Icelandic Sagas

Paper Summary:

The Icelandic sagas "The Saga of Grettir the Strong" (written in the fourteenth century by an unknown author) and "Egil's Saga" (written in the early thirteenth century by Snorri Sturlson), tell us much about the life in Scandinavia at the time and about the culture that produced these works. The paper shows that in this regard, they are similar to other epics and sagas which convey information about the life of the past, from the Homeric epics through Virgil, "Beowulf", "El Cid" and many others. It shows that the plots might emphasize heroic actions and great battles, but at a more basic level, the sagas tell us how the people lived , how they related to the world, and what they thought about the world in which they lived. This paper analyzes both works, including characters. It discusses the societies in both sagas and compares them with one another.

From the Paper:

"The characters in the Icelandic saga Egil's Saga live in a brutish world where they have to fight almost constantly to live and protect themselves and their kin. The rules of conscience such as we know them today do not apply to characters such as Egil, who commits his first murder when he is six years old and who is noted and honored for the ruthlessness with which he conducts his affairs. The values of the Vikings have to do with a sense of honor, with the maintenance of order within a kingdom if not between kingdoms, with the continuation of a hierarchy, and with the all-embracing need to further the interests of society in terms of security and the economy. These values applied in an environment of violence, plunder, and the destruction of enemies, and these values can be seen as reflective of the world which formed them."

More papers on Icelandic Sagas:

• Book Review # 136484 : "Life in Medieval Iceland"
• Analytical Essay # 22262 : "Njal's Saga" ( Anonymous )"
• Term Paper # 99927 : "J.R.R. Tolkien"

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