Howson, George. The death of Gunnar

• Author: George Howson
• Title: The Death of Gunnar. A tribute to Ian Ramsay Maxwell.
• Published in: Treasures of the Elder Tongue, fifty years of Old Norse in Melbourne
• Editors: Katrina Burge, and John Stanley Martin
• Place, Publisher: Melbourne: University of Melbourne,
• Year: 1995
• Pages: 115-26
• E-text:
• Reference: Howson, George. “The Death of Gunnar: A Tribute to Ian Ramsay Maxwell.” In Treasures of the Elder Tongue, fifty years of Old Norse in Melbourne, The Proceedings of the Symposium to Celebrate the Golden Jubilee of Old Norse at the University of Melbourne, 14th May 1994. Ed. Katrina Burge and John Stanley Martin, pp. 115-126, Melbourne: University of Melbourne, 1995.

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• Key words: literary elements, narrative technique, language and style (bókmenntaleg einkenni, frásagnaraðferð, mál og stíll)

Annotation

This article is a complementary approach to Ian Maxwell's "Patterns in 'Njáls saga'" with a narrow focus on a small section of the saga, namely the six lines enclosing Gunnar's decision to return to his homestead at Hlíðarendi in spite of his sentence of outlawry. The author states that this famous section has been misunderstood, and argues, through a close analysis of semantics and word-order, that the scene of Gunnar's getting on his horse is a metaphor of his inner battle and frustration.

Lýsing

Þessi grein er eins konar viðauki við grein Ians Maxwell, „Patterns in 'Njáls saga'“ og hnitast um örstuttan kafla í sögunni, þ.e. sex línur kringum þá ákvörðun Gunnars að snúa aftur heim að Hlíðarenda í trássi við útlegðardóm sinn. Höfundur heldur því fram að þessi frægi kafli hafi verið misskilinn og sýnir, með merkingarfræðilegri greiningu og því að rýna í orðaröð, að senan þar sem Gunnar snýr aftur sé myndhverfing hans innri baráttu.

See also

• Maxwell, Ian Ramsay, “Patterns in Njáls saga”, Saga-Book of the Viking Society. London: 1957-1961.

References

Chapter 75: : stingur niður atgeirinum: “Inlaid this renowned episode lies an insight into the pattern of the inner life of Gunnar's character, and of the dilemma he faces in the saga” (pp. 117-18).

Links

• Written by: Marion Poilvez
• Icelandic translation: Svanhildur Óskarsdóttir