an iceberg, and the melted water gave birth to two lives.
One is Imil, the ancestor of the giant, and the other is a giant cow.
Imil grew up drinking milk and gave birth to three giants in his sleep.
The cow licked the ice and licked a person. This man is the ancestor of God, Bligh, and the grandfather of Odin, the father of the gods.
Later, the bull was born, married the giant's daughter, and gave birth to Odin, Willie and Fei.
At this time, there is nothing in the world, and there is no trace of other life.
The three brothers summed up the creation of the new world. So they killed Imil. Because he is the origin of all life.
After his death, Imil's body became land, bones became hills and cliffs, fragments of teeth and bones became rocks, stones and sand, and blood and sweat became the sea.
They also made men and women from ash trees and elms, which are the ancestors of mankind.
Seeing this, do you think of our fairy tale, like me, that Pangu created the world and Nuwa made man?
This is also one of the surprises brought by this book, the inexplicable sense of crossing.
When neil gaiman said that Loki, Odin's sworn brother, turned into blackfly, wiped out dwarves and made treasures, I thought of the first episode of Journey to the West 15, in which the Monkey King turned into a centipede and made Yang Li's immortal fall from the high platform.
Thor's hammer, equivalent to a golden hoop, also has the function of zooming in and out. There are also somersaults and big ships in Narnia legends.
The next world tree and nine worlds may also remind you of the six worlds in ancient mythology, namely, heaven, fairy, human, demon, and underworld. In The Journey to the West, a TV series in which one action will be replayed three times is a good interpretation of the six realms.
The world tree grows among the nine worlds, connecting them. The nine worlds are protoss, light elves, dark elves, human beings, giants, foggy city, fire world and underworld.
Are these names familiar? Yes, the creation background of The Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit, which is popular all over the world, is based on this.
At this time, the curtain of the world has been opened, and the daily life of the immortals has begun to be officially staged.
Among the Nordic gods, my favorite god is not Loukimo. He is Odin's sworn brother.
Even if you are handsome, your brain is still good. In today's words, he is a deep and gentle person. Although he often gets into trouble, he can always think of a solution and finally solve everything.
For example, in order to let the gods get the six treasures of the dwarf and the blonde hair that Seaver, the wife of Thor, wanted, he turned into blackfly and severely bit the face of the dwarf who was building a hammer, so that the dwarf could neither concentrate on pulling the bellows nor ensure that the temperature in the bellows remained at the same level all the time, which led to the shorter handle of the hammer and lost the bet with the gods.
When the dwarf sewed Loki's mouth together with thread, it was all over.
In fact, you will find that in many stories, Loki is always the person who gives advice and always takes the blame. As Raytheon always said, "If something goes wrong, my first thought is always that it's all Loki's fault. This saves me a lot of time. "
Of course, he also has some disadvantages. He cheated in marriage and gave birth to three children with a giant woman, a giant snake, a giant wolf and Hella, the goddess of death.
Because of a dream, Odin knew their existence and saw that they would be the chief culprit in ending the world.
So Odin killed the grass without saying anything. Send the serpent to the seaside of Midgard, away from any land; The giant wolf was tied to the shore of the black lake, with a sword in his mouth, with the handle down and his head up, so that he could never close his mouth; Hella, the goddess of death, was taken to the world without light and became the god in charge of the underworld.
However, the ending has long been doomed and cannot be changed, and that is another story.
In this way, Odin completely subverted the wise and gentle image he had seen before, but showed a cruel side.
However, these things just show that the gods in Nordic mythology are not perfect at all. On them, there are few traces of God, and more are the embodiment of human nature.
Just as they will have Gray who loves beauty but doesn't love mountains and rivers, Freya who is afraid of getting old and eating golden apples to stay young.
This group of gods is probably the legendary lovely love.
There are two stories that impressed me the most.
Let's start with the first story, Bud's death.
God of light Budd is Odin's second son and Odin's favorite son.
One night, he dreamed that someone was going to kill him. He told it to Odin, who told it to his wife, frigga.
The mother of the gods is worried. So she asked everything in the world to promise her that it would not hurt Bud. Only mistletoe is missing. In her eyes, mistletoe is too weak to kill Bud.
Thought foolproof, unexpectedly, she inadvertently told it to Loki who became a woman.
The tragedy happened, but it didn't end.
When Odin's other son avenged Bud, he quickly took his place.
Seeing this, I feel a lot.
In the workplace, when we talk to colleagues, we must be careful what we say and do, and don't expose our weaknesses just because the other person is inconspicuous.
Because you can't guarantee that the person you are talking to is an enemy or a friend; You can't guarantee that no third person will know your conversation. Once someone takes advantage of your weakness and wants to make a fuss about it, the hit rate is absolutely 100%.
The most important thing is that when you are "framed" for this, a second person will replace you soon.
In fact, I have experienced something like this, but fortunately, the supervisor is open-minded, understands my personality and recognizes my work ability. This matter has passed. I suffered a loss once and never made a similar mistake again.
Talking less and doing more is the wisdom in the workplace.
Another story is Loki's last days.
In autumn, Loki drinks with God. When he was drunk, he laughed at God and told them all the disgraceful secrets. You can imagine how ugly the gods look and how much they want to kill him.
This became the fuse of the gods at dusk.
Later, they caught Loki, tied him up with shackles made of his son's intestines, and dripped snake venom on his face, which made him miserable.
The cause of all this is that Loki can't control his mouth, and he knows too many secrets, which makes him the target of public criticism.
Such stories, every generation, emerge one after another.
In Yongzheng Dynasty, after Yongzheng succeeded to the throne, he killed Gao, a confidant, and made Li Dequan the eunuch manager. Because Yongzheng killed many people on his way to the throne under the guise of Gao's hand. In order to keep these secrets from people, killing people is the best solution. After all, the dead can't talk.
This was the case in previous dynasties, especially in the harem. Find a lot of palace dramas such as Empresses in the Palace, War and Beauty, and Walking on Thin Ice. Here, I won't give examples.
So, try not to know other people's secrets, and even if you do, pretend you don't know them.
Neil gaiman said in the preface, "All this is like a trip, starting with everything in ice and fire; From ice and fire, everything is over. " This is the final outcome of the twilight of the gods.
In this doomsday war, many important gods, including Odin, Loki and Heimdahl, no longer exist. Everything in the world, once living, is spared.
The whole world has returned to the time when it has not been established. The surviving God and two human beings once again established a new world.
Probably every death will be accompanied by a new life.
This is not only the case in Nordic mythology, but also in many things.
In a big way, every change of dynasty will promote social progress.
The Revolution of 1911 overthrew the corrupt and incompetent Qing government and ended the feudal system of more than two thousand years.
Later, in the Republic of China, many talents emerged. Revolutionary Liu Daoyi, politician Kong Xiangxi, diplomat Diao Zuoqian, writer Lu Xun, and so on.
In a small way, every progress is a new life.
Take me for example, I am a person who is easy to forget after reading books. I tried reading notes and mind mapping, but in the end it was not satisfactory.
So I got myself into the habit of reading and writing book reviews. Everything is difficult at the beginning, but fortunately, compared with myself six months ago, it is a little progress.
People are animals that are afraid of change, including me. Often because of the sudden change of life, it becomes inexplicable anxiety. But when I see that your changes have enriched my life, I will probably be as happy as I am.
The book Norse Gods has 16 stories.
It seems to be a story, but it is actually about human nature.
If you are interested in fairy tales, I recommend you to read them. If you want to know about human nature, I recommend you to read it.