Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1981, Síða 226

pares, for example, Evida’s lament when Erex fails into a death-like
swoon, with Blensinbil’s lament over the loss of Kanelangres in the Nor-
wegian Tristrams saga (see pp. 166-67), or with Iven’s lament over being
rejected by his wife (see pp. 164-65), or with the lament of Parceval’s
kinswoman over the death of her husband (p. 157). In all three instances,
the authors took especial pains to convey the poignancy and pathos of the
moment by means of stylistic and rhetorical embellishment. That is not
the case in Erex saga. When confronted by what she assumes to be the
corpse of her husband, Evida stretches herself out over his body and
expresses her grief as follows:
Vesol em ek ordin af dauda bonda mins, ok f)ess annars at
med minni tungu kom ek honum å £>essa ferd, er ek Jtagda
eigi yfir rangligu åmæli våndra manna. Edr hversu må ek lifa
vid harm eptir [wilikan bonda? F>vi mun ek få mér skjotan
dauda med hans sverdi. (ch. 11, 54:8-55:2)
(How wretched I have become because of the death of my hus-
band, and because my tongue brought him on this journey, since I
was not silent at the unjust reproach of evil men. How can I ever go
on living, grieving for such a husband? Thus, I shall find a quick
death on his sword.)
The monologue is stark, devoid of all ornamentation. Evida’s rhetorical
question - “How can 1 ever go on living?” - is a familiar one. Blensinbil
confronts the same dilemma when Kanelangres dies: “How shall I live
after the death of such a magnificent hero?” as does Iven when his wife
rejects him: “To what purpose should I, wretched man, live?” For Broth-
er Robert and the author of Ivens saga the question serves to launch a
soliloquy on the unhappiness experienced by the respective mourners,
but in Erex saga analysis of the meaning of the question is aborted. The
fault hardly lies with the French source, in which Evida’s monologue
corresponds to vv. 4615-18; 4621-31; 4635-49; 4653-63, but rather with a
different style, one devoid of ornamentation - of extended alliteration,
semantic or grammatical variation, and tautological collocations - in
short, a style that eschews redundancy.
Similarly, Blenzibly’s reaction to the death of Kalegras is given short
shrift by the author of the Icelandic Saga af Tristram and is for that very
reason a poignant, albeit unexpected counterweight to the expansive
depiction of their love. The Icelandic Blenzibly’s lack of verbal response
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