Skáldskaparmál - 01.01.1997, Qupperneq 260

258
Umsagnir um bœkur
territory, but she privileges the Eddic poems and the fornaldarsögur, cherishing
the latter for the embedded lausavísur which in most cases she considers ancient.
The foundation of the book consists of five articles published between 1980
and 1991. Translated from Helga’s Norwegian manuscript, the book at hand
appeared in a slightly different version in Danish in 1993 as the introductory
chapter in volume one (/ Guds navrí) (In God’s Name) of Nordisk kvindelittera-
turhistorie (History of literature by Nordic women) (NK), here entitled ‘Volven:
Hvad en kvinde kvæder. Kultur og kon pá Island i den norrone middelalder’ (The
prophetess. What a Woman sings: Culture and Gender in Iceland during the
Norse Middle Ages). The articles were partially rewritten for the essay in NK,
which in turn has been slightly enlarged for the Icelandic book, as the author has
added new materials as well as reincorporating other segments from her original
articles. In other words, as in case of the texts with which Helga is working, the
intertextuality of her own pieces is complicated.
The idea that emerges from a reading of Helga’s works can be stated as follows:
to the generally accepted thesis that the transition from oral tradition to written
literature was paralleled by the passage from paganism to Christianity, Helga adds
a third progression which she combines with the two previous ones. Her special
signature is to postulate a transition from a primarily female control of oral culture
to a civilization dominated by male writings. While in charge of culture, women
developed distinct oral genres such as the spá (prophesy), the grátur (lament), and
the hvöt (whetting, egging, or inciting). Finding ancient examples of these genres
in Codex Regius, she reads VÖluspá as the last vestige of female power. At some
point men usurped from women the power of language. This event marks the
introduction of patriarchy, symbolized by Óðinn stealing the mead of poetry from
Gunnlöð.
Conscious of ancient female power, medieval men suppressed women. To
illustrate the problem, Helga borrows a term formerly connected with witch hunts
in Scandinavian languages and in English and coins the word völvuofsóknirnar,
although the texts scarcely justify the concept of persecution of prophetesses.
When female creative powers eventually dried up women were replaced by men
as carriers of a now written culture. Male concerns, of which Snorri Sturluson
was the chief exponent, dominate the prose literature. Meanwhile, the majority
of women were reduced to silence and limited to body language. Thus, the noble
genre of eloquently articulated lament (the ancient grátr) was reduced to ordinary
tears (grátur), which became women’s most common but inarticulated form of
expressing grief. However, masculine efforts to suppress women did not succeed
entirely. Norse literature is replete with ‘mighty maidens’ who — like Fenja and
Menja in the poem Grottasóngr— continued to rise up in rebellion against their
oppressors. Helga therefore assumes the double task of restoring the evidence of
women’s poetic articulations in ancient times and recording their medieval revolt.
Since male leadership in literature and scholarship continues to the present, she
accordingly pursues a secondary theme of chastising Icelandic scholars for not