"DEEP THE RAVEN WADES IN GORE:" DEATH SONGS AND THE NORSE-GOTHIC SPECTACLE.
The Norse skaldic poem The Death Song of Ragnar Lodbrok, a celebration of the military exploits and death of the legendary warrior-king Ragnar Lodbrok, was a popular text for translation in the eighteenth century. In the early part of the period, the barbaric ancient North was set in opposition to t...
| Published in: | Litteraria Pragensia: Studies in Literature & Culture Vol. 35; no. 69; pp. 30 - 44 |
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| Format: | Article |
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Charles University Prague, Faculty of Arts
2025
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=187659224&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 187659224 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 08628424 IHH jtl: Litteraria Pragensia: Studies in Literature & Culture issn: 08628424 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: 2025 vid: 35 iid: 69 pid: 88155 pub: Charles University Prague, Faculty of Arts artinfo: ui: 187659224 10.14712/2571452X.2025.69.3 ppf: 30 ppct: 14 formats: fmt: @attributes: type: P size: 4.2MB tig: atl: "DEEP THE RAVEN WADES IN GORE:" DEATH SONGS AND THE NORSE-GOTHIC SPECTACLE. aug: au: Sharon Choe su: Violence Gothic fiction (Literary genre) Courage Cultural identity Literature translations Norse mythology England sug: subj: England Violence Gothic fiction (Literary genre) Courage Cultural identity Literature translations Norse mythology keyword: Gothic Norse reception Northern antiquarianism Ragnar Lodbrok Romanticism translation ab: The Norse skaldic poem The Death Song of Ragnar Lodbrok, a celebration of the military exploits and death of the legendary warrior-king Ragnar Lodbrok, was a popular text for translation in the eighteenth century. In the early part of the period, the barbaric ancient North was set in opposition to the refined Classical world, but by the late eighteenth century the Nordic landscape was recast as a place of Gothic liberty, and the Norseman as a familiar Other. Translations of The Death Song increasingly presented Ragnar's violent exploits and fearless death in a snake pit as a spectacle of heroism, especially when the Norse-Gothic became integrated into England's search for an ethnic literary past to counter the rising Celticism post-Ossian. However, despite revising the Nordic martial spirit into a symbol of resistance against tyranny, English translations of Norse narratives continued to present shocking visuals for the British public, where tales of terror and extraordinary courage were packaged in gory visions of Viking warmongering. This article compares three influential translations of The Death Song: by Thomas Percy (1763), Hugh Downman (1781), and James Johnstone (1782). The article examines how their presentation of gory spectacle reworks Viking death-defiance into a British, specifically English, trait, thus transforming Ragnar's exploits into a prototype of resistance and "necropower." Death is reimagined within modes of political sovereignty via the shocking aesthetics of Norse-Gothic terror. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Copyright of Litteraria Pragensia: Studies in Literature & Culture is the property of Charles University Prague, Faculty of Arts and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. item: Litteraria Pragensia: Studies in Literature & Culture holder: Charles University Prague, Faculty of Arts dt: @attributes: year: 2025 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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