I agree with k_a_nitz - if your wife only wants one book that will cover divination well, as well as providing room to explore Runic magic, Thorsson's Big Book is the way to go. If she wants to focus only on divination and is looking to save some money, his older book The Runecaster's Guidebook would work, but its contents are wholly contained in the Big Book.
That being said, Thorsson has a very particular, very developed take on what the Runes mean, and so studying him tends to pull you into that, and your wife may or may not find that to her taste. For starters, he's been involved in Temple of Set stuff, and while he seems to be one of the more reasonable "left hand path" types I've encountered, a certain individualistic "will-to-power" attitude colors many of his interpretations.
So, if she is looking for other perspectives, I found this list immensely helpful when starting out (but note that all of the Thorsson titles on it are superseded by the Big Book, which is mostly a collection and light edit of those previous books). If she's looking for a "bare bones" approach, focusing on the literal meanings and adding any color and symbolism herself, Plowright's The Rune Primer and Pollington's Rudiments of Rune Lore are the way to go. Helrunar is a much, hmm, weirder take, but the loose, free-association style has some occasionally useful insights.
If your wife is a meditator, there's a third option she might consider (though all of these can, of course, be combined): meditate on the Rune Poems directly. There three primary Rune Poems: the Old English Rune Poem, the Old Norse Rune Poem, and the Old Icelandic Rune Poem. You can find translations of these online, but there's a collection edited by P D Brown and Michael Moynihan which includes translations of all three, along with an assortment of modern "Rune poems" that come at the Runes in different ways. Thorsson, under his real name Stephen Flowers, has also published a short translation of the Rune Poems called, imaginatively enough The Rune Poems, which is nice because it contains tables of Icelandic helrunar, which come from the later medieval/early modern Icelandic Galdrabok (essentially grimoires) tradition, but which sometimes seem to have derived from the "real" Runes. Unfortunately, this last one seems to be back out of print after being readily available again for a while. Regardless, if you get Thorsson's Big Book, his translations are in there too (or in most, if not all of his books on Runes).
Anyway, in the poems, each Runestave is given a stanza, and they make for first-rate meditative material. One caveat: if your wife works with the Elder Futhark (24 Runes to the Younger Futhark's 16 or the Anglo-Frisian Futhorc's 26-33, depending on which version you use), the only poem with a stanza for every Runestave will be the Old English one, but the Old Icelandic and Old Norse are still helpful for the 16 Runestaves they do cover.
Lastly, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention The Teutonic Way: Magic by Kveldulf Gundarsson. Gundarsson was a student of Thorsson's, so his interpretations aren't so different, but what this book includes that the others don't are some guided pathworkings/scryings for the Runes. I've come to prefer self-directed scrying, of course, but it was while meditating through one of these guided ones that I had my very first TSW religious experience, so maybe there's something there!
Anyhow, I know that's a lot, but if you or she have any other questions, I'll be happy to share what I can. There's some other titles I've heard good things about, but haven't checked out myself, so I can't speak to them directly (like Long Branches for the Younger Futhark, or Living Runes by Galina Krasskova, whom I respect and have found useful on other matters).
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branchandroot
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Date: 2024-03-15 01:16 am (UTC)That being said, Thorsson has a very particular, very developed take on what the Runes mean, and so studying him tends to pull you into that, and your wife may or may not find that to her taste. For starters, he's been involved in Temple of Set stuff, and while he seems to be one of the more reasonable "left hand path" types I've encountered, a certain individualistic "will-to-power" attitude colors many of his interpretations.
So, if she is looking for other perspectives, I found this list immensely helpful when starting out (but note that all of the Thorsson titles on it are superseded by the Big Book, which is mostly a collection and light edit of those previous books). If she's looking for a "bare bones" approach, focusing on the literal meanings and adding any color and symbolism herself, Plowright's The Rune Primer and Pollington's Rudiments of Rune Lore are the way to go. Helrunar is a much, hmm, weirder take, but the loose, free-association style has some occasionally useful insights.
If your wife is a meditator, there's a third option she might consider (though all of these can, of course, be combined): meditate on the Rune Poems directly. There three primary Rune Poems: the Old English Rune Poem, the Old Norse Rune Poem, and the Old Icelandic Rune Poem. You can find translations of these online, but there's a collection edited by P D Brown and Michael Moynihan which includes translations of all three, along with an assortment of modern "Rune poems" that come at the Runes in different ways. Thorsson, under his real name Stephen Flowers, has also published a short translation of the Rune Poems called, imaginatively enough The Rune Poems, which is nice because it contains tables of Icelandic helrunar, which come from the later medieval/early modern Icelandic Galdrabok (essentially grimoires) tradition, but which sometimes seem to have derived from the "real" Runes. Unfortunately, this last one seems to be back out of print after being readily available again for a while. Regardless, if you get Thorsson's Big Book, his translations are in there too (or in most, if not all of his books on Runes).
Anyway, in the poems, each Runestave is given a stanza, and they make for first-rate meditative material. One caveat: if your wife works with the Elder Futhark (24 Runes to the Younger Futhark's 16 or the Anglo-Frisian Futhorc's 26-33, depending on which version you use), the only poem with a stanza for every Runestave will be the Old English one, but the Old Icelandic and Old Norse are still helpful for the 16 Runestaves they do cover.
Lastly, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention The Teutonic Way: Magic by Kveldulf Gundarsson. Gundarsson was a student of Thorsson's, so his interpretations aren't so different, but what this book includes that the others don't are some guided pathworkings/scryings for the Runes. I've come to prefer self-directed scrying, of course, but it was while meditating through one of these guided ones that I had my very first TSW religious experience, so maybe there's something there!
Anyhow, I know that's a lot, but if you or she have any other questions, I'll be happy to share what I can. There's some other titles I've heard good things about, but haven't checked out myself, so I can't speak to them directly (like Long Branches for the Younger Futhark, or Living Runes by Galina Krasskova, whom I respect and have found useful on other matters).
Good luck!
Jeff