[Main Blog Post] Eirik Westcoat and the American Futharch

[jprussell]

Eirik Westcoat is the modern poet from whom I have learned to craft verse in Germanish meters, and he has constructed a new set of Runestaves fitted to the sounds of modern English. Along the way to explaining why he did that, though, he just happened to drop a remarkable insight into one of the mysteries of Runic scholarship.

Comments

[k_a_nitz]

Fascinating, though I have to say his American English sounds seem quite different from modern NZ English if some of the alliteration is anything to go by! It also makes me wonder why the Germans never came up with a new rune poem for the Armanen runes - I suspect the connection was missed primarily because the Elder Futhark was missing a surviving rune poem (which presumably would have made the connection more obvious).

[causticus]

Eirik's American English Runes seem quite fascinating, to say the least. I really enjoyed the alliterations he used in his runepoems.

I do wonder if these are any good for divination though, given that he's changed the meaning of some of them.

[borealbear]

(Just so you know, I'm the same person who talked about the Heathen Golden Dawn over on MM a couple weeks back)

Thanks for this. Very interesting indeed, and I don't think I've seen that explanation suggested anywhere either. You're right that it makes a lot of sense, especially for such a poetry-obsessed culture, haha.

As for the American Futhark, I really like it, but I'll admit it also leaves me a tad envious as a European Heathen. I'd love to have something like this for Scandinavian languages. Westcoat's praise for the runes as phonetically one to one is pretty absurd when it comes to the Younger Futhark. The HGD also suggests writing modern Norwegian using the YF, which doesn't make much sense to me as a native speaker. That thing is missing half the sounds of Old Norse, nevermind the modern language (plus it's not anywhere near as aesthetically pleasing as the Older and OE Futharks IMO, but that's another story). An adapted version like this would be neat.

Still, I really like seeing projects like this, even if I can't benefit from it personally. There does seem to be a living spark to modern Heathenry, with people building new and intriguing things on the traditional framework, a la Westcoat, Kvilhaug, Hodge-Rose, Hill with the HGD et al (and of course yourself and Krasskova with the Heathen Rosary). That's much more interesting and worthwhile IMO than strict academic reconstructionism, which will always be chasing a mirage anyway.

Like I've said on JMG's blogs before, it sometimes feels like the creative core of Heathenry has moved more to the New World these days. And in many ways the tradition seems to fit American culture better than our Scandinavian ones these days. Of course, the US also just has many more people to innovate and experiment with new religions to begin with, and Kvilhaug is a counter-example. But again, as a Scandinavian it makes me glad to see it, but also a little wistful that the Americans are doing all the fun stuff with Heathenry these days...

The organized Heathen scene here is tiny, and I haven't had any contact with it personally, but maybe I'll see about that as I proceed with the HGD.