StillStunned
Writing...
- Joined
- Jun 4, 2023
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Yes, it's time for another of my navel-gazing, self-congratulatory discourses on one of my stories. Note that @joy_of_cooking has also written one. (I promise I'll take proper look tonight!)
Like with my previous "What I wrote and why", any feedback is welcome, as long as it respects the story for what it is. Yes it's short, yes it's dark, yes it's completely wrong for the characters to be speaking modern English. This is about what I was attempting, and whether I succeeded.
The story I'm analysing this time is Life and Death of the She-Wolf. It's 3.1k words and currently stands at 737 views, with a rating of 4.15/20, one heart and two comments. Not quite a NYT bestseller. Perhaps that's because of the tagline: "It’s so cold beneath her hill that warmth is just a memory." I suppose it doesn't really invite people in.
The story is told from the perspective of the ghost of a Viking warrior woman, trapped in the mound that's her hill and reflecting on her life. There's one brief sex scene, but it's not a happy story. Yes, she dies in the end.
My inspiration came from two sources. The first was a hauntingly beautiful song by Scottish band Deacon Blue: Is It Cold Beneath The Hill? The opening line of the story is in fact this:
More importantly, though, there was the description of magic as being the realm of women, and any male "practitioner" effectively becoming a woman as a result. (Bearing in mind that Odin is also the god of magic, this didn't appear to be anything particularly shameful.) With these male witches already bridging the gap between man and woman, it seemed logical for female warriors to do the same. So I have the She-Wolf (who remains unnamed in my story) bonding with Eimar the wizard.
I asked myself how it would feel for them, caught between two worlds, part of both but belonging to neither. For this, I drew on my own experience of growing up a foreigner, always being different, never quite belonging. It meant that I always had an outside perspective, and I decided that this would probably be true of Eimar and our heroine.
Alright, so much for the substance. Let's have a look at the form.
Writing about a Viking woman, it was almost natural to slip into alliteration. As we all know, of course, alliterative verse was the preferred form for songs and poetry in Germanic cultures. One of the most famous examples is Beowulf. The form is quite simple: each line has four stressed syllables (and as many unstressed syllables as you need or can cram in). The third stressed syllable determines the alliteration: at least one of the other three has to alliterate with it. Look up the songs of the Riders of Rohan in The Lord of the Rings for some examples.
So while I didn't try to turn any of the prose into verse, there's plenty of alliteration:
That's not to say that alliteration is the only tool I used. The Rule of Three is everywhere too: "stone, sand and soil" from one of the examples above, for example. Repetition and parallels seemed appropriate, in reference to the oral tradition of alliterative verse:
For my imagery, I tried to put myself in the mind of a Viking. So we get this description of Fulk, our heroine's lover:
When I began writing I didn't have a clear idea of where I was going. Vaguely, I thought perhaps this might serve as an introduction to a story where a later warrior woman seeks out the grave for the She-Wolf's wisdom. But I realised that I couldn't bring her back for something trivial: it would need to be an epic, and probably a very dark one at that, and it just didn't feel right.
Instead, I decided that her death was the logical destination. But it had to be tragic, and of her own making. By this time I'd already sent her off into exile, leaving a trail of dead bodies behind her. A kinsman comes seeking revenge, and even though she defeats him one of her earlier victims seems to come back from the dead to distract her long enough to receive a mortal wound of her own. Iron-willed to the end, she outlasts her opponent before dying.
The end ties back in with elements from the beginning: the coldness beneath the hill, tracing decorative patterns with her fingers. Again, I'm not sure whether I did this deliberately. I don't think so, I think I was too focused on getting the ending right:
Let me know what you think. It's short - but did I cut corners, would the story have more impact if certain parts were longer? It's dark - but do the lighter parts blend in well, are any of the transitions too jarring? It's anachronistic - but enough to break the suspension of disbelief?
Do the images work, does the style fit the tale? And of course: did you enjoy it?
Thanks for reading!
Like with my previous "What I wrote and why", any feedback is welcome, as long as it respects the story for what it is. Yes it's short, yes it's dark, yes it's completely wrong for the characters to be speaking modern English. This is about what I was attempting, and whether I succeeded.
The story I'm analysing this time is Life and Death of the She-Wolf. It's 3.1k words and currently stands at 737 views, with a rating of 4.15/20, one heart and two comments. Not quite a NYT bestseller. Perhaps that's because of the tagline: "It’s so cold beneath her hill that warmth is just a memory." I suppose it doesn't really invite people in.
The story is told from the perspective of the ghost of a Viking warrior woman, trapped in the mound that's her hill and reflecting on her life. There's one brief sex scene, but it's not a happy story. Yes, she dies in the end.
My inspiration came from two sources. The first was a hauntingly beautiful song by Scottish band Deacon Blue: Is It Cold Beneath The Hill? The opening line of the story is in fact this:
The second source is an audiobook: "Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings", by Neil Price. This book gave me many of the details: the Vikings' tendency to decorate their clothes and furniture, the phenomenon of "battle-brothers", their habit of bathing once a week (and being derided as effeminate for it by the Anglo-Saxons).
More importantly, though, there was the description of magic as being the realm of women, and any male "practitioner" effectively becoming a woman as a result. (Bearing in mind that Odin is also the god of magic, this didn't appear to be anything particularly shameful.) With these male witches already bridging the gap between man and woman, it seemed logical for female warriors to do the same. So I have the She-Wolf (who remains unnamed in my story) bonding with Eimar the wizard.
I asked myself how it would feel for them, caught between two worlds, part of both but belonging to neither. For this, I drew on my own experience of growing up a foreigner, always being different, never quite belonging. It meant that I always had an outside perspective, and I decided that this would probably be true of Eimar and our heroine.
So she fights harder to prove herself, even when she has nothing left to prove. And she doesn't hesitate to go her own way because she never quite fit in anyway.
Alright, so much for the substance. Let's have a look at the form.
Writing about a Viking woman, it was almost natural to slip into alliteration. As we all know, of course, alliterative verse was the preferred form for songs and poetry in Germanic cultures. One of the most famous examples is Beowulf. The form is quite simple: each line has four stressed syllables (and as many unstressed syllables as you need or can cram in). The third stressed syllable determines the alliteration: at least one of the other three has to alliterate with it. Look up the songs of the Riders of Rohan in The Lord of the Rings for some examples.
So while I didn't try to turn any of the prose into verse, there's plenty of alliteration:
And so on. Quite honestly, I don't remember how much of this was deliberate and how much "just sounded right". Rereading the story now, though, it strikes me that the alliterations mostly happen at bits where I can imagine a Viking standing up at a feast and proclaiming his (or her) deeds, with the other warriors shouting their approval.
That's not to say that alliteration is the only tool I used. The Rule of Three is everywhere too: "stone, sand and soil" from one of the examples above, for example. Repetition and parallels seemed appropriate, in reference to the oral tradition of alliterative verse:
For my imagery, I tried to put myself in the mind of a Viking. So we get this description of Fulk, our heroine's lover:
And this of Fulk's homeland:
The eternal problem of finding a sexy way to refer to the clitoris became this:
I'm not sure whether that one worked though.
When I began writing I didn't have a clear idea of where I was going. Vaguely, I thought perhaps this might serve as an introduction to a story where a later warrior woman seeks out the grave for the She-Wolf's wisdom. But I realised that I couldn't bring her back for something trivial: it would need to be an epic, and probably a very dark one at that, and it just didn't feel right.
Instead, I decided that her death was the logical destination. But it had to be tragic, and of her own making. By this time I'd already sent her off into exile, leaving a trail of dead bodies behind her. A kinsman comes seeking revenge, and even though she defeats him one of her earlier victims seems to come back from the dead to distract her long enough to receive a mortal wound of her own. Iron-willed to the end, she outlasts her opponent before dying.
The end ties back in with elements from the beginning: the coldness beneath the hill, tracing decorative patterns with her fingers. Again, I'm not sure whether I did this deliberately. I don't think so, I think I was too focused on getting the ending right:
Let me know what you think. It's short - but did I cut corners, would the story have more impact if certain parts were longer? It's dark - but do the lighter parts blend in well, are any of the transitions too jarring? It's anachronistic - but enough to break the suspension of disbelief?
Do the images work, does the style fit the tale? And of course: did you enjoy it?
Thanks for reading!
