by Daniel Viorica<\/p>\n
The sun turns black,\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0the earth sinks below the sea,
\nno bright star now\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0shines from the heavens;
\nflames leap\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0the length of the World Tree,
\nfire strikes\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0against the very sky.<\/p>\n\u2014 The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> (trans. Terry)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Most English speakers today are familiar with the concept of Ragnar\u00f6k. It’s the Norse apocalypse. The world goes up in flame, even the gods fight and meet their doom. It’s appeared in any number of pop-cultural products, from the Thor<\/em> films to World of Warcraft<\/em>. But even those relatively familiar with the concept of Ragnar\u00f6k are less familiar with its origins in the written record\u2014the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>, an Old Norse poem, dated at or soon after the Viking Age.<\/p>\n
What is this poem? How can we make sense of it? And why should we care? The V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> is notoriously obscure. Our aim in this exhibition will be to introduce the poem for a non-specialist audience. We will place it in the cultural context of the Viking Age and make sense of some of its more difficult elements, using as guides the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>‘s more notable entrances to 20th- and 21st-century English-speaking culture.<\/p>\n
This exhibition is broken into five sections. In the first, we’ll introduce the current state of V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> scholarship and make a first foray into material analysis by inquiring as to the identity of the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>‘s titular speaker. In the second, we’ll use Thor: Ragnarok<\/em> as a touchstone for investigating how the vikings1<\/a><\/sup> may have conceptualized their deities. In the third, Seamus Heaney’s \u201cNorth\u201d will help us envision the settlement of Iceland, and in the fourth the works of J.R.R. Tolkien will give us a window into the \u2018other beliefs\u2019 of the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>, including incurrent Christianity and other strange beings of the earth. Finally, we’ll move away from contextual information and return to the poem as a poem, focusing the construction of its verse. We’ll even make a V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em>\u2014or part of one\u2014for our own.<\/p>\n
In the end, we hope to elucidate not only the entanglements present within the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/em> itself, but also the ways in which the poem is entangled with the world we live in today.<\/p>\n
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- What makes the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1 difficult?<\/strong><\/a>
\nSidebar 1: the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1 and Iceland<\/a><\/li>\n- Building a Cast of Characters<\/a><\/strong>
\nSidebar 2: The Appropriation of Ragnar\u00f6k<\/a><\/li>\n- Conflict and Unity: A V\u00f6lusp\u00e1 of the Icelandic Settlement<\/a><\/strong>
\nSidebar 3: Using Science to Place the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/a><\/li>\n- Other Beliefs in the V\u00f6lusp\u00e1: Christianity & Strange Beings of the Land<\/strong><\/a>
\nSidebar 4: Snorri Sturluson<\/a><\/li>\n- Coda: Making a V\u00f6lusp\u00e1<\/strong><\/a>
\nResources<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/p>\n
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