The Genre of Trolls - Doria

story on the same topic, collected in the neighbouring parish of Oravais,
recalls the metaphorical blindness of SLS 28, 3 (text 6):
18) sússas matt å ja jikk eingang i jepu in påsk-natt åsta hör på trúlltsjärngan vi kleiv åp
på i föustak såm a vali flytta tri gangur. vi satt áldeiles tyst ti mit i náttin nåu fikk vi hör,
men int så vi nu na int. e föfasilit vesen va e: tem jikk å dråu jinom påurtin å timra o
vesnast på fleira sett.
måut pensal hödis e föst huru e susa å så hödis in ståur klåkku tå byra e sedan skrål i
föfasilit jud å sáma påsk kört tsjengu-heik i häl se. (SLS 22, 26: 83–84)
18) Sussas Matt and I once went to listen to the witches on Easter Eve in Jeppo. We
climbed onto the roof of a byre, which had been moved three times. We sat completely quiet
long into the night. We did get to hear, but we didn’t see anything, we didn’t. It was a terrible
noise: they pulled [things?] through the gate and hammered and made noise in
many ways.
Toward Pensala it was first heard how it whistled, and a large bell was heard. Then
it started bellowing a horrible sound, and the same Easter Kengu-Heik was killed in a
driving accident.
Here knowledge is attained through the sense of hearing: aural impressions
of people pulling things through the gate, doing carpentry and making
noise are portrayed, and a whistling sound, followed by the tolling of a
church bell and a terrible noise presage a person’s death. Presumably, “all
was dark before [their] eyes”, just as we may surmise the herd girl “got to
hear”, but not see, anything in church (cf. text 6). The difference is of
course that the girl is unable to see her own world, while the men are blind
to the otherworld.
The ritual time-space is once again Easter Eve and the thrice-moved
building, in this case a byre. Contrary to the previous example (text 17),
there is no suggestion of a failure to abide by the rules of the game; the
narrator and his companion are still listening in on the supernatural sphere
when the narrative ends. Thus the schemes of these two ritual illumination
narratives diverge on this point, the latter being the negation of the second
part of the former:
The everyday world – Ritual – Second sight – Breach of silence – The everyday world
The everyday world – Ritual – Prescience
The blindness to the supranormal world emphasized in this text is rather
curious, since the visual dominance in stories of prognostication is so
Blindness and Illumination 165