Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1981, Side 147
hohem reize dient, ein sprunghaftes vorgehen der erzåhlung, ein umkeh-
ren zu schon gesagtem, ein vorausgreifen auf kommendes, erscheint der
prosaischen form unangemessen, und ruhiger geschlossener gang ist hier
geboten.”6 Meissner’s comments apply primarily to the sagas’ linear
mode of presentation. He believed that the translators often modified the
succession of details or events as found in their sources primarily because
the narrative structure of the romances conflicted with their own percep-
tion of proper sequence or dramatic perspective. A stylistic analysis of
the translated romances demonstrates, however, that “ruhiger, geschlo-
ssener gang” is not always the case.
Tradition was perhaps the most cogent reason why verse romances
were translated into prose in Norway - and not into verse, as in the
German works of Hartmann von Aue, Wolfram von Eschenbach, and
Gottfried von StraBburg, or in the Swedish Eufemiavisor. To be sure,
skaldic and eddic metres were flourishing at the height of the translation
period, but concurrently prose had become the accepted form for transla-
tions from other languages, such as the Latin saints’ lives.7 Eugéne Vina-
ver’s comments regarding the tenacity of form - although made specif-
ically in regard to structure - are not inappropriate here: “... in the
sphere of fiction form is perforce more fragile than matter and less easily
adaptable to the changes of taste and fashion.”8 Those who express dis-
may at the loss of verse in the riddarasogur tend to ascribe the change to
prose to a lack of appreciation of the verse form of the French sources. In
this respect, a historical faet should be considered: during the same pe-
riod that Norwegians first heard the Tristan legend in their own tongue, a
prose version of Tristan was being composed (between 1225 and 1235) in
France.9 This is not to suggest that the rise of Arthurian prose romances
in France was in any way responsible for the decision to translate French
verse into Norwegian prose; nonetheless, we may be more tolerant of the
6 Die Strengleikar. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der altnordischen Prosalitteratur (Halle/
Saale: Max Niemeyer, 1902), p. 241.
7 Cf. E. F. Halvorsen, The Norse Version of the Chanson de Roland, Bibliotheca Arna-
magnæana, XIX (Copenhagen: Munksgaard, 1959), p. 27; Carol Clover, ANF, 89 (1974),
p. 66; Hans Bekker-Nielsen, “Den ældste tid,” Norrøn fortællekunst, pp. 21-24; Dag Strom-
båck, “The Dawn of West Norse Literature,” BONIS, 1963 (Copenhagen: Munksgaard,
1964), pp. 14-15; E. F. Halvorsen, “Translation - Adaptation - Imitation,” Mediaeval
Scandinavia, 7 (1974), pp. 58-59.
8 “The Prose Tristan,” in Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages. A Collaborative Histo-
ry, ed. R. S. Loomis (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1959), p. 346.
9 Eugéne Vinaver, “The Prose Tristan," p. 339.
10 King Arthur
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