#riastrad

[refra1004-blog]

RAGE OF LUCIFER (2020)

[eirikrjs]

Wait, so a proper modern depiction of riastrad would just be berserker rage with a drastic artstyle shift for emphasis?

Well, what I wrote last night was entirely my own speculation. But I do feel safe saying that the modern notion of Cu Chulainn's riastrad is exaggerated (in a pop culture-influenced way) compared to how it may have been originally envisioned.

But in fact, I just searched JSTOR for 'riastrad' and it found an article talking about berserkers as a kind of pan-Indo-European tradition. The Cu Chulainn mention:

There are many other examples in the article, but this is exactly what I expected (that said, I only skimmed the piece). Here the example of Egil's contortions are similar to Cu Chulainn's own but still obviously just making a crazy and imposing "madness" face, but there are others including a focus on the nakedness of berserkers via Beowulf fighting Grendel naked, and also that Woden's name means "fury." An apparent history of warriors symbolically "transforming" into beasts is perhaps behind Cu Chulainn's own.

[loiterer87]

Working on a thing. Felt inspired to do something unrelated, sort of. Anyway, this here's Cu Chulainn, legendary Irish warrior. Doing a thing called the Riastrad in battle. Translated it means either 'Battle Frenzy' or 'Warp Spasm'. Basically, it turns him into the Incredible Hulk by way of John Carpenter's The Thing and I wanted to try visualise that. Really pleased with the results, especially the red shadows I dropped over everything... Included the lineart here too.

[oidheadh-con-culainn]

Do you have any particularly deep thoughts on the Riastrad/Warp Spasm/Torque (whichever you prefer, I normally use Riastrad). Personally, I find it very interesting how its essentially presented as an antithesis of what Cu is, and how he presents himself. Monster/Hero, Large/Small, etc.

i DO have a lot of thoughts on the ríastrad but i am not sure they are of the sort that can really be articulated in a tumblr post bc they are... well, maybe not thesis length, but at the very least conference-paper-length

(actually i was considering submitting a paper on the ríastrad to a conference this year but. covid happened. so, you know, RIP that paper i never actually wrote)

the other thing about my ríastrad thoughts is that they are... very influenced by other people’s opinions, which is understandable, so it’s hard to articulate them without like. footnotes to say “oh this is actually drawing on jeremy lowe’s article from 2000″ or “yeah I borrowed this from sarah kunzler” and like. academically speaking i always wanna give credit for concepts

(sarah kunzler’s article “inside out... and upside down: cu chulainn and his ríastrad” is available here btw, you don’t need a login, and she refs a lot of other articles that i’ve found useful)

i really like what jeremy lowe says in “kicking over the traces” (sadly NOT available online -- i have a very messy photocopy of this article with my scribblings all over it but nothing else) about how like. the threat of the ríastrad is always present. there is no cú chulainn without it. the name ‘cú chulainn’ refers both to the beautiful hero and to the terrifying monster, and that duality always exists and that danger is always present.

lowe comes really close to talking about gender stuff in this article and touches on the idea of instability on that front but then. doesn’t. but it’s still a really good article and gives me a lot of feelings.

amy mulligan also has some really interesting readings of the ríastrad (some in published articles, some in her unpublished dphil thesis which she was kind enough to send me during undergrad). in particular she looks at how it illustrates isidorean ideas of the body and like. medieval medical beliefs, and how you can interpret it through those frameworks to create some kind of logic to the absurdity of the transformation. i don’t agree with all of her interpretations but i find them very useful in making my own

uh but yeah i have. many complicated feelings about the ríastrad. i would like to one day make them into words so that they don’t just live in my head.

[finnlongman]

hey remember that time the Muddle Ages suggested a Venom AU?

can confirm that i have now watched Venom and it... works...

[finnlongman]

This is the most terrible explanation for the ríastrad we've ever come up with and I love/hate everyone in this server.

I mean, I know it's my fault. I realised where my sentence was going halfway through writing it, and foolishly kept going, as though if I didn't mention it, nobody would pick up on it. I should know these guys better by now.

(The funniest part of it is that none of us have actually seen Venom. And this still happened.)

My mood:

The Muddle Ages is a server full of informed and academic discussion of medieval literature! said nobody ever.

[refra1004-blog]

RIASTRAD ATTACK

[lightningskissed]

Okay I might be really getting into this. Still no promises that this will ever be a deck but I really hope it will be. Sci fi versions of Scathach, Cuchulainn, Cuchulainn starting his Warp spasm, and Lugh