Places and realms in Norse Mythology

"Asgard Saga" is a series of books telling the stories of Norse Mythology. The first part has already been released and is available at Smashwords.com and Amazon (and more will follow soon.) In it, you will meet various characters, all derived from the tales, Vikings have told about Aseir, Yetten, Vanes and a whole bunch of strange creatures. You will meet Thor, Odin, Freya, Mimer, Loke and elves, humans and giants.


Norse Mythology is rather complicated in the way these entities interact with each other and as to whom is blood related.


This post is meant as background material, or a guide if you will, giving you a better understanding of Norse Mythology, its characters and its view of the world. You will be provided with explanations: where do we find these myths? how do the different creatures relate to each other? what is the context in which the stories originated?


As I move forward with the writing of the Saga, I will post more, so that you will be able to get a basic understanding of it all.


First, let´s have a look at how the world is percieved according to Norse Mythology:


Places and realms

Illustration of Niflheim shamelessly stolen from Niflheim.com

Niflheim: A realm far north, where the Ice Dragon Nidhug sleeps. "Nidhug" can be directly translated to "Eager to strike" or "Will bite" - Niflheim probably means "home of the cold," which is rather fitting, as this realm is cold and dark.

Muspelheim: Opposite of Niflheim in every respect, Muspelheim is guarded by a create by the name of Surt. "Surt" directly translated means "Sour" and is probably referring to the soil being of such a nature, that nothing can grow there. I have yet to figure out, what Muspelheim really means, so the only thing, I can reveal at this point is that the ending "heim" means home - as in home of. But I suppose you already figured that out.

Obviously Ginnungagab cannot be illustrated,
but this illustrates the creational myth

Ginnungagab: The space between Muspelheim and Niflheim. Ginnungagab can be translated to something like "the gap of nothing," which is exactly what it is: A whole lot of nothing. As the cold from Niflheim meets with the heat from Muspelheim in Ginnungagab, the first creatures of the world emerges.

Midgard: After creating humans, Odin and his brothers, Vile and Ve, built a fence to protect the humans from the Yetten and this area is called Midgard, which simply means "Place in the middle."


One of Loke´s children is the Midgard Serpent, which surround Midgard waiting for Ragnarok to begin. Then it´ll have an important role to play, before the world is doomed and re-created


Utgard: Everything outside Midgard is Utgard, which means "Place Outside."

Another shamelessly stolen illustration,
this one is from marvel,wikia.com

Asgard: The home of the Aseir. They built it right after building the fence around Midgard. Asgard is placed over Midgard and thus represents Norse Mythology´s equivalent to Greek Mythology´s Olympia.


Vanaheim: Home of the Vanes. Only the name of the place can be derived from the early texts of Norse Mythology


Jotunheim: Another word for Utgard - or perhaps a specific place in Utgard, where the Yetten live.

Bifrost: The bridge connecting Midgard to Asgard. It is guarded by Heimdal, whose ears are so sensitive that he can hear the sound of grass growing. He lives in his house at the top of Sky Mountain.


An interesting detail is that while Bifrost is often depicted as a rainbow, like this illustration here, scholars today believe this is a misconception of the modern world. Instead they believe Bifrost to be the mythical object trying to explain - not the rainbow - but to explain the Milky Way.

Was this guide helpful?

Anything you´d like to add?

Asgard Saga - Odin the Creator released!

The most amazing thing just happened. I finished the first part of Asgard Saga much earlier than I expected and it is already available at Smashwords.com:

It is priced at $2.99 
     - "Hey! Didn´t you promise it would be only $0.99?"


Yes, I did, and I will keep my promise, of course. That´s why I generated a coupon for it to be used at Smashwords.com only. Go to the book´s page at  https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/148001  and punch in this code before going to payment: DT64W


That´s it! You´re set to read! Enjoy!

Norse myth narrative

Writing the Asgard Saga is no less than a real treat to me. Not only do I love the stories, but working with them in a more modern narrative form is very rewarding. These stories have been handed down from generation to generation and were not written down before some time in the early 13th century after the chance from Heathen religion to Christianity. This brings a challenge differing from, say the Christian or Jewish texts.


The Jewish tradition is different from the Viking tradition, because the storytelling of the latter wasn´t a "to-the-letter" handing down. The base line was more important than telling the stories exactly in the same way, whereas the Jewish tradition demanded the handing down of myth and stories to be told word for word. This means that the stories from the Bible are very accurate. They are told in the original languages almost exactly as they were told 500, 1000 or even 5000 years ago.

The Norse myths aren´t this accurate and in time some of the stories have changed some of their meaning. For instance, there is some doubt as to weither Odin and Frey were married or not.

The most important thing, however, is that I want to make as good a balance as possible between telling the stories in such a way that the characters come alive, but still honors the original stories. This is a difficult task, mostly due to the narrative tradition of Norse Mythology, where the characters are flat, meaning that they lean towards action rather than the characters´ mindsets and characteristics behind the action.

This is their strength, but it also makes it difficult to describe who these characters really are. For instance, the stories do not reveal Odin as having a devious mind, but his actions are either devious or he is not aware of the results of his actions. Of course, the stories tell little by little that he IS devious, but you have to read quite a few of the myths to catch that.

That´s why I really enjoy writing my interpretation of these myths. It´s a challenge to bring the stories to life and give my readers a good reading experience without being unfaithful to the messages of the myths.

I am very much looking forward to getting feedback from all you people out there, just waiting for the first volume to come out and as a treat, I want to share with you the cover for the book. It´s not entirely finished yet and it may look somewhat different when I publish, but this is what I´ve got so far:

I hope, you´ve enjoyed reading my blog posts on the Norse Mythology and I can assure you, that I´m not even close to being finished with it yet. There will be more to come.

Do you like the cover?

Feel free to comment, even if you really, really hate the cover!

The wasted young - on traditional and Indie publishing

"The youth now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers."

Perhaps you´ve seen the above statement before. Supposedly it was said by Socrates in his defense speech when he was acused of corrupting society. If this is true or it´s a hoax made by either Platon or Xenophon is unknown, but the fact remains that it´s been written by the students of Socrates and thereby we can safely say that someone thought these thoughts in ancient Greece.

Recently I read a quote by a simple farmer that is even more to the point:

“Things today are not what they used to be - and they never have!”

“What does this have to do with Indie vs. Traditional publishing?” you may ask.

Well, it really is quite simple:

Every generation feels threatened by the culture and views of the next and this is apparently also the case for generations of publishers and authors.

Try watching the underneath clip from youtube. It´s in Norwegian, but someone has been kind enough to provide a translation in English. When you´ve watched it, please read on, because I have some important points to make:

Medieavel Help Desk

A friend and fellow author wrote on his blog:

“One of my university lecturers told a friend to tell me that if I self-publish it might ruin my chances of being traditionally published or entering competitions.” - you can read the entire post here.

Why would any publisher or host of a writing competition rule out selfpublishers? Do they not want good quality? Or could it be that they would rather have uniformity in views on how to properly publish?

Indie Authoring threaten to shift the power balance 

I think it has to do with defending your livelihood. If Indie Authoring becomes main stream, how would publishers make money and survive the publishing business?

Thus, it would seem to be better to try giving selfpublishers a bad name and start rumours about poor quality and bad editing. And yes, there a examples of both in the Indie World, but quite frankly: so is the case with traditional publishing.

Are there more poor quality in Indie books than in others?

Well, to be honest, I think there is, but for one thing, it´s going in the right direction as the readers simply won´t read bad quality and thereby bad writers and writers publishing bad edited books won´t sell their books. In time, bad quality will diminish to a level competing well with traditional published books. And we are almost there…

And this brings me to the point I want to  make:

Really, the publishing war is not a question of quality, but a question of “who makes money and for what services?”

But it doesn´t sound good if traditional publishing companies use this argument, does it?

“We think, Indie Publishing should stop, because it shifts the balance of power and we are beginning to make less money than before!”

Hmmm…. Not a solid case, is it?

It sounds much more reasonable to come up with all sorts of excuses and statements about quality and reading experience - just like you saw the munk in the video clip complaining about this new world of books, where things aren´t as they used to be.

Examples are vast 

I could continue for hundreds of pages with examples that Indie Authoring is a good idea that will not go away, but it would bore you, I think.

Instead, I´ll tell you something quite interesting:

About a decade ago, a single mum received no less than 25 rejections on her manuscript for a children´s book, before a small publisher decided to take her in as a new author.

That author was J.K.Rowlings and the book was “Harry Potter and the sorcerers stone.”

Imagine, if she decided to believe the publishers word that the book wasn´t any good?

Presenting Danish Humor

A couple of days ago someone asked me: "Is Danish humor any different from say, American humor?"
At the time I didn´t know exactly what to say, because let´s face it: to answer that question I need to know a lot about both of them.

Let´s think about it
However, it did make me think about humor and what it is that makes something funny. It´s quite the challenge to say, what makes people laugh. Culture plays a part, but so does language and accents. And maybe, the most interesting feature with humor is the very fact that it cannot be explained.


For example: Charlie Chaplin was immensely funny in his time and many people, including myself, still find his films funny. But to be honest, I don´t think he would be having much success, if he presented his films to the audience of today.


So, what was funny is not funny anymore.

What, if any, Is the difference?
But let´s get back to the original question: is Danish humor different than American humor?


Yes, I think it is. One thing I have observed is that humor seems to be influenced by temperature and light.
"What?" you may say, but I really mean it.


The lower the temperature, the more slow and layed back the humor. If you´re an American, just think of British humor in general: is it funnier than American humor? Or what about Canadian humor? Do you laugh at Candian jokes (not meaning jokes ABOUT Canadians)?


When I, as a Scandinavian, think about funny movies or books in Europe, neither Spain, Italy nor Greece comes to mind, because the humor in these countries seem to be too much up in your face, meaning that the jokes are served to you on a silver platter. You don´t have to think much to get the funny in the joke. I´ll give you an example after I present the influence of light:


The darker a place is, the darker the humor. It seems to me that series such as "The Golden Girls," if you remember them, is mostly light and giggly, even in the gravest of circumstances. In Denmark, the sitcom hasn´t ever worked and I tell you, it´s been tried a few times.


So, what IS the difference?

A few examples:
Well, let me give you a few examples of Danish humor and then you can decide if I am right about the two points above:


- from a viking legend:
"He had been sleeping with his sword right beside him all night, because he knew the other family would very likely avenge his killing. He was right. He woke up at the sound of noise outside, took his sword and opened the door. As it turned out, this was a bad idea. The father of the one he killed in a fair fight threw a spear from 200 yards out and it pierced right through his heart. Knowing this was the perfect death for a true viking he pulled together all of his strength and said to his friends and family: 'Nice shot!" - Then he died."


- from a justice book describing a trial against a man who had killed another man´s property (meaning a slave):
"Asked about the reason why he chopped off the slave´s head in the field, the accused answered: 'Well, he was stooped down in the perfect position for a clean and quick cut and my sword needed initiation'"


- from "In China they eat dogs" - a Danish Crime Comedy Film:
"a: 'I killed her'
b: 'Why?'
a: 'She took my TV'
b: 'Well, that not so good. We need to clean up'
a: nods his head
b: 'where did you leave her body?'
a: 'In the living room'
b: 'okay'
a: 'and the kitchen'"


- and finally from my own Flash Fiction "The Sissy Eunuch":
"Kate and I did our part populating the world and we love all of our five children. I suppose two or three would´ve been enough and every time we had another one we did make the decision to not have more.

But somehow, when we get in that mood, it´s like our brains are disconnected. I´ve tried to hold on to our decision: “No, honey” I´ve said numerous times, “we already are a family and we aren´t going to have any more children.”

It doesn´t help much when her uterus is screaming for more work. So I give in. And for some strange reason we always conceive at first attempt. Usually we never win the lottery, but when it comes to pregnancy we always win first price. Well, except for Milly maybe. I suppose she is more like a consolation prize."

Your turn!

What do YOU think: is there a cultural difference between Danish/Scandinavian and American humor?