quote:

Originally posted by johnc:
I just posted this in another thread, so sorry for the double post, but I was always under the impression that he was a reincarnation of Odin. Am I the only one that came to this conclussion? I haven't seen anyone else suggest this.

He isnt odin. There are strong suggestionst that he is odin's son, plus I dont think the old odin would have to "coach" the new odin, and their personalities were fairly different. He also had all his eyes.

Shadows fortune :

Every Ending is a New Begining.
Your Lucky Number is None.
Your Lucky Color is DEAD.
Motto:
Like Father. Like Son.


I seem to remember another quote actually talking about how if one God dies or quits or goes away another will fill his place if people still believe in him. But unfortunately I can't find the passage. Maybe I am just making it up, but if anyone knows what I am talking about, by all means speak up. :P

And I fully realize that Shadow is Odin's son, but I don't think that means he can't take his fathers place. Think of it as kind of a family buisness. There is a different 'Odin' in Europe and America, why is it so hard to believe that the American Odin 'title' moves on to someone else when he dies?

quote:

Originally posted by johnc:
Shadows fortune :

Every Ending is a New Begining.
Your Lucky Number is None.
Your Lucky Color is DEAD.
Motto:
Like Father. Like Son.


I seem to remember another quote actually talking about how if one God dies or quits or goes away another will fill his place if people still believe in him. But unfortunately I can't find the passage. Maybe I am just making it up, but if anyone knows what I am talking about, by all means speak up. :P

And I fully realize that Shadow is Odin's son, but I don't think that means he can't take his fathers place. Think of it as kind of a family buisness. There is a different 'Odin' in Europe and America, why is it so hard to believe that the American Odin 'title' moves on to someone else when he dies?

Odin has a son who is a god, I forget his name but that is who shadow becomes.

That passage you told was to let us know that Shadow is like his dad, though we dont know who his dad is yet, and that shadow will die, but it wont be the ending of the story. Thats where he becomes the god he is.

Fair enough. I have done a little bit more research over the last few days and I think your right. I sure did like my whole 'replacing Odin' thing though. :P

while reading the story I thought he was going to be thor.

"thor was a big guy, like you. you would have liked him."

heh. But yeah, Wednesday almost reforms during the ragnorak thingie, so its clear he and shadow arent the same person.

Okay, I know this is an old thread, but I did manage to find out an book reference about who Shadow is...

"In the book American Gods by Neil Gaiman, Loki says that he will sharpen a stick of mistletoe and ram it into the eye of Shadow (the novel's protagonist), a reference to what he did to Balder. Also notable, is the fact that Shadow is also Odin's son."

when in doubt, wiki it.

quote:

Originally posted by Pinckle:
This is a reference a Norse legend in which Freya (Baldur's mother) makes him invulnerable to all things in an effort to protect him. .

Sorry, it's not Freyr. Freyr was a Vanir who went to the Aesir and Odins court after the war between the two races of Gods. Baldr was already extant at that point. Secondly, Freyr was a male deity.

It was Odin's wife Frigg who was Baldr's mother and implored the things of the world to do him no harm.

what if shadow is a new god, that has never been mentioned before. And i have read american gods and Anansi boys, and there are a lot of gods, but not a single one other than odin uses his powers. Most of them act as if being a god is just another humen being who lives longer. i mean if i was god, i would use my powers all the time.

Okili-dokili, let´s see.... When I read it, I got it like he (Shadow that is) kinda turned into being the new Oden/Odin, reading through this thread I´m getting more and more convinced he´s supposed to become/have become Balder/Baldur. In what´s left of the old norse mythology Balder is actually not much but the guy who is invulnurable to everything (´cept mistletoe) and who dies, and give the gods a good reason to punish Loke in a very nasty way. The Gods try an get Balder back, though they don´t succeed.

So: Shadow does come back, and thus Mr. Gaiman can use him in almost any way he wants to, since very little is known/remembered about the Balderpersonality... And also I think that every Incarnation has something of his/her previous personality in him/her still... everything changes constantely and always stay the same (both at the same time).

Besides the blatant similarities with Christianity, there is also Horus and Osirus. Oh, any The Buddha had a rebirth as well.
Most all of the Gods in A.G. have a root-self. There have been many different names and meanings for each of them throughout history, and many of them have carried the same spirit so to say.

Horus and Osiris from the ancient Egyptian world have almost identical stories to Jesus and "God". Many theolgians believe Roman Christianity took from ancient Egypt to satisfy the beliefs of that day. (Horus was even born of the virgin Isis)

Although, the Baldur theories do make alot of sense... If there were any connections at all between Horus/Osirus and Odin/Baldur, I would think it would depend on which came first. My guess is Babylon and Egypt.

He's not a god, but a demigod. The result of Odin's philanderin' ways. He has some of the powers of gods, has a god-like vision of the world, but is not a god himself.
We could view him in more platonic terms though, ie the cave. He's been dragged from what he thought was reality, into the world of the divine.

So I first thought just to post a correction to the Freyr/Freya misunderstanding above, and then as I kept finding good stuff, decided to post these 3 bios from the Norse pantheon (from pantheon.org):
Freya
by Micha F. Lindemans

In Norse mythology, Freya is a goddess of love and fertility, and the most beautiful and propitious of the goddesses. She is the patron goddess of crops and birth, the symbol of sensuality and was called upon in matters of love. She loves music, spring and flowers, and is particularly fond of the elves (fairies). Freya is one of the foremost goddesses of the Vanir.
She is the daughter of the god Njord, and the sister of Freyr. Later she married the mysterious god Od (probably another form of Odin), who disappeared. When she mourned for her lost husband, her tears changed into gold.
Her attributes are the precious necklace of the Brisings, which she obtained by sleeping with four dwarfs, a cloak (or skin) of bird feathers, which allows its wearer to change into a falcon, and a chariot pulled by two cats. She owns Hildesvini ("battle boar") which is actually her human lover Ottar in disguise. Her chambermaid is Fulla. Freya lives in the beautiful palace Folkvang ("field of folk"), a place where love songs are always played, and her hall is Sessrumnir. She divides the slain warriors with Odin: one half goes to her palace, while the other half goes to Valhalla. Women also go to her hall.
Frigg
by Micha F. Lindemans
As the wife of Odin, Frigg is one of the foremost goddesses of Norse mythology. She is the patron of marriage and motherhood, and the goddess of love and fertility. In that aspect she shows many similarities with Freya, of whom she possibly is a different form.
She has a reputation of knowing every person's destiny, but never unveils it. As the mother of Balder, she tried to prevent his death by extracting oaths from every object in nature, but forgot the mistletoe. And by a fig made from mistletoe Balder died. Her hall in Asgard is Fensalir ("water halls"). Frigg's messenger is Gna, who rides through the sky on the horse Hofvarpnir. In some myths she was rumored to have had love affairs with Odin's brothers Ve and Vili.
Balder
by Micha F. Lindemans
The god of light, joy, purity, beauty, innocence, and reconciliation. Son of Odin and Frigg, he was loved by both gods and men and was considered to be the best of the gods. He had a good character, was friendly, wise and eloquent, although he had little power. His wife was Nanna daughter of Nep, and their son was Forseti, the god of justice. Balder's hall was Breidablik ("broad splendor").
Most of the stories about Balder concern his death. He had been dreaming about his death, so Frigg extracted an oath from every creature, object and force in nature (snakes, metals, diseases, poisons, fire, etc.) that they would never harm Balder. All agreed that none of their kind would ever hurt or assist in hurting Balder. Thinking him invincible, the gods enjoyed themselves thereafter by using Balder as a target for knife-throwing and archery.
The malicious trickster, Loki, was jealous of Balder. He changed his appearance and asked Frigg if there was absolutely nothing that could harm the god of light. Frigg, suspecting nothing, answered that there was just one thing: a small tree in the west that was called mistletoe. She had thought it was too small to ask for an oath. Loki immediately left for the west and returned with the mistletoe. He tricked Balder's blind twin brother Hod into throwing a mistletoe fig (dart) at Balder. Not knowing what he did, Hod threw the fig, guided by Loki's aim. Pierced through the heart, Balder fell dead.
While the gods were lamenting Balder's death, Odin sent his other son Hermod to Hel, the goddess of death, to plead for Balder's return. Hel agreed to send Balder back to the land of the living on one condition: everything in the world, dead or alive, must weep for him. And everything wept, except for Loki, who had disguised himself as the witch Thokk. And so Balder had to remain in the underworld.
The others took the dead god, dressed him in crimson cloth, and placed him on a funeral pyre aboard his ship Ringhorn, which passed for the largest in the world. Beside him they lay the body of his wife Nanna, who had died of a broken heart. Balder's horse and his treasures were also placed on the ship. The pyre was set on fire and the ship was sent to sea by the giantess Hyrrokin.
Loki did not escape punishment for his crime and Hod was put to death by Vali, son of Odin and Rind. Vali had been born for just that purpose. After the final conflict (Ragnarok), when a new world arises from its ashes, both Balder and Hod will be reborn.
In some versions it was his mother who had these disturbing dreams about his death.

Old Norse: Baldr

I think he was very much like Fat Charlie, born to a god, but wasn't a god himself. He realized his full potential through the course of the book, which meant that he had god-like powers all along. He just didn't know his powers at first, or he knew them but somehow he didn't dare to use them, but as the book went on, he began gaining more and more confidence. This, to me, was what made me as a reader really identify myself with Shadow, that any given person has room to grow, and that we all have flaws but we are also improving as people, as individuals day by day.

Hey I always assumed Shadow was Thor, god of thunder, I think there were a few hints in there, also it kinda completes the norse trinity, Odin, Thor and Loki.

quote:

Originally posted by Leigh:
Hey I always assumed Shadow was Thor, god of thunder, I think there were a few hints in there, also it kinda completes the norse trinity, Odin, Thor and Loki.

Shadow was american, and he lived in America before he moved to Europe and then a time after that he came back to America and lived there ever since. If he had been Thor, he would've known what was going on.

quote:

Originally posted by Leigh:
Hey I always assumed Shadow was Thor, god of thunder, I think there were a few hints in there, also it kinda completes the norse trinity, Odin, Thor and Loki.

No, in a conversation with Shadow about whether or not gods can die Wednesday specifically mentions Thor committing suicide, and being very definitely dead.

At any rate, Shadow is Baldur. Not only is there no shortage of clues alluding to it in the novel, but I heard it straight from Neil's mouth in the Q&A portion of a reading he did for Fragile Things which you can probably still find on YouTube without much trouble.

At the end of the book Shadow leaves north america and travles the world. This si a big nono in the God michanics of the american god world. So Shadow can't be a god.

I was under the impression that Shadow becomes a hero (like Hercules, rather than, say, the Trojan heros - I'm more familiar with Greek Myth)

If you read The Golden Bough, there's a whole section about how heros are created through completing heroic tasks, then visiting the underworld, and coming back to the world of the living with "the power to bestow boons on their fellow man" (or something along those lines, I can't remember the exact quote).

As this is what happened to Shadow, I assumed that was what his role was.

quote:

Originally posted by moonglum:
At the end of the book Shadow leaves north america and travles the world. This si a big nono in the God michanics of the american god world. So Shadow can't be a god.

I hadn't thought about that. huh. that's a rather compelling point. I'd always assumed that he was Thor (what with the controlling the weather bit), and that he was a reincarnation, as it were, of the Thor who committed suicide. (the verisimilitude of the story would allow that, right? or are my assumptions getting in the way?)

so...how does the world tree and Shadow dying and all that fit in to the Balder stories? or is that pure Gaiman?

(the "power to bestow boons" stuff is taken from Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces if you want to pursue the monomyth.)

I may be a romantic, but the alternative what if idea I had was:

Odin the all-father would probably have know what was to happen and thus decided to give his son the greatest if of all - immortality.
(the reason would have been his own soon-to-arrive demise due to lack of faith, he had to rely on Shadows powers with the weather.)
Remember the silver coin he needed on the tree, makes you think:P.
But it still is one of the best books I´ve read this far.

Or maybe Shadow became a god who survives on the belief of the gods-like a god of the gods, as so many of them liked him and helped him even though he was just a human.