I used to think of Norway as the land of Nordic blue eyed, blonde, outdoors-y, heathy youngsters with bright white teeth. Now when I think of Norway, I think of trolls. Trolls, trolls, trolls, and more trolls. They're everywhere and the Folk Tales are filled with horrible stories of youngsters being terrorized and eaten by trolls. Norway has to keep it quiet or else their tourist market would suffer.
The scariest story is about a kid named Butterball who is the target of a hungry troll. If you were a troll, wouldn't you pick the kid named Butterball? Sounds like good eatin'. But I digress... the thing that always freaked me out about this particular story was that the troll carried it's own head under it's arm. And the little things that look like sticks coming up out of the neck just make me queasy. Even now looking at them makes me feel slightly ill.
5 comments:
I know exactly what you mean. I read that story as a teenager, and man it freaked me out. The pictures make it that much worse.
Thank god! Someone else who knows exactly what I mean about the creepiness of Norwegian trolls. Cool stories, but damn are they creepy!
I've got to say, your blog rocks. Its nice to find that you're not the only one who digs this stuff. I'm 40 years old so every thing you share here brings back some great memories. Thanks!
Can you give me the publisher of this? I can't find it.
Unless they reprinted it, it might be hard to track down. Here's the info:
Norwegian Folk Tales
From the Collection of Peter Christen Asbjornsen and Jorgen Moe
Translated by Pat Shaw Iversen and Carl Norman
Published by George Allen and Unwin LTD in Great Britain. There is no copyright date in the book but it was given to me in the early 1970s (prior to mid 1973).
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