I’ve started reading Ragnarok by A.S. Byatt. Ragnarok is the final war of the gods, or the end of the world. I use it as the title for the final part of my own novel, The End Of All Worlds.
It’s a beautifully written book so far which seems room draw, at its heart, much of the same imagery army own book. This makes me happy. The imagery is comfortingly familiar. The myths are resold in different says but that is the point when handling retellings – to come up with a new way of saying it.
The publication of A.S. Byatt’s book, and also Joanne Harris’ Runemarks books and their basis in norse mythology is one of the reasons why I decided that the time was now to publish my own norse-inspired story.
One of the challenges that I faced, and one that I still need to write about, is how I was to ensure that my Indie-published book is properly edited. I was therefore interested to read the author’s note to the book, and wonder whether I should have opted for something similar to explain any residual inconsistencies in my names and spellings…
A Note on Names
This story has been made from many stories in many languages – Icelandic, German and others. The names of the persons in the myth vary from telling to telling. Iduna is the same person as Idun. There are many ways of spelling Jørmungandr or Jörmungander. I feel happier using various spellings, rather than trying to achieve artificial consistency. Myths change in the mind depending on the telling – there is no overall correct version.
Perhaps not!
