Loki and Odin: Old Gods Repurposed by Neil Gaiman, A. S. Byatt, and Klas Östergren

Norse Gods are repurposed by contemporary authors in different modes than those used for classical, Egyptian, African, and Native American gods. Whereas those others mostly lend a trace of heroic glamor or even help the characters in the novels, Odin and Loki are used to darker ends. Their connection to Ragnarok—Odin through knowing of its coming, and Loki for bringing it about—gives them more threatening roles. Gaiman, Byatt, and Östergren all locate their novels’ action in a situation of apparently waning power and threatening doom, and make connections between those two figures and our behaviors, ecological, political, and personal.