Laxdaela Saga (Penguin Classics) [Mass Market Paperback]

Anonymous (Author), Magnus Magnusson (Translator), Hermann Palsson (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1995 | ISBN-10: 0140442189 | ISBN-13: 978-0140442182

Written around 1245 by an unknown author, the Laxdaela Saga is an extraordinary tale of conflicting kinships and passionate love, and one of the most compelling works of Icelandic literature. Covering 150 years in the lives of the inhabitants of the community of Laxriverdale, the saga focuses primarily upon the story of Gudrun Osvif's-daughter: a proud, beautiful, vain and desirable figure, who is forced into an unhappy marriage and destroys the only man she has truly loved - her husband's best friend. A moving tale of murder and sacrifice, romance and regret, the Laxdaela Saga is also a fascinating insight into an era of radical change - a time when the Age of Chivalry was at its fullest flower in continental Europe, and the Christian faith was making its impact felt upon the Viking world.

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)

About the Author

Magnus Magnusson is an Icelander who has been resident in Scotland for most of his life, and is well-known for his presentation of the BBC's Mastermind. He is also chairman of the Scottish National Heritage. He studied English and Old Icelandic at Oxford University. Hermann Palsson studied Icelandic at the University of Iceland and Celtic at University College, Dublin. Formerly Professor of Icelandic at the University of Edinburgh and General Editor of the New Saga Library, he has written many books on the history and literature of medieval Iceland. He died in 2003.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Mass Market Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Penguin Classics (January 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140442189
• ISBN-13: 978-0140442182
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #660,966 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #10 in Books > Education & Reference > Foreign Language Nonfiction > More Languages > Icelandic

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Men (and Women) of Iron, August 11, 2000

By 

James Paris "Tarnmoor" (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Laxdaela Saga (Penguin Classics) (Mass Market Paperback)

Whenever I confront the Icelandic sagas, as I have the urge to do from time to time, I feel anew the onrush of a different reality.

Did someone do you dirt? Then bushwhack him and and his family and put them all to the sword. There will be settlements to be paid based on your wealth and influence and that of your victim's friends and remaining family, and the desire of your neighbors to put a cap on a burgeoning intergenerational blood feud. Divorce? Tell your old man you've had it with him, march away, and lay claim to half of his estate. (This while women in mainland Europe barely had the right to breathe.)

The LAXDAELA SAGA is one of the best of the sagas, ranking with THE BURNT NJAL SAGA as one of the greatest works to come from the Viking world -- and the greatest literary works of the 12th-14th centuries from anywhere. Its numerous cast of characters (I count 189 names in the book's helpful Glossary of Proper Names, about 40 of which begin with "Thor") boggles the mind. Just remember, these were real people, and their names are enshrined in the history of Iceland by their descendents.

It takes several generations of ambushes, conniving marriages and bloody divorces, and even the introduction of Christianity around A.D. 1000 before the main story gets under way, namely the story of Gudrun Osvifs-daughter and her four marriages. This is no blushing romance: Look at Gudrun the wrong way, and start drafting your will! Her boyfriend Kjartan Olafsson dallies too long in Norway, and she marries his cousin Bolli out of spite. Then, when he returns, she does everything she can to urge Bolli to kill him and his men. A series of internecine feuds breaks out, and it takes more than twenty years for the bad blood to be drained off.

Even minor characters suddenly come to life. Here is how Vigdis Ingjalds-daughter treats a man she regards as dishonorable: "Vigdis went indoors to a chest that belonged to Thord [her husband] and there, at the bottom, she found a heavy purse. She took the purse and went out with it to Ingjald [no relation], and told him to take his money. Ingjald cheered up at this and held out his hand for it. Vigdis raised the purse and struck him on the nose with it, drawing blood; she accompanied this with a stream of derisive words, adding that he would never get the money back, and told him to clear off."

Life was cheap in medieval Iceland. The anonymous author of this saga was, however, a great writer who identified closely with the people and events that went into the making of this sometimes barbaric, always awe-inspiring masterpiece.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the finer ones!, January 22, 2002

By 

Stuart W. Mirsky "swm" (New York, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Laxdaela Saga (Penguin Classics) (Mass Market Paperback)

As a lover of the Icelandic sagas, I can say I've had the opportunity to read quite a few. But this one, the tale of Gudrun Osvif's Daughter who marries four times, while bringing about the death of one of the most remarkable men Iceland had ever seen up to that time, out of a kind of lover's pique, is surely one of the best. Gudrun belongs to an illustrious family and soon comes into the orbit of an even more illustrious one, that of Olaf the Peacock. While this tale, like all true sagas, spans several generations, the core of the book revolves around the fair Gudrun and the men she encounters and enters into relationships with. But it's a tragic tale in the end, as well, because Gudrun, proud and unforgiving as any Norseman in the saga world, cannot give way and is thus doomed to lose the one man she may have desired most of all. It falls, finally, to her son, born after the killing of her third husband, to bring a kind of rough Icelandic justice to those who brought down the father he never knew, while Gudrun, in her old age, remains typically taciturn, unable to tell him who it was she cared for most, the man who sired him or the one whose death she sought.

SWM
author of The King of Vinland's Saga

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best Icelandic Sagas and known as romantic., March 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Laxdaela Saga (Penguin Classics) (Mass Market Paperback)

This Icelandic saga deals with event in Laxriverdale, first tracing the story of the families involved before leading into the real story of the desirable Gudrun and her sequential marriage to four gentlemen. The basis for the story is certainly true,
although it is never known how true an Icelandic saga is. This is one of the best sagas
both for its moving story and easier readability than other sagas. Is interesting too in
that it deals in part with the introduction of Christianity into Iceland. Contains family trees
for the characters involved and four maps of Iceland and Laxriverdale.