The Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot (good beach reads .TXT) 📕
Description
The Kalevala is a Finnish epic poem, which tells of the creation of the world and how the heroes that inhabit it came to be, and the legends of their conflicts and adventures. Spread out over fifty cantos, we hear how existence was created from the egg of a duck, how the forests were created from the chips of a world-tree felled by an ancient wizard, how the mighty Sampo—a multicolored mill of plenty—was created and later stolen, how the nine dread diseases came to be, and many more such stories.
The tales contained here are formed from Finland’s oral history. The author, Elias Lönnrot, was a Finnish doctor who was fascinated with his country’s stories, so between the 1820s and 1850s he embarked on a series of expeditions to the countryside of Finland and the surrounding area to collect and transcribe the folk stories told by local people. These tales were gradually collected into several volumes, the final of which is this “new” Kalevala. Lönnrot collected many different variants of each story, then edited each down into a cohesive whole when composing the new verse. The distinctive Kalevala-meter that was a common feature of all the original oral stories was kept during the process, and Crawford used the same with this English translation.
Lönnrot’s work proved extremely influential in Finland, and the national pride it imbued has been cited as a factor in the later Finnish independence movement. The Kalevala was also a source of inspiration for later authors of the twentieth century. Tolkien reused some of the themes and characters for the basis of his fictional universe (in particular The Silmarillion), the Kalevala-meter was used in Longfellow’s The Song of Hiawatha, and even Donald Duck has quested—as the Kalevala heroes did—for the legendary Sampo.
This edition was translated by John Martin Crawford in the late nineteenth century, and includes his introduction discussing some of the themes, characters, and settings.
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- Author: Elias Lönnrot
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Then arose the notes of discord;
When the aged played upon it,
Dissonance their only music.
Spake the wizard, Lemminkainen:
“O ye witless, worthless children,
O ye senseless, useless maidens,
O ye wisdom-lacking heroes,
Cannot play this harp of magic,
Cannot touch the notes of concord!
Give to me this thing of beauty,
Hither bring the harp of fish-bones,
Let me try my skillful fingers.”
Lemminkainen touched the harp-strings,
Carefully the strings adjusted,
Turned the harp in all directions,
Fingered all the strings in sequence,
Played the instrument of wonder,
But it did not speak in concord,
Did not sing the notes of joyance.
Spake the ancient Wainamoinen:
“There is none among these maidens,
None among these youthful heroes,
None among the old magicians
That can play the harp of magic,
Touch the notes of joy and pleasure.
Let us take the harp to Pohya,
There to find a skillful player
That can touch the strings in concord.”
Then they sailed to Sariola,
To Pohyola took the wonder,
There to find the harp a master.
All the heroes of Pohyola,
All the boys and all the maidens,
Ancient dames, and bearded minstrels,
Vainly touched the harp of beauty.
Louhi, hostess of the Northland,
Took the harp-strings in her fingers;
All the youth of Sariola,
Youth of every tribe and station,
Vainly touched the harp of fish-bone;
Could not find the notes of joyance,
Dissonance their only pleasure;
Shrieked the harp-strings like the whirlwinds,
All the tones wore harsh and frightful.
In a corner slept a blind man,
Lay a gray-beard on the oven,
Rousing from his couch of slumber,
Murmured thus within his corner:
“Cease at once this wretched playing,
Make an end of all this discord;
It benumbs mine ears for hearing,
Racks my brain, despoils my senses,
Robs me of the sweets of sleeping.
If the harp of Suomi’s people
True delight cannot engender,
Cannot bring the notes of pleasure,
Cannot sing to sleep the aged,
Cast the thing upon the waters,
Sink it in the deeps of ocean,
Take it back to Kalevala,
To the home of him that made it,
To the hands of its creator.”
Thereupon the harp made answer,
To the blind man sang these measures:
“Shall not fall upon the waters,
Shall not sink within the ocean;
I will play for my creator,
Sing in melody and concord
In the fingers of my master.”
Carefully the harp was carried
To the artist that had made it,
To the hands of its creator,
To the feet of Wainamoinen.
Wainamoinen, ancient minstrel,
The eternal wisdom-singer,
Laves his hands to snowy whiteness,
Sits upon the rock of joyance,
On the stone of song he settles,
On the mount of silver clearness,
On the summit, golden colored;
Takes the harp by him created,
In his hands the harp of fish-bone,
With his knee the arch supporting,
Takes the harp-strings in his fingers,
Speaks these words to those assembled:
“Hither come, ye Northland people,
Come and listen to my playing,
To the harp’s entrancing measures,
To my songs of joy and gladness.”
Then the singer of Wainola
Took the harp of his creation,
Quick adjusting, sweetly tuning,
Deftly plied his skillful fingers
To the strings that he had fashioned.
Now was gladness rolled on gladness,
And the harmony of pleasure
Echoed from the hills and mountains:
Added singing to his playing,
Out of joy did joy come welling,
Now resounded marvelous music,
All of Northland stopped and listened.
Every creature in the forest,
All the beasts that haunt the woodlands,
On their nimble feet came bounding,
Came to listen to his playing,
Came to hear his songs of joyance.
Leaped the squirrels from the branches,
Merrily from birch to aspen;
Climbed the ermines on the fences,
O’er the plains the elk-deer bounded,
And the lynxes purred with pleasure;
Wolves awoke in far-off swamp-lands,
Bounded o’er the marsh and heather,
And the bear his den deserted,
Left his lair within the pine-wood,
Settled by a fence to listen,
Leaned against the listening gate-posts,
But the gate-posts yield beneath him;
Now he climbs the fir-tree branches
That he may enjoy and wonder,
Climbs and listens to the music
Of the harp of Wainamoinen.
Tapiola’s wisest senior,
Metsola’s most noble landlord,
And of Tapio, the people,
Young and aged, men and maidens,
Flew like red-deer up the mountains
There to listen to the playing,
To the harp of Wainamoinen.
Tapiola’s wisest mistress,
Hostess of the glen and forest,
Robed herself in blue and scarlet,
Bound her limbs with silken ribbons,
Sat upon the woodland summit,
On the branches of a birch-tree,
There to listen to the playing,
To the high-born hero’s harping,
To the songs of Wainamoinen.
All the birds that fly in mid-air
Fell like snow-flakes from the heavens,
Flew to hear the minstrel’s playing,
Hear the harp of Wainamoinen.
Eagles in their lofty eyrie
Heard the songs of the enchanter;
Swift they left their unfledged young ones,
Flew and perched around the minstrel.
From the heights the hawks descended,
From the clouds down swooped the falcon,
Ducks arose from inland waters,
Swans came gliding from the marshes;
Tiny finches, green and golden,
Flew in flocks that darkened sunlight,
Came in myriads to listen,
Perched upon the head and shoulders
Of the charming Wainamoinen,
Sweetly singing to the playing
Of the ancient bard and minstrel.
And the daughters of the welkin,
Nature’s well-beloved daughters,
Listened all in rapt attention;
Some were seated on the rainbow,
Some upon the crimson cloudlets,
Some upon the dome of heaven.
In their hands the Moon’s fair daughters
Held their weaving-combs of silver;
In their hands the Sun’s sweet maidens
Grasped the handles of their distaffs,
Weaving with their golden shuttles,
Spinning from their silver spindles,
On the red rims of the cloudlets,
On the bow of many colors.
As they hear the minstrel playing,
Hear the harp of Wainamoinen,
Quick they drop their combs of silver,
Drop the spindles from their fingers,
And the golden threads are broken,
Broken are the threads of silver.
All the fish in Suomi-waters
Heard the songs of the magician,
Came on flying fins to listen
To the harp of Wainamoinen.
Came the trout with graceful motions,
Water-dogs with awkward movements,
From the water-cliffs the salmon,
From the sea-caves came the whiting,
From the deeper caves the bill-fish;
Came the pike from beds of sea-fern,
Little fish with eyes of scarlet,
Leaning on the reeds and rushes,
With their heads above the surface;
Came to bear the harp of joyance,
Hear the songs of the enchanter.
Ahto, king of all the waters,
Ancient king with beard of sea-grass,
Raised his head above the billows,
In a boat of water-lilies,
Glided to the coast in silence,
Listened to the wondrous singing,
To the harp of Wainamoinen.
These the words the sea-king uttered:
“Never have I heard such playing,
Never heard such strains of music,
Never since the sea was fashioned,
As the songs of this enchanter,
This sweet singer, Wainamoinen.”
Satko’s daughters from the blue-deep,
Sisters of the wave-washed ledges,
On the colored strands were sitting,
Smoothing out their sea-green tresses
With the combs
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