In the introduction to her book, The Ring of the DarkElves, Victoria Randall states that composer Richard Wagner combined the ancient Viking Volsunga Saga with the Germanic Nibelungenlied legend to create his epic “Ring Cycle” operas. Randall has taken the same characters who have been singing Wagner’s arias on international stages since 1876 and placed them in a literary work. She is not the first modern writer to do this, but I can’t imagine anyone else creating a more accessible and beautiful version of these ancient narratives.
While reading The Ring of the Dark Elves, I was fascinated
to discover just how much Tolkien had dipped into the same (as he put it)
“Caldron of Story” that inspired Wagner. And while the Oxford don created his
own mythology from what he discovered in that cauldron, I must admit that I
have never been able to get through “The Silmarillion” though I’ve tried more
than once. Though Tolkien’s story was his own, I’ve always felt that his prose
was influenced by something very ancient; after all, he personally translated
the Volsunga Saga into English and, while participating in two pre-Inkling
literary circles, read it aloud in its original Old Norse.
Though Randall’s plot sticks closely to Wagner’s, and though
there is certainly something a bit lofty about her prose, in my opinion it is more
beautifully written than Tolkien’s. Consider the following excerpt from the
first chapter describing Urda, guardian of the well of wisdom, as Odin leaves
after his costly drink:
“She stood and watched until the shadows of night swallowed
him. Tears blinded her own eyes, and she let them fall. So proud, she thought,
so mighty, and so weak. She turned at last and went to sit beside the well in
the darkness, as the stars began to shine in the cold remote sky.”
Or this one, describing Asgard:
“Scattered within the walls were other halls: Breidablik,
where Nanna lived in lonely splendor now that Baldr was gone; Bilskirnir, where
Thor lived with his beautiful Sif; and Vingolf, with its high seats for Odin’s
wife Frigga and the other women of the Aesir. There he could just catch the
movement of the leaves in Freya’s garden, where grew the tree with golden
apples, the secret of the Aesirs’ youth and strength. Beside it stood Valhalla,
many-doored, where the heroes lived who had been brought from many battles; his
heart swelled at sight of it. Far beyond the cliffs, shrouded in cloud now on
this blustery day, gleamed Bifrost the rainbow bridge, its smooth shape
shifting and shining with color as it arched down to the lands of men.”
Speaking of mythological characters, Randall includes an
exhaustive list of them at the beginning of the book, which is helpful, but each
is so uniquely drawn in the text and introduced with such tension that the
reader can easily keep them straight. It’s rare that a writer excels equally
well at characterization, dialogue, and description, but Randall, a phenomenal
storyteller, accomplishes this with seeming effortlessness.
Readers who enjoy stories deeply rooted in ancient myth told
in in breathtakingly beautiful prose will not be able to stop turning the pages
of The Ring of the Dark Elves.
