Gripla - 20.12.2016, Page 25

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It should not be overlooked that this is from a sales-pitch designed to
promote a new venture, but Sigurður seems to be calculating that this ap-
proach, which is very much still in the spirit of Halldór’s Formáli, would
strike a responsive chord: saga is still history and who could not be flat-
tered by the suggestion that those who loved such sagas were capable of
appreciating deeper truths than those who scorned these works. Half a
century later, Sigurður nordal was being deliberately provocative when
he wrote: “aðalviðburðirnir, sem Hrafnkatla segir frá, hafa aldrei gerzt”.59
not all of Sigurður nordal’s fellow citizens greeted this insight with great
enthusiasm, and this response reveals that the tensions that Halldór had
addressed between “truth” and “fiction” in the sagas were still in large
measure unresolved. Helgi Haraldsson (1891–1984) from Hrafnkelsstaðir
in Hrúnamannahreppur gained notoriety for a blistering review he pub-
lished in 1953 in the newspaper Tíminn of Gerpla, the most recent novel by
Halldór Kiljan Laxness which had appeared late the previous year. 60 Helgi
lambasts Laxness for having brought the Íslendingasögur and their protago-
nists into disrepute: “Ég hef þá trú á íslenzku þjóðinni, að það verði aldrei
vinsælt verk, hver sem það reynir, að breyta gullaldarbókmenntum okkar í
stóran sorphaug”.61 While Helgi does not discuss Sigurður nordal’s work
on Hrafnkels saga, his position towards such scholarship is clear:
“nýjustu vísindin eru þau, að Ingólfur Árnarson hafi aldrei verið
til … Hvað ætli að Norðmenn segðu við því, ef þeim væri sagt, að
Heimskringla væri lygasaga frá rótum og Haraldur hárfagri hefði
59 Sigurður Nordal, Hrafnkatla, Íslenzk fræði 7 (reykjavík: Ísafold, 1940), 66. ‘[t]he principal
events in [Hrafnkels saga] never took place.’ Hrafnkels saga Freysgoða: A Study by Sigurður
Nordal, trans. r. George thomas (Cardiff: university of Wales Press, 1958), 56.
60 Halldór Kiljan Laxness, Gerpla (reykjavík: Helgafell, 1952). Tíminn (1917–1996) was the
party newspaper of the Progressive Party (Framsókn), which in particular drew its support
from the rural areas. at this time, it was in the opposition in the Alþing, and 1953 was an
election year. Helgi’s writings, which are often more polemical than carefully argued and
which are not free from political, religious, and regional biases, struck a particular reson-
ance among people of his own age and background.
61 ‘I have then faith in the Icelandic people, that it [Gerpla] will never be a popular work,
however much it may try, to turn our Golden age literature into a huge pile of rubbish.’
“Gerpla Halldórs Kiljans,” Tíminn 37.46–47 (february 26–27, 1953), 4; 4 [quotation, 37.47,
pg. 4, col. 3]. reprinted as “Gerpla Halldórs Laxness” in Helgi Haraldsson, Engum er Helgi
líkur: Bóndin á Hrafnkelsstöðum segir sína meiningu, ed. Indriði G. Þorsteinsson (reykjavík:
Örn og Örlygur, 1971), 151–56 at 156.
HALLDóR JAKOBSSON ON TRUTH AND FICTION