Gripla - 01.01.2003, Page 101

FORNALDARSÖGUR AND FLATEYJARBÓK
99
point of view they have to be considered as belonging to different genres. That
is, we bring one interpretive framework to Þorsteins þáttr because it is copied
as an independent text, and we bring a different interpretive framework to
Helga þáttr because it is embedded in Oláfs saga Tryggvasonar and themati-
cally paired with Norna-Gests þáttr. In this context, the joumey to the other-
world in Helga þáttr ceases to provide the text with its overall structure and
instead is reduced to an introductory story whose function is to set up the
conflict between Olaf and a powerful pagan figure; it is this conflict that is at
the heart of the narrative as a whole. Similarly (to cite a Flateyjarbók text that
is not related to the fornaldarsögur), Helga þáttr ok Úlfs is another work that
on the basis of its theme and structure belongs to one group (the conversion
þættir) but from a matrix-text/manuscript-context point of view has to be
marked as different from the other members of that group.9 Helga þáttr ok
Úlfs is indeed about conversion, but because it was added to the manuscript
by a different scribe with (arguably) a different editorial program and is not
embedded in a king’s saga, it must be read against the conversion þættir of the
Olaf-sagas and not with them (Rowe forthcoming).
Indeed, an analysis that uses structure as a marker of genre can end up iden-
tifying some texts as having a relationship to the fornaldarsögur that the tradi-
tional analyses using only subject matter and setting do not. Here I am think-
ing of Harris’s theme-and-structure survey of the þættir, which comes to some
conclusions that have not fully penetrated fornaldarsaga studies. An expansion
of the corpus is suggested by his statement that Orms þáttr Stórólfssonar and
Þorsteins þáttr uxafóts are “comparable to fornaldar sögur such as Örvar-Odds
saga” (Harris 1989:3a). A reduction of the corpus is implied by his noting that
Helga þáttr Þórissonar and Þorsteins þáttr bæjarmagns “share the tone and
many motifs of the fornaldar söguT’ but are analogues of the joumeys to the
otherworld found in romances and, particularly, in Breton lays (Harris
1989:3a). Stephen Mitchell also acknowledges Orms þáttr's many connec-
tions to the fornaldarsögur (Mitchell 1991:22) and Helga þáttr’s dissimilarities
(Mitchell 1993:206b), but Harris’s position regarding Þorsteins þáttr uxafóts
and Þorsteins þáttr bæjarmagns are (to the best of my knowledge) unique.10
9 Helga þátlr ok Úlfs is found in Flateyjarbók 111:445—460.
10 My own view regarding Orms þáttr is that, despite the fornaldarsaga elements in the
beginning and its biographical serial-adventures structure, the text as we have it is deployed
as a kind of lslendingaþáttr, using an unusual Icelander’s interactions with powerful men in
Norway to make a particular point about a king and an Icelander. In this regard, it is not so
different from Auðunar þáttr vestfirzka.