The Sleeping Almanac

Tonight, the feast in Ægir's hall by the sea, where the gods gathered to drink and one uninvited guest spoke every cruel and true thing he had ever held back. Of Bragi and Iðunn. Of Óðinn lowering his cup. Of Frigg, who heard at the table the name of the one responsible for her son's death. Then the flight to the high mountain. The hall with four doors. The salmon in the dark pool below the waterfall of Fránangr. The first fishing ...

Tonight, the brightest of the gods begins to dream of his own ending. Baldr, the most loved and the most gentle, wakes from dreams of death, and his mother Frigg walks the whole world asking every living thing to swear it will never harm him. Everything swears, except one small plant she passes by. A slow, sorrowful story of love, an overlooked thing, and a grief that even the gods cannot undo. Let it settle over you softly.

Chapter...

Tonight, the gods discover they can grow old. Iðunn keeps the apples that hold age away, and when Loki, cornered by a giant in eagle feathers, gives her up, the halls of the gods begin to gray and stiffen and slow. To undo it, Loki must fly north as a falcon and carry her home before the oldest of them forgets how to stand. A gentle story about time, and the quiet panic of losing it, told slowly enough to lose track of time yoursel...

Tonight, the gods try to hold back the future. A wolf is growing among them, larger and stronger each day, and the gods know how the story is meant to end. They bring him chains, and call it a game, and he breaks them. Then they bring a ribbon made of impossible things, and a single god is brave enough, or honest enough, to pay the price of the lie. A calm, sad story about fate beginning to set. Let it settle over you slowly.

Chapte...

Tonight, a wager in the dark under the mountains. Loki, having cut the golden hair from Thor's wife while she slept, must replace it, and to do so he sets the finest dwarven smiths against one another. Out of their forge come a ship that folds into a pocket, a spear that never misses, a ring that makes more of itself, and a short handled hammer that will become the most famous object in all the nine worlds. A slow, warm story of cr...

Tonight, the Allfather goes looking for what he does not yet know. He comes to the well at the root of the world, where Mímir keeps the water of wisdom, and he pays for a single drink with an eye. Later he hangs nine nights on the windswept tree, wounded and alone, until the runes rise to him out of the dark. A quiet story about how much a god will give to understand the world. Let it carry you down slowly.

Chapters:

0:00 Welcome

1:46...

Tonight, the shape of everything. Before the gods have names you know, there is a tree, and from its branches and roots hang nine worlds. We move slowly through each one, from the fire of Muspelheim to the mist of Niflheim, the halls of the gods, the home of giants, and the dark below, until the whole map of Norse reality is laid out quietly around you. This is the orientation episode of the season. Everything that follows happens ...

A slow, calm place for the world's oldest stories, told for the listener who cannot quite turn off. Season 1 is Norse mythology, narrated across a single season long arc, from the nine worlds to Ragnarǫk.

How to use the show: press play, close your eyes, and let it drift over you. The pacing is slow and the music never spikes. You are not meant to stay awake.

New episodes every Wednesday and Sunday.

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