It remains true, all the same, that
even robbed of their peculiar and excellent form, and their own tongue whose
shape and peculiarities are intimately connected with the atmosphere and ideas
of the poems themselves, they have a power; moving many even in school or
pre-school days in filtered forms of translation and childish adaptation to a
desire for more acquaintance.
In other words, you don’t have to be able to read Old Norse
in its native tongue to enjoy the myths and legends of Odin and Loki and Thor, of
the war of the Giants and Aesir and Vanir, and of Ragnarok and the ending of
the world. The characters and stories have a power all their own, regardless of
the language in which they’re told or the particular form they take, be it alliterative
verse or child-accessible plain narration. Which is why I derive such great
pleasure in owning and reading Padraic Colum’s The Children of Odin.
Published in November 1920, The Children of Odin would have been available to Tolkien
(1892-1973) and perhaps he too read and enjoyed Colum’s work. One wonders what
he would have made of the volume. It certainly meets his criteria of being
possessed of a heady northern power, even while remaining accessible to younger
readers.
