Saturday, January 14, 2012

Lord of the Wind

"ARNeumann" brings us this custom sculpt of the Assyrian demon Pazuzu, made famous by William Peter Blatty's "The Exorcist". At 14" in height it's an impressive beast.

4 comments:

Raven said...

Oooh. Oooh. Oooh. This hits me right in my eclectic little heart.

There's actually a song titled "Lord of the Wind". I listen to it often, and to other songs on the same album. They're beautiful.

The original spelling's "Владыка Ветра", but same meaning. It's on the "A Elbereth Gilthoniel" album by Irina and Anton Kruglov, better known as Airë and Saruman to the Russian Tolkien fandom community.

Who'd'a thunk it would ever tie in here?

And, due credit, it's written by Lora Provençal a.k.a Lora Bocharova, co-author of "Finrod-Song" / "Leithian: Unchained," the heartbreaking opera about Elf-king Finrod Felagund's role in the Silmarillion.

Admittedly these are two very different "Lords of the Wind," one a Mesopotamian demon, and the other a Vala (somewhere between angel and demigod) of Arda.

But you might enjoy the song and the lyrics anyway. (Take your pick of translate.(google/bing/yahoo).com for translations.)

CoastConFan said...

This sculpt is 14 inches tall, which is impressive. For more information check out the Wikipedia article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pazuzu

Great amulet head of Pazuzu at the British Museum http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/me/h/head_of_pazuzu.aspx and http://arthistory.about.com/od/from_exhibitions/ig/treasures_from_assyria/aae_mfab_0809_10.htm

Here is a great Pazuzu stele http://www.helsinki.fi/science/saa/sct07cov.html and reverse http://www.lessing-photo.com/dispimg.asp?i=08021124+&cr=24&cl=1 and also http://www.friendsrevolution.com/2011/03/legendary-bronze-amulet-depicting-demon.html

Raven said...

Mmmph. Just listening through "Leithian" again ("a story of loyalty, duty, death and immortality; of pride and sizzling fatal greed of the powerful; of hostages' courage following their fate and not retreating before the face of death; of honor, freedom, and love") -- and while grooving on the traditionally ultra-deep villain's voice, realized that, like Sauron... in Russian opera... Great Cthulhu would also have to sing.

The sailors arrive at R'lyeh with its Cyclopean and non-Euclidean architecture (which I personally have always thought was to blame for Frank Lloyd Wright's roofs leaking!), the music crescendoes, and Cthulhu appears to begin his basso-profundo aria Fhtagn... in the course of which he gestures the sailors off to various horrible (and very briefly screaming) fates arranged by stage magic, save the only two who escape back to the ship.

My goodness, considering the gutterals in Lovecraft's Old Speech ("Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn"), is there a language better than Russian for Cthulhu to sing in? (Save perhaps Klingon?)

Would that, or would it not, become a song that Lovecraft fans around the world would learn by heart and sing aloud, even if they had to learn Russian to do so?

Raven said...

Well, first rough and imperfect notes toward an aria.

Ктулху:
     Ах звезды удачный! Это мое время!
     Теперь я буду пожирать все мире!
     Вечный ветры вожделения нес меня,
     через черный размеры безумия,
     в глубокую ловушку! Морская вода —
     смерть, даже для бессмертного бога!
     ...

Cthulhu:
     Oh favorable stars! This is my time!
     Now I'm going to devour all the world!
     The eternal winds of desire carried me,
     through the black dimensions of insanity,
     into a deep trap! Seawater —
     death, even for a deathless god!
     ...

Note both rhymes and alliterations in the Russian, e.g.:

     Vechnii vetri vozhdeleniya nes menya,
     cherez chernii razmeri bezumiya,
     v glubokuyu lovushku! Morskaya voda —
     smert', dazhe dlya bessmertnovo boga!

But what this needs is a poet on the order of Lora Provençal — if there's an equivalent for Russian Lovecraft fandom. And why wouldn't there be?