Lögberg-Heimskringla - 05.09.1963, Blaðsíða 2

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LÖGBERG-HEIMSKRINGLA, FIMMTUDAGINN 5. SEPTEMBER 1963
Bókaþáttur
lcelandic Saga Casts
Its Spell On Love Affair
AN INTERRUPTED COURT- is elected and on a mission
SHIP—By Henry Goddard
Leach. 222 pages. $4. Expo-
sition Press of New York.
During his senior year at
Dartmouth in 1905, Kenneth,
a boy from Maine’s back
country, chances across an
ancient Icelandic saga, Cor-
mac and Sieingerd. This ro-
mantic and enigmatic tale of
thwarted, non - consummated
love bemuses him. Inexplic-
ably, it seems to relate di-
rectly to himself.
The following year, while
teaching math at G r o t o n
School, he meets Aurelia Ho-
bart, a Boston belle and, for
her time, an audacious non-
conformist. The Maine farm
boy immediately capitulates
and the Back Bay Brahman
evinces considerable interest
in him in return, despite his
lowly social estate. At their
first meeting she candidly
states that she is taken with
his “long legs,” for that prim
era and setting, a scandalous
declaration.
Aurelia’s aristocratic family
makes it quickly known to the
Groton master that she is not
for him. Kenneth realizes that
to surmount the social barrier
between them he has to make
something important of him-
self. He goes to Harvard Law
School as the best course to
gain this end .
4
On his graduation, Aurelia
runs off to northern Europe
and to be near her, the smit-
ten young barrister takes a
diplomatic post in Copenha-
gen. When his dark beauty re-
turns to the U.S., after her
father has flatly refused Ken-
neth’s courtship, the discour-
aged young man has a short
affair with a Danish countess.
He returns home and becomes
a junior partner in a New
York City law firm, still
yearning for Aurelia. They
see each other now and then,
and one day while out driv-
ing, Kenneth runs over and
injures a Gypsy’s dog and the
Romany hurls a curse at him.
This reminds the frustrated
swain again of Cormac, the
Viking, w h o s e difficulties
with Steingard seem to spring
from a n e v i 1 malediction
placed on his head by a witch
whose two sons he had slain.
He then senses that his own
courtship of Aurelia is run-
ning along the same rocky
path which bedeviled the Ice-
landic skald.
Kenneth runs for Congress,
to Europe falls in with a
friend of Aurelia’s, whó se-
duces him into a literary
walking tour of Ireland and
into sharing her bed.
In the end, the American
love saga comes out some-
what better than its earlier
counterpart, but not before
considerable intriguing con-
flict.
This is author Henry God-
dard Leach’s sixth book, but
his first venture in fiction.
He writes with a brightness
and a pleasingly subtle note
of humor. A Mayflower de-
scendant, he was born in Phil-
adelphia, received his A.B.
from Princeton and his mas-
ters and Ph.D. from Harvard.
As did his protagonist, he
taught two years at Groton
School and then returned to
Harvard as an instructor in
English and a traveling fel-
low in Scandinavia. His tour
in the north country instilled
him with a love for the Norse-
men and their history. He was
for years president of the
American-Scandinavian Foun-
dation and a contributing edi-
tor to the Foundation’s “Re-
view.” He was also editor of
the famous old FORUM and
CENTURY magazines. He is
the possessor of numerous
decorations and honors con-
ferred by Norway, Sweden,
Denmark and Iceland. Cur-
rently, he resides in Manhat-
tan.
The Vikings
(HOLGER ARBMAN)
Reviewed by
RICHARD BECK
HOLGER ARBMAN, THE
VIKINGS. Translated and
edited, with an introduc-
tion, by Alan Binns, New
York: Frederick A. Praeger,
1961. Pp. 212; 67 photos, 38
line drawings, 6 maps, $6.50.
This authoritative work on
the Vikings is a most welcome
addition to the extensive lit-
erature on the subject in Eng-
lish. Dr. Arbman, who is pro-
fessor of Scandinavian arch-
æology at the University of
Lund in Sweden, is a highly
regarded specialist in Viking
art and archæology, w i t h
numerous significant publica-
tions in his field to his credit,
as well as with first-hand ex-
perience of having excavated
a number of sites in Europe.
His work under r e v i e w
bears ample evidence of his
ripe scholarship and insight,
and presents a well-rounded
survey of the Viking period.
The author bases his discus-
sion and interpretation of life
and culture in the Viking age
on both historical sources and
archaæological information,
succeeding excellently in in-
vesting that distant age and
its people with convincing re-
ality. Naturally, on the other
hand, in the coverage of such
a large subject, in terms of
time and geography, there are
bound to be points of honest
disagreement among scholars
in the field.
The first chapter of the
book provides an excellent ac-
count of “The Background in
Scandinavia” previous to the
Viking Age. The opening par-
agraph strikes at the heart of
the matter:
“A new culture is usually
a gradual development, but
in some circumstances very
wide-ranging c h a n g e s can
happen very quickly without
our being able to tell what
the decisive factors w e r e .
Contacts with foreign coun-
tries are important, but rare-
ly alone decisive. The Viking
Age in Scandinavia may seem
at first to have been a period
of such sudden change, but a
closer study of the archæo-
logical material shows that a
fundamental continuity un-
derlies it. A gradual develop-
ment in contact with Western
Europe was already taking
place in the preceding period,
the Vendel age, indicated by
the boat graves near Vendel
church in Uppland in mid-
Sæeden. In these as in other
boat-graves the dead were
buried with food and weap-
ons, and goods which already
included glass beakers and
woolen cloth from Western
Europe.”
The author goes on to prove
this contention with a pene-
trating evaluation of archæ-
ological finds in Sweden (in
particular) and elsewhere in
Scandinavia, describing cli-
mate, settlements, military
camps and graves, the growth
of market towns and the types
of merchants found in Scan-
dinavia at that time. Here is
indeed brought together much
salient and revealing informa-
tion on the subject.
The following chapters deal
in considerable detail with
Viking colonization of the
British Isles and Atlantic Is-
lands, and on the West Euro-
pean continent; also, in turn,
with “Swedish Vikings in the
East,” the colonization of Ice-
land and Greenland, and the
Norse expeditions to North
America.
Especially interesting and
enlightening is the chapter
dealing with the expeditions
of Swedis Vikings to Russia
and their establishment of col-
onies there. Here, as through-
out the book, the author
draws both on historical ma-
terial, in this case particularly
the early twelfth- century
Nestorian Chronicle, and on
the archæological discoveries
available.
Then comes the closing
chapter, on “The Art of the
Viking Age,” which, to this
reviewer at any rate, is the
most important part of the
work. Here Dr. Arbman an-
alyzes in great detail and with
commensurate penetration the
art of the Vikings as pre-
served on weapons, orna-
ments, and other objects not-
able in the Oseberg find from
Vestfold in southeastern Nor-
way, which is of basic signifi-
cance in this connection. He
takes, of course, due notice of
similar or related archæologi-
cal material discovered else-
where in Scandinavia, but
this is limited in scope.
Alan Lk Binns, lecturer in
Anglo-Saxon studies at the
University of Hull, has effec-
tively translated and edited
Professor Arbman’s Swedish
text, and writes a highly in-
formative introduction, where
he rightly stresses the some-
times overlooked, or at least
underestimated, “technologi-
cal” side of the achievements
of the Vikings, in shipbuild-
ing, navigation, and trade.
This leads Mr. Binns naturally
to a detailed discussion of
“the tools of trade” of the
Vikings, their ships and weap-
ons. Other phases of Viking
life and civilization are not
neglected.
Numerous excellent photo-
graphs, line drawings, and
several maps add to the gen-
Framhald á bls. 3
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