The Vikings [Denmark] by Elsé Rothdahl, translated by Wang Feng, published by Social Science Literature Press
The World of the Vikings, by Philip Parker, translated by Gao Wanbo and Li Da, published by Democracy and Construction Press
"Viking Legend" [US] by Lars Brownworth, by Douyan, translated by Chen Li, published by CITIC Press
"Norse Mythology" by Mao Dun SWiM painting, published by Jiangsu Phoenix Literature and Art Publishing House
Finns' Nightmares: A Guide to Alternative Finnish Social Interactions by Karolina Kolhonen, translated by Li Junfan and published by Guangxi Normal University Press
Northern Europe is both a geographical and a cultural concept.
Northern Europe generally refers to the five countries of Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark and Iceland, and their dependent territories of Faroe Islands, Greenland, Åland and Svalbard. They are on the geographical fringes of Europe, but fierce warriors once swept across Europe, their stone carvings and bronze ornaments once aroused the nobility, and the spiritual climate of Nordic culture is still fascinating to this day.
Vikings, wolves from the North
When it comes to Nordic culture, many people may immediately think of Vikings. Viking legend, fascinating.
The newly published book Vikings by Danish archaeologist Elsé Rosdahl (published by the Social Science Literature Press) covers the fields of history, literature, linguistics, toponymic studies, archaeology, zoology, botany and other natural sciences through interdisciplinary research and international cooperation and comprehensive investigation. The book is based on a wealth of information: written evidence of contemporaneous or slightly later events (including the Lune inscription), poetry, place or person names, archaeological finds (including both evidence of human activity and remains of flora and fauna), topography and climate. The book covers many knowledge points, such as: farmers from Greenland are the first Europeans to set foot in the Americas, and the 12th-century "Book of Settlement" has its early character stories; "Original Chronicle" and other historical sources show that the Scandinavians were once called "Rus", and the Kingdom of Kiev was inextricably linked with the Vikings ... The book is a cultural encyclopedia from an archaeological perspective.
In terms of history, the most amazing thing is the brilliant achievements of the Vikings.
Scandinavia had a barren land and harsh climate, and in order to survive and wealth, people had to live to the sea. Tribal leaders often organized young adults to plunder at sea, which later developed into a sweep of hundreds of warships on expeditions to the continent. Known as Vikings, they roamed the Baltic and Atlantic Seas, occasionally setting foot on the continent and looting.
In 1013, the Danish Cnut family established the "Great North Sea Empire", which included Scandinavia and most of the British Isles. The 8th-11th centuries were the heyday of the Vikings. After the 11th century, in the face of increasingly powerful European monarchies and urban centralization, the chiefs of Northern Europe were unable to maintain their autonomous status, and the backward political system eliminated the Vikings' military dependence. At the same time, because the Vikings' trade did not conform to the trend of trading commodities such as grain, timber, and olive oil that emerged in the late Middle Ages, they lost their original advantage.
Among the books about the Vikings, Philip Parker's The World of the Vikings is a work of historical narrative for the general public. The book presents the history of the Vikings from the 8th to 15th centuries from political, economic, military, cultural and other perspectives, reviews the origin of the Vikings, follows the pace of Viking conquest and disappearance, and sorts out the process of plunder and settlement, colonization and assimilation. If you're interested in battle stories, read Lars Brownworth's Viking Saga, subtitled "Wolf from the Sea," which features bloody and ups and downs.
The notoriety of the Vikings is etched in cultural memory, but this perception is exaggerated, and the Vikings were no more violent than other peoples of their time, they were simply more combative. The arrival of the Vikings was like putting a catfish in a pool of stagnant water, the old system was destroyed, and the people called for unified leadership and efficient political order. On top of the ruins ravaged by the Vikings rose the four great powers of medieval Western Europe, namely England, France, the Holy Roman Empire and the Kingdom of Sicily. They breathe in compromise, rise up in struggle, experience division and unity, escape and merge, and seek new life in the midst of pain. The other side of destruction is creation, in which Northern Europe participates in the course of the entire history of Europe.
The history and culture of the Vikings is rooted in the vast and harsh land of Northern Europe, and we need to trace back to the source to better understand the Vikings and understand the Nordic culture.
Norse mythology, one of the origins of Western culture
The Eda and Sakya are the most important classics of Nordic literature handed down from the Middle Ages. Shi Qin'e and Sven translated these two epics, and explained the "Edda" and "Sakya" in the preface and evaluated the cultural value.
The word "Edda" originally meant "grandmother" or "ancient tradition" in ancient Scandinavian, which later translated into "divine revelation" or "the use of wisdom." In the 9th and 13th centuries AD, Icelandic troubadours recorded the poetic ballads sung by folk songs from all over Northern Europe, describing pirates and their lives, and the gods appearing in the poems were all pirate figures.
"Sakya" is derived from the ancient Germanic language, which originally means "to speak" and "to tell", that is, to tell a story. Around the 13th century AD, Icelanders and Norwegians used prose to record the oral literature of their ancestors' heroic deeds, including social life, customs, religious beliefs and spiritual outlooks, as well as biographies, family genealogies and local chronicles.
Edda and Sakya were formed in the Middle Ages and are accounts of Norse mythology and heroic legends, so the true source of Nordic culture is unique Norse mythology. The universe was originally ruled by the giant race, and the giant was ruled by the god race after the extinction, but the god race finally embarked on the road to extinction due to cannibalism and natural disasters, and Odin's descendants such as the light god and the dark god returned to the earth one after another, but the time of the gods is gone, and the god survivors can only integrate into humans and enter the new world together.
Norse mythology also tells about the miracle of creation and the glory of the gods, but it focuses more on describing the limited power of the gods and the destruction of the world. The term "Ragnarok" comes from Norse mythology, fate has been predetermined, and the gods cannot be recovered. These myths contain a profound sense of tragedy, an initial conception of equality, and a fearless sacrifice of human resistance.
Norse mythology is one of the sources of Western mythology outside of ancient Greece and Rome. Several translations with the title "Norse Mythology" alone can be found, and Mr. Mao Dun also wrote a popular book "Norse Mythology ABC" in 1930.
Odin is dressed in gold armor, holding the spear of eternity, sitting on a golden throne, on his shoulders are two crows, symbolizing "thoughts" and "memories" to deliver messages to him, and two hungry wolves lying at his feet, symbolizing "greed" and "desire", ready to attack; Thor, the god of thunder, armed with a magic hammer, patrols the park in a chariot; Frey, the god of abundance, is handsome and in charge of reproduction; The patron saint Heimdall is faithful, guarding the entrance and exit of the park and the Rainbow Bridge; Loki, the god of fire, is a villain who causes trouble everywhere; There are also gods such as Valkyrie, the god of spring, and the god of the sky. Norse mythology belongs to the animist belief, where all things in the mountains and rivers have animism, giants, elves, monsters, revenants and nightmares, etc., sharing living space with gods and humans.
Norse mythology has a far-reaching influence and is also the source of inspiration for many literary and artistic works: Richard Wagner's opera works such as "The Ring of the Nibelungs" and "The Female Warrior" are based on Norse mythology; The winter in A Song of Ice and Fire is the winter of Finbull in Norse mythology; In Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, monsters, wizards, elves, dwarfs, and hobbits all have the shadows of Norse mythological figures; The Marvel sci-fi action movie "Thor" tells the story of Thor, who was banished to Earth, and learned how to become a real hero.
Norse mythology has been integrated into the blood of Western culture and entered the orbit of world culture, and our Chinese scholars and cultural figures have also turned their attention to Northern Europe.
Nordic culture, building bridges of exchange
In 1989, Mr. Feng Zhi served as the president of the Chinese Nordic Literature Research Association, and made an opening speech: "At the beginning of this century, as far back as 1908, Lu Xun, the founder of new Chinese literature, talked about Kirkgaard's cynical ideas in two papers introducing Western culture and literature, Ibsen's play "The Enemy of the Nation", Brandeis's "Impressions of Russia" in two papers on Western culture and literature... In 1911, the famous Chinese historian and poet Chen Yinke, who was recovering from illness in Norway, visited the graves of Ibsen and Bujosen, and wrote two poems praising their literary achievements and describing the scene in front of their tombs. Eighty years ago, when the Chinese people were still very new to Northern Europe and had little understanding of Northern Europe, there were already literary and historians who made great contributions in China who made great contributions in their youth and made spiritual contact with outstanding Northern European thinkers and writers. ”
Feng Zhi's speech briefly sorted out the historical clues of China's Nordic literature. When the modern Chinese intellectual elite entered the world's modern civilization, many people drew nourishment from Nordic culture. For example, Mao Dun has a soft spot for Norse mythology, and his literary work also has Nordic overtones, and the heroine of his 1930 novel "Hong", Mei Xingsu, is a "Chinese Nala" who mentally controls her own destiny and forges ahead without looking back. The issue of women is one of the central issues in the history of modern Chinese literature, and there has been a fierce discussion around "Nala's Exodus", which has produced many literary classics, and in Ba Jin's "Home", the book Qin holds in his hand is "A Doll's House".
In addition to Ibsen's plays, as well as Feng Zhi's philosophy of Kierkegaard and Brandeis's literary criticism, Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales had a greater influence on mainland culture. The climax of the Chinese translation of Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales also appeared in the 20s of the 20th century. Lin Lan, Zhao Jingshen, Xu Zhuofu, Gu Junzheng and others are all famous translators. There is a saying in critics that "children's literature with modern Chinese concepts was born out of the craze for translating foreign children's literature" (Wei Wei, An Overview of the History of World Children's Literature). Hans Christian Andersen's eastward transition marks the all-round development of Chinese children's literature from translation to creation to theory. Is there any Chinese child today who doesn't read Hans Christian Andersen?
Nordic contemporary literature also has many readers in China. When Thomas Tronström won the 2011 Nobel Prize in Literature, Chinese readers were delighted because translators had already disseminated Tronström's outstanding poetry. Nordic contemporary novels such as "A Man Named Ovie", "Bear Town" and "Fish Without Feet" have been best-selling in China and have received rave reviews. Swedish film master Ingmar Bergman is deeply loved by Chinese audiences, and his works "Wild Strawberry" and "Shouting and Whispering" are immortal classics of film history.
The Nordic concept of life drives the world trend. Finns' Nightmares: A Guide to Alternative Finnish Socialization is a fun little book: stop the wrong bus, embarrassed not to get on it; Don't want to run into neighbors; Don't want to be followed by a shopping guide when visiting the mall; After work, I saw my colleague walking in front and quietly changed the road... Perhaps, we are all a "Finn". As conveyed by the title and theme of author Zeng Yanbing's "Life, Simple and Radiant", those Nordic homes that are both pyrotechnic and full of artistic sense make us feel the simple aesthetic taste, as well as elegant, peaceful, self-sufficient, and heart-focused life propositions.
We now discuss Nordic culture, emphasizing its ability to absorb, integrate, and create shared cultural spaces around the world beyond its geographical significance. As a big country, China has an open mind to face heterogeneous cultures and their resources, and we can also use the courage and insight of "meeting the top and seeing the mountains and small mountains" to actively play the big chess game of world culture.
Source: Wen Wei Po