The Sagas of Icelanders (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0141000031 ISBN 13: 9780141000039

Verlag: Penguin, 2005

Inhaltsangabe

In Iceland, the age of the Vikings is also known as the Saga Age. A unique body of medieval literature, the Sagas rank with the world’s great literary treasures – as epic as Homer, as deep in tragedy as Sophocles, as engagingly human as Shakespeare. Set around the turn of the last millennium, these stories depict with an astonishingly modern realism the lives and deeds of the Norse men and women who first settled in Iceland and of their descendants, who ventured farther west to Greenland and, ultimately, North America. Sailing as far from the archetypal heroic adventure as the long ships did from home, the Sagas are written with psychological intensity, peopled by characters with depth, and explore perennial human issues like love, hate, fate and freedom.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Jane Smiley's ten works of fiction include The Age of Grief, The Greenlanders, Ordinary Love and Good Will, Moo, A Thousand Acres (which won the Pulitzer Prize), and most recently the bestselling Horse Heaven.

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Sagas of Icelanders, the (Classics Deluxe Edition)

Penguin Classics Deluxe EditionBy Jane Smiley

Penguin Books

Copyright ©2001 Jane Smiley
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0141000031

Chapter One

EGIL'S SAGA

Egils saga Skallagrímssonar

Time of action: 850-1000
Time of writing: 1220-40

Egil's Saga is acknowledged as one of the masterpieces of the genre, amagnificently wrought portrait of poet, warrior and farmer Egil Skallagrimsson,loosely contained within the framework of the family saga, but with anunusual twist ? the feud that Egil and his forebears wage is with the kingsof Norway.

    Spanning some 150 years, much of the action takes place outside Icelandand repeatedly returns to Norway, where the saga starts and where its mainthemes are laid out against the background of King Harald Fair-hair'smerciless unification of the realm. Egil's grandfather Kveldulf and fatherSkallagrim refuse allegiance to the king, while Kveldulf's other son Thorolfenters his service but dies at the king's own hands, the victim of maliciousslanders. Beyond the closely mapped sites in Norway, the setting extendsinto vaguer territory elsewhere in Scandinavia, deep into the Baltic andEast Europe, far north to Finnmark, and to England ? much of the knownViking world at that time. Often the adventures and heroics are larger thanlife, but are outrageous and delightfully gross rather than implausible orfantastic. Egil's enemies are motivated by treachery, self-interest and malice,and he confronts them as his forebears did, with the family traits of obstinacy,ruthlessness, animal strength and an instinctive inability to accept authority.To his friend and advocate Arinbjorn in Norway, however, and to otherswhose favour he wins, Egil shows loyalty and unswerving devotion, and heheroically adheres to a brutal but not entirely unappealing sense of justice.

    The action in Iceland falls into several phases. Skallagrim settles at Borgand is an ideal of pioneer and craftsman, but the social order which he buildsis threatened by the unruly and rebellious Egil. When Egil many years laterinherits his farm, he becomes a respected figure of authority himself, anddoes not engage in feuds in Iceland; his main involvement in a disputeoccurs when he rules in his son Thorstein's favour, acting as a figure ofauthority rather than of force. However, the trick he plans to humiliate thegreedy thingmen in his eighties shows that his relish for provocation hasnever been entirely lost. At intervals he had been drawn away from Borgto pursue his feud with the Norwegian royal family, which escalates into asheer battle of personalities with King Eirik Blood-axe and Queen Gunnhild.After their deaths he seems to realize that Norway is gradually changinginto a world in which he can never be accepted, and Iceland becomes forhim, as for so many other saga heroes, a kind of retirement home for ageingVikings.

    Although the objective style of the sagas does not allow direct revelationof the characters' thoughts, the portrayal of Egil is exceptionally rich inpsychology. His gestures are dramatic, almost ritualistic, as he sulks orbroods, suffers personal sorrow in silence, flies into a rage or succumbs tochildlike joy on receiving a noble gift. And while the saga is clearly a man'sworld in which Egil fears no adversary, he is timid and submissive towardswomen, as shown by his almost blushing love for his brother's widow Asgerd,who later becomes his wife, and by the way he allows his daughter Thorgerdto trick him out of his sympathy-seeking act of pining away after the deathof his sons.

    Scholars have pointed out the psychological tension between the uglyEgil and his `exemplary' brother Thorolf, the jealousy which sometimesmanifests itself in irresponsible pranks and then turns into self-reproachafter Thorolf's death in battle. Egil seems to have inherited this jealousyfrom his father, who was always overshadowed by his own brother, alsonamed Thorolf, in the first part of the saga. Macabre tension between fatherand son is another psychological theme: Skallagrim even comes close tokilling the young Egil once in a savage, shape-shifter's fury.

    Another window into Egil's psyche is his poetry, which ranks with themost personal as well as the most accomplished in the sagas. We see Egilglorifying his own ugliness as if it were an archetypal landscape, depictingthe living forces of nature and mythology in brisk, dramatic strokes, andexalting the values he cherishes most. The scene where Egil saves his lifein York by reciting his `Head Ransom' to King Eirik abounds in irony, sincethe poem has an empty, tongue-in-cheek ring to it compared to his otherverse and seems, so to speak, to go over the king's head anyway. By contrast,the eulogy for Arinbjorn is heartfelt, engaged, stacked with monumentalmetaphor and tinged with nostalgia for the lost Viking lifestyle. In `TheLoss of My Sons' Egil lays his soul bare, delves into thwarted ambition forhis family and unrealized affection in the bonds that have been lost, andbreaks with the god Odin who has given him gifts in both poetry and war,but deprived him of personal fortune.

    Egil's Saga is preserved in a number of vellum manuscripts and fragmentsdating from the second half of the thirteenth century onwards, although themost important is Möðruvallabók (AM 132 fol., dated 1330-70). Composed inthe second quarter of the thirteenth century, the saga is generally attributedon stylistic and other grounds to Iceland's greatest medieval historian, SnorriSturluson (1179-1241), who was a descendant of Egil. If the attribution iscorrect, Egil's Saga is the only one whose author is known. It is translatedhere by Bernard Scudder from the version printed in Íslendinga sögur, vol. l(Reykjavík 1987), and incorporates a number of emendations based on BjarniEinarsson's new reading of Möðruvallabók and paper manuscripts derivingfrom it.

1

       There was a man named Ulf, the son of Bjalfi and of Hallbera, thedaughter of Ulf the Fearless. She was the sister of Hallbjorn Half-trollfrom Hrafnista, the father of Ketil Haeng. Ulf was so big and strong that noman was a match for him; and he was still only a youth when he became aViking and went raiding. His companion was Kari from Berle, a man ofhigh birth who had the strength and courage to perform great deeds. Kariwas a berserk. He and Ulf shared all they owned and were close friends.

    When they gave up plundering, Kari returned to his farm on Berle, avery wealthy man. Kari had three children, two sons called Eyvind Lamband Olvir Hump, and a daughter named Salbjorg. She was a beautiful womanof firm character. Ulf married her, then he too returned to his farm. He wasrich in both lands and possessions. He became a landholder like his ancestorsand was a powerful figure.

    Ulf is said to have been a very clever farmer. He made a habit of gettingup early to inspect what his farmhands or craftsmen were doing and to keepan eye on his cattle and cornfields. Sometimes he would talk to people whowere in need of his advice, for he was shrewd and always ready to makeuseful suggestions. But everyday towards evening he would grow so bad-temperedthat few people...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Penguin
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2005
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0141000031
• ISBN 13: 9780141000039
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 848
• Herausgeber: Jane Smiley
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Penguin Random House Verlagsgruppe GmbH; kundenservice@penguinrandomhouse.de; ; Neumarkter Straße 28; München; Bayern; 81673; Deutschland