For my next trick: Forgotten Variants

When Asbjørnsen & Moe went into the field, they recorded the folklore as well as they could, as their respective raconteurs told them their legends and tales. Not having voice recorders, the collectors relied on their ability to make notes of what they heard, for later recomposition into more or less polished narratives suitable for publication. As they collected, they repeatedly heard stories that resembled one another, and although they recorded them all, they chose to compose and publish only the strands of tradition that best suited their sensibilities. The other variants were relegated in note form to their records, to which they refer from time to time.

Outlines of some of these variants found their way into the notes appended to the second edition of the first collection of folktales (1852). Some were recovered later by other editors, and published – either in reconstituted form or as sketches – in the twelve-volume Norsk eventyrbibliotek (Norwegian Folktale Library, published between 1967 and 1981) or other, more minor editions.

Working on The Complete Norwegian Folktales and Legends of Asbjørnsen & Moe, I have come to appreciate how entertaining some of these alternative variants would have been, had they been written out in full and published. And then I thought: Why shouldn’t I have a go at doing just that?

My first foray into writing – reconstituting – folktales was “Sir Varivan,” a white bear/ East of the Sun type folktale I published in my Five Norwegian White Bear Tales in 2019. It was fun to do; and having immersed myself in the language of the folktale – the eventyrstil – for so long, I found the idiom came quite easily. So I have continued to work on them, from time to time. There will soon be enough to fill a volume of stories, which I will publish in due course.

So what is different about these tales? Well, how about a variant of the billy-goats and the troll under the bridge in which the confrontation takes place as the goats return home in the late summer, having already eaten their fill? It makes much more sense that way. How about a tale of “Faithful and Unfaithful,” where the talking animals accuse a squirrel who lives in the tree of telling their secrets? This one brings to mind the squirrel Ratatoskr, which lives in Yggdrasil. A variant of “Grim Buckskin” called “ Bucephalus”? A mashup of “The Three Princesses in Hvittenland,” “The Swan Maidens,” and “The Seventh Father of the House”? Or how about a confusing tale with the remarkable title, “The Princess Who Should Commit Fornication and Murder” in which the moral character of the stepmother is ambiguous? Exciting stuff, indeed!

As ever, watch this space. The book is forthcoming.