Gripla - 01.01.1975, Page 174

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GRIPLA
were effective in Norway as in Iceland, perhaps in some aspects
earlier in Norway. The most artistic form of Germanic—maybe
of European—poetry, the poetry of the scalds, existed in Nor-
way already at the time of the discovery of Iceland. But the
development of literature is quite different in both countries:
a) the Eddic lays were preserved only in Iceland; here they
were elaborated and probably first written on parchment,
b) scaldic poetry has become a mere Icelandic art since the end
of the lOth century,
c) and again only in Iceland we find artistic prose narratives
like those in the saga literature.
And this was at a time when the connection between Iceland
and Norway was most intense. During the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries Iceland of all the Scandinavian countries was cleary
dominant in literary production. Nearly all the sagas about Nor-
wegian kings and jarls, about Danish history (in the Skjpld-
unga saga and the Knýtlinga saga), and about events on the
Orkneys and the Faroe Islands were written in Iceland or by
Icelanders. And when King Sverrir of Norway wanted to have
his biography written, he charged an Icelander, Karl Jónsson,
with this work.
We all know more examples of this kind. But the question remains:
what are the reasons for such a different development of literature in
Norway and in Iceland? Since the literary preconditions were nearly
the same in both countries, we have to look for explanations outside
literature. Many attempts have been made in this direction in order
to find a possible solution. Out of these I would like to quote only a
few. For instance, it was supposed that the Norwegians, who emi-
grated from their home country, had been a kind of élite, men with a
special longing for independence. According to another opinion the
extraordinarily highly developed sense of literature among the Ice-
landers was a consequence of Irish influence on Icelandic literature or
of the Irish strain in the Icelandic people. Other scholars suggested
that the alþingi as a centre for communication and tradition was of
extremely high importance for the literature of Old Iceland. Of course
all the facts just mentioned could possibly have influenced the deve-