Gisli Sursson’s Saga

"I am afraid not too many of my colleagues share my fascination for the old sagas. They are still—to a certain extent—taught in school, but I wish I could say that of all the things that were bad when I grew up, the knowledge of the saga tradition was not one of them. That does not mean, however, that contemporary Norwegian literature is not influenced by the sagas, when it comes to style, wit, irony, the soft spot for realism—and especially the main subject of the sagas. It is at least not easy to pick one modern Norwegian writer who—sooner or later in his or her career—does not elaborate on the twin questions, Who am I? And where do I come from? A perhaps more frequently asked question in young nations than in older ones. Norway is still quite young and unshapen as was Iceland in the 12th century. Just look at our love for childhood and coming-of-age stories. Too complicated to be retold, so take my word for it: it is a flawless, beautifully written and complex mix of family saga, love story and crime novel with an unknown culprit. It is helpful to know the values of the society the story is set in, its social, political and anthropological context, but a modern middlebrow should be more than capable of pointing out the villain—this is realism. It is a masterpiece that can be measured against almost anything in the literary canon. Not quite—it is set in motion by the reality behind the gossip, the true minds of the characters whom the women are gossiping about. Fate is at work, i.e., both man and woman are to take their part of the blame. Absolutely. It’s a novel about a wonderful brotherhood that no sane person would dream of breaking up—apart from through love and death. And it is an even more beautiful love story: between man and woman. As you said—vengeance begets vengeance, violence begets violence—that is the backbone of fate, but it is also important to remember that in no saga does it go on forever, till the last man standing so to speak. “Norway is still quite young and unshapen as was Iceland in the 12th century—just look at our love for childhood and coming-of-age stories” There are lots of remedies to break the spiral of violence and vengeance, and that’s where the saga ceases to be just a retelling of fate—to be an exemplum—and turns into pragmatism and realism, stories of real men and women. Aud leaves for Rome after she (unsuccessfully) has tried to avenge her murdered husband. But that is not the finale—in the ending we see the two sons of the third brother (whom they left behind in Norway in the beginning of the book), tying up the loose ends by killing off the last living killer of their uncle—they are, so to speak, fulfilling the wish of their aunt Aud, who has now (unknowingly to them) turned herself into a nun in Rome. I guess you could call that neat, or maybe more of a holy merger of irony and realism."