Would you explain your concept of Aspect? Aside from its use as it a plot device, how do you think this idea relates to modes of religious belief, both ancient and contemporary? Heathenry that asks whether the gods are physical beings or disembodied Powers, whether they are actual or metaphorical.

Elsewhere in Runelight, Sleipnir appears as “a regular horse – a strawberry roan with a long black mane.” Throughout the books, you make a distinction between the physical appearance of the gods (and associated characters) and their true Aspects – how they manifest in more purely spiritual forms. This seems a spot-on description of the Valkyrie welcoming Sleipnir on the Tjängvide stone, down to the red color. Sepulchre’s Fire, obliterating half the sky. The body’s proportions were almost right but the legs – all eight of them, no less – were grotesquely long and thin, like the legs on a midsummer crane fly, digging so far into the ground that they might have been the roots of trees and reaching so far above her that Maddy had to tilt her head back to see the creature standing over her, its colours like St.

It looked like some madman’s dream of a horse. He’s the carving on Red Horse Hill come to life, and you explain his eight legs by saying that he “has a foot in each World except in Pan-daemonium.” You describe him like this: KS – Your characterization of Sleipnir is fascinating. Rather, what I’m trying to do is ask questions about the changing nature of belief, the way our perception of the Divine changes to suit our changing society, and to ask the question why we need those gods in the first place. JH – Of course, and my fiction in no way pretends to cast any light on their nature. How would you describe the nature of the Norse gods – especially as opposed to gods of monotheistic traditions? Has your conception of their nature changed over the many years you’ve thought about this material? Odin describes Order and Chaos as “the twin forces that even gods cannot hope to understand,” and he spills “the last few drops onto the earth as an offering to any old gods that might be around.” Your Loki, when in a real bind, prays to any gods that may be listening. KS – Like the Norse gods portrayed in the Eddas, the gods in your version areįlawed and fallible they are definitely not omniscient or omnipotent. Click here for the previous installment of the interview.

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