Today, October 17, , is a big day. He had wished to retreat into a quiet and bucolic existence, yet he could not refrain from broadcasting his opinions, via the Internet, concerning the unique excellence of the white race, and the deplorable condition of contemporary multicultural Europe.
On his blog he developed a theory of the primordial unity of all European peoples, and he promoted a return to the true old-time religion of the continent: the worship of nature, and strength, and bravery. He denounced the Jews, and claimed that Christianity was itself nothing but Judaism. He had nothing kind to say about Muslims either. His softest words were for his family, and for the new and beautiful region he had come to call home. Vikernes was happy to finally be settling down.
Soon enough, the Norwegian immigrant would be called to Paris to defend himself. What is Europe? Where are its cracks? Agamben would like to include France in this breakaway federation, yet there is in fact some ancient and medieval basis for the belief that French identity, unlike Italian, is not simply descended from the Romans, but indeed is forged out of a significant encounter with the Germanic and Celtic worlds.
Students in traditional programs of Romance philology were required to master the non-Romance languages of influential neighbors; those specializing in Spanish also took Arabic, while those focused on France had to prove mastery of German.
But here in fact the neighboring relation does not do justice to the nature of the influence in question. The two cultural spheres are co-generated, and share much of the same stock of treasures. Before there was Tristan und Isolde there was Tristan et Yseult.
