Gripla - 01.01.2002, Page 122

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GRIPLA
Dasent: Then Kari took his horse and was for riding away.
B-H: Kári took his horse and meant to ride away.
HP-MM: Then Kari wanted to saddle his horse and go away. (1999:
Kari then wanted to take his horse and ride away.)
Cook: Then Kari wanted to take his horse and ride away.
We may guess that Kári puts a saddle on his horse — just as in the above
example we may assume that Gunnarr was uncomfortably hot — but the saga
does not tell us that.
I must confess, however, to neglecting this principle in at least one in-
stance. After killing Lýtingr, Ámundi the Blind comes to Njáll, who tells him
that his deed was understandable, því at slíkt er mjQk á kveðit, en viðvgrunar-
vert, efslíkir atburðir verða, at stinga eigi af stokki við þá, er svá nær standa
(106. 274). I translated this “for such things are preordained, and when they
occur they are a waming not to decline the claims of close kin.” “Decline the
claims of’ is needlessly explanatory and goes beyond the down-to-earth Ice-
landic phrase at stinga af stokki við, glossed by Cleasby-Vigfusson as “to
prick one out of one’s seat.” The simple word “rebuff,” used by B-H and also
by MM-HP, is preferable; “shove aside” might be even more in line with the
original.
5. The historical present
A likely carry-over from the spoken language into saga style is the often
disconcerting and illogical shifting between past tense and present tense:
Hann komsk út á ána undan þeim ok svá til hrossa ok hleypir, til þess er
hann kemr í Ossabœ. Hgskuldr var heima, ok finnr hann þegar (99.253:
“He fled across the river to the horses and gallops off, until he comes to
Ossabaer. Hoskuld was at home, and Lyting goes to him at once.”) Dasent
and Morris were literal translators in this regard, and George Johnston has
been the main modem advocate of this approach, both in theory and in prac-
tice:
In my opinion the tenses of the Icelandic should be followed as closely
as possible; their effect is startling and vivid, the events come before
the eye of the reader as they seem to do in life, unpredictably and un-
ceremoniously (1961:396; cf. 1973:13).