long on the wonderful poetry of the other books that we must refrain
from further comment in this strain. As we read these eloquent
imaginings, we regret that the English reading public have left this
work through fear of its great length or the ignorance of its existence,
in the dust of half-forgotten shelves. Gold disused is true gold none
the less, and the ages to come may be more appreciative than the
present.
For the sake of rounding out this story, be it noted concerning this
Book IV, that the poet has taken liberties with the saga story here, as
elsewhere. Motives more easily understood in our day are assigned for
the deeds of dread that throng these closing scenes. Gudrun weds King
Atli at her mother's bidding, and under the influence of a wicked
potion, but neither mother nor magic drives the memory of Sigurd from
her mind. She lives to bring destruction upon her husband's murderers,
and those murderers are her own flesh and blood. Through her appeals to
Atli's greed, and through Knefrud's lies in the Niblung court, the visit
of her proud brothers to her pliant husband is brought about. The saga
makes Atli the arch-plotter, and the motive his desire to possess the
gold. This sentence exculpates Gudrun from any wrong intention towards
her brothers: "Now the queen wots of their conspiring, and misdoubts her
that this would mean some beguiling of her brethren." (Chap. XXXIV.) In
Chap. XXXVIII, we are told that Gudrun fights on the side of her
brothers. We see at once the superiority of the poet's motive for a
modern tragedy.
It is impressed upon the reader of an epic that the plan of its maker
does not call for fine analysis of character. The epic poet is concerned
necessarily with large considerations, and his personages do not split
hairs from the south to the southeast side. One sign of this is seen in
the epic formulæ employed to characterize the personages of the story.
Such formulas are in _Sigurd the Volsung_ in abundance, as we have noted
on another page. But there are also many departures from the epic model
in this poem. Some of these we have referred to in the remarks on Book
III, where we noted Sigurd's mental sufferings. In Book IV we have a
discrimination of character that is not epic, but dramatic in its
minuteness. In the speech and the deeds of the Niblungs their pride and
selfishness is clearly set forth, but the individual members of that
race are distinguished by traits very minutely drawn. Thus Hogni is the
wary Niblung, and is averse to accepting Atli's invitation:
"I know not, I know not," said Hogni, "but an unsure bridge is the sea,
And such would I oft were builded betwixt my foeman and me.
I know a sorrow that sleepeth, and a wakened grief I know,
And the torment of the mighty is a strong and fearful foe."
(P. 281.)
Gunnar is here distinguished as a hypocrite by word and deed; Gudrun
remembers Sigurd in her exile and schemes and plots to make her husband
Atli work her vengeance on the Niblungs; Atli is greedy for gold and
Gudrun's task is not hard; Knefrud is a liar whose words are winning,
and overcome the scruples of the Niblungs. In these careful
discriminations of character we see a non-epical trait, and of necessity
therefore, a non-Icelandic trait. The sagaman was epic in his tone.
As a last appreciation of the art of William Morris as it is displayed
in this poem, we would call attention to the tremendous battle-piece
entitled "Of the Battle in Atli's Hall." It is the climax of this
marvelous poem, and in no detail is it inadequate to its place in the
work. The poet's constructive power is here demonstrated to be of the
highest order, and in the majestic sweep of events that is here
depicted, we see the poet in his original role of _maker_. The sagaman's
skill had not the power to conceive this titanic drama, and the memory
of his battle-piece is quite effaced by the modern invention. In blood
and fire the story comes to an end with Gudrun,
The white and silent woman above the slaughter set.
As we turn from the scene and the book, that figure fades not away. And
it is fitting that the last memory of this poem should be a picture of
love and hate, inextricably bound together, for that is the irony of
Fate, and Fate was mistress of the Old Norseman's world.
5.
Between the great works dealt with in the last two sections, which
belong together and were therefore so considered, came the book of 1875,
bearing the title _Three Northern Love Stories and Other Tales_. It is
as good a representation as Iceland can make in the love-story class.
These tales are charmingly told in the translation of Morris and
Magnusson, the second one, "Frithiof the Bold," being a master-piece in
its kind. Men will dare much for the love of a woman, and that is why
the sagaman records love episodes at all. Frithiof's voyage to the
Orkneys in Chap. VI is a stormpiece that vies with anything of its kind
in modern literature. It is Norse to the core, and we love the peerless
young hero who forgets not his manhood in his chagrin of defeat at love.
Surely there is fitness in these outbursts of song in moments of extreme
exultation or despair! "And he sang withal:
"Helgi it is that helpeth
The white-head billows' waxing;
Cold time unlike the kissing
In the close of Baldur's Meadow!
So is the hate of Helgi
To that heart's love she giveth.
O would that here I held her,
Gift high above all giving!"
Modern literature has lost this conventionality of the older writings,
found in Hebrew as well as in Icelandic, and we think it has lost
something valuable. Morris thought so, too, for he restored the
interpolated song-snatches in his Romances. We are tempted to dwell on
these three love-stories, they are so fine; but we must leave them with
the remark that they show the poet's appreciation of the worth of a
foreign literature, and his great desire to have his countrymen share in
his admiration for them. "The Story of Gunnlaug the Worm-Tongue and
Raven the Skald," and "The Story of Viglund the Fair," are the other two
stories that give the title to the volume, representing the thirteenth
and fifteenth centuries, as "Frithiof" represented the fourteenth.
6.
With _Sigurd the Volsung_ ended the first great Icelandic period of
Morris's work. More than a dozen years passed before he returned to the
field, and from 1889 until his death, in 1896, everything he wrote bore
proofs of his abiding interest in and affection for the ancient
literature. The remarkable series of romances, _The House of the
Wolfings_ (1889), _The Roots of the Mountains_ (1890), _The Story of the
Glittering Plain_ (1891), _The Wood Beyond the World_ (1895), _The Well
at the World's End_ (1896) and _The Sundering Flood_ (posthumous), are
none of them distinctively Old Norse in geography or in story, but they
all have the flavor of the saga-translations, and are all the better for
it. They are as original and as beautiful as the poet's tapestries and
furniture, and if they did not provoke imitation as did the tapestries
and furniture, it was not because they were not worth imitating: more
than likely there were no imitators equal to the task. In these romances
we have men and women with the characteristics of an olden time that are
most worthy of conservation in the present time. The ideals of womanfolk
and manfolk in _The House of the Wolfings_ and _The Roots of the
Mountains_, for instance, are such as an Englishman might well be proud
to have in his remote ancestry. Hall-Sun, Wood-Sun, Sunbeam, and Bowmay
are wholesome women to meet in a story, and Thiodolf, Gold-mane,
Iron-face and Hallward are every inch men for book-use or to commune
with every day. Weaklings, too, abide in these stories, and Penny-thumb
and Rusty and Fiddle and Wood-grey lend humanity to the company.
The two romances last mentioned are so steeped in the atmosphere of the
sagas, that what with folk-motes and shut-beds, and byres, and
man-quellers, and handsels and speech-friends, we seem to lose ourselves
in yet another version of a northern tale. Morris retains the old idiom
that he invented for his translations, and keeps the tyro thumbing his
dictionary, but the charm is increased by the archaisms. As one seeks
the words in the dictionary, one learns that Chaucer, Spenser and the
Ballads were the wells from which he drew these rare words, and that his
employment of them is only another phase of his love for the old far-off
things. It is true that the language of Morris is not of any one
stadium of English, but it is a poet's privilege to draw upon all
history for his words as well as for his allusions, and the revivals in
question are of worthy words pushed aside by the press of newer, but not
necessarily better forms.
These works are the kind that show the influence of Old Norse literature
as spiritual rather than substantial. The stories are not drawn from the
older literature, nor are the settings patterned after it; but the
impulses that swayed men and women in the sagaman's tale, and the
motives that uplifted them, are found here. We cannot think that the
English people will always be unmindful of the great debt that they owe
to the Muse of the North.
7.
In 1891, Morris engaged in a literary enterprise that set the fashion
for similar enterprises in succeeding years. With Eirikr Magnusson he
undertook the making of _The Saga Library_, "addressed to the whole
reading public, and not only to students of Scandinavian history,
folk-lore and language."[33] With Bernard Quaritch's imprint on the
title pages, these volumes to the number of five were issued in
exceptional type and form. The munificence of the publisher was equalled
by the skill of the translators, and in their versions of "Howard, the
Halt," "The Banded Men," and "Hen Thorir" (in Vol. I, dated 1891), "The
Ere-Dwellers" (in Vol. II, dated 1892) and _Heimskringla_ (in Vols. III,
IV and V, dated 1893-4-5), the definitive translations of sterling sagas
were given. As was the case with their _Grettis Saga_, the works rise to
the dignity of masterpieces, and had we no other legacy from Morris'
wealth of Icelandic scholarship, these translations were precious enough
to keep us grateful through many generations.
8.
One more contribution to English literature hailing from the North, and
we have done with William Morris's splendid gifts. The volume of 1891,
entitled _Poems by the Way_, contains several pieces that must be
reckoned with. The vividest recollections of Icelandic materials here
made use of are the poems "Iceland First Seen," and "To the Muses of the
North." No reader of the poet's biography can forget the remarkable
journey that Morris made through Iceland, nor how he prepared for that
journey with all the care and love of a pilgrim bound for a shrine of
his deepest devotion. Every foot of ground was visited that had been
hallowed by the noble souls and inspiring deeds of the past, and that
pilgrimage warmed him to loving literary creation through the remainder
of his life. The last two stanzas of the first of the poems just
mentioned show what a strong hold the forsaken island had upon his
affections, and go far to explain the success of his Icelandic work:
O Queen of the grief without knowledge,
of the courage that may not avail,
Of the longing that may not attain,
of the love that shall never forget,
More joy than the gladness of laughter
thy voice hath amidst of its wail:
More hope than of pleasure fulfilled
amidst of thy blindness is set;
More glorious than gaining of all
thine unfaltering hand that shall fail:
For what is the mark on thy brow
but the brand that thy Brynhild doth bear?
Lone once, and loved and undone
by a love that no ages outwear.
Ah! when thy Balder conies back,
and bears from the heart of the Sun
Peace and the healing of pain,
and the wisdom that waiteth no more;
And the lilies are laid on thy brow
'mid the crown of the deeds thou hast done;
And the roses spring up by thy feet
that the rocks of the wilderness wore.
Ah! when thy Balder comes back
and we gather the gains he hath won,
Shall we not linger a little
to talk of thy sweetness of old,
Yea, turn back awhile to thy travail
whence the Gods stood aloof to behold?
In several other poems in this volume he recurs to the practice of his
romances, Scandinavianizes where the tendency of other poets would be
to mediævalize. "Of the Wooing of Hallbiorn the Strong," and "The Raven
and the King's Daughter" are examples. Here we have ballads like those
that Coleridge and Keats conceived on occasion, full of the beauty that
lends itself so kindly to painted-glass decoration; clustered
spear-shafts, crested helms and curling banners, and everywhere lily
hands combing yellow hair or broidering silken standards. But the names
strike a strange note in these songs of Morris, and the accompaniments
are very different from the mediæval kind:
Come ye carles of the south country,
Now shall we go our kin to see!
For the lambs are bleating in the south,
And the salmon swims towards Olfus mouth.
Girth and graithe and gather your gear!
And ho for the other Whitewater![34]
The introduction of the homely arts of bread-winning distinguishes the
romance of Scandinavia from the romance of Southern Europe, and here
Morris struck into a new field for poetry. Wherever we turn to note the
effects of Icelandic tradition, we find this presence of daily toil,
always associated with dignity, never apologized for. The connection
between Morris' art and Morris' socialism is not hard to explain.
No commentary can equal Morris' own poem, "To the Muse of the North," in
setting forth the charm that drew him to the literature of Iceland:
O Muse that swayest the sad Northern Song,
Thy right hand full of smiting and of wrong,
Thy left hand holding pity; and thy breast
Heaving with hope of that so certain rest:
Thou, with the grey eyes kind and unafraid,
The soft lips trembling not, though they have said
The doom of the World and those that dwell therein.
The lips that smile not though thy children win
The fated Love that draws the fated Death.
O, borne adown the fresh stream of thy breath,
Let some word reach my ears and touch my heart,
That, if it may be, I may have a part
In that great sorrow of thy children dead
That vexed the brow, and bowed adown the head,
Whitened the hair, made life a wondrous dream,
And death the murmur of a restful stream,
But left no stain upon those souls of thine
Whose greatness through the tangled world doth shine.
O Mother, and Love and Sister all in one,
Come thou; for sure I am enough alone
That thou thine arms about my heart shouldst throw,
And wrap me in the grief of long ago.
V.
IN THE LATTER DAYS.
ECHOES OF ICELAND IN LATER POETS.
After William Morris the northern strain that we have been listening for
in the English poets seems feeble and not worth noting. Nevertheless, it
must be remarked that in the harp of a thousand strings that wakes to
music under the bard's hands, there is a sweep which thrills to the
ancient traditions of the Northland. Now and then the poet reaches for
these strings, and gladdens us with some reminiscence of
old, unhappy, far-off things
And battles long ago.
As had already been intimated, the table of contents in a present-day
volume of poetry is very apt to show an Old Norse title. Thus Robert
Lord Lytton's _Poems Historical and Characteristic_ (London, 1877)
reveals among the poems on European, Oriental, classic and mediaeval
subjects, "The Death of Earl Hacon," a strong piece inspired by an
incident in _Heimskringla_. In Robert Buchanan's multifarious versifying
occurs this title: "Balder the Beautiful, A Song of Divine Death," but
only the title is Old Norse; nothing in the poem suggests that origin
except a notion or two of the end of all things. "Hakon" is the title of
a short virile piece more nearly of the Norse spirit. Sidney Dobell's
drama _Balder_ has only the title to suggest the Icelandic, but Gerald
Massey has the true ring in a number of lyrics, with themes drawn from
the records of Norway's relations with England. In "The Norseman" there
is a trumpet strain that recalls the best of the border-ballads; there
is also a truthfulness of portraiture that argues a poet's, intuition in
Gerald Massey, if not an acquaintance with the sagas:
The Norseman's King must stand up tall,
If he would be head over all;
Mainmast of Battle! when the plain
Is miry-red with bloody rain!
And grip his weapon for the fight,
Until his knuckles grin tooth-white,
The banner-staff he bears is best
If double handful for the rest:
When "follow me" cries the Norseman.
He knows the gentler side of Old Norse character, too, a side which, as
we have seen, was not suspected till Carlyle came:
He hides at heart of his rough life,
A world of sweetness for the Wife;
From his rude breast a Babe may press
Soft milk of human tenderness,--
Make his eyes water, his heart dance,
And sunrise in his countenance:
In merriest mood his ale he quaffs
By firelight, and with jolly heart laughs
The blithe, great-hearted Norseman.
The poem "Old King Hake," is as strikingly true in characterization as
the preceding. In half a dozen strophes Massey has told a whole saga,
and has found time, too, to describe "an iron hero of Norse mould." How
miserable a personage is the Italian that flits through Browning's pages
when contrasted with this hero:
When angry, out the blood would start
With old King Hake;
Not sneak in dark caves of the heart,
Where curls the snake,
And secret Murder's hiss is heard
Ere the deed be done:
He wove no web of wile and word;
He bore with none.
When sharp within its sheath asleep
Lay his good sword,
He held it royal work to keep
His kingly word.
A man of valour, bloody and wild,
In Viking need;
And yet of firelight feeling mild
As honey-mead.
Another poem, "The Banner-Bearer of King Olaf," pictures the strong
fighter in a death he rejoiced to die. It is a good poem of the class
that nerves men to die for the flag, and it has the Old Norse spirit.
These poems are all from Massey's volume _My Lyrical Life_ (London.
1889).
A glance at the other poems in Gerald Massey's volumes shows that like
Morris, and like Kingsley, and like Carlyle, the poet was a workman
eager to do for the workman. Is it not suggestive that these men found
themselves drawn to Old Norse character and life? The Icelandic republic
cherished character as the highest quality of citizenship, and put few
or no social obstacles in the way of its achievement. The literature
inspired by that life reveals a fellowship among the members of that
republic that is the envy of social reformers of the present day. Morris
makes one of the personages in _The Story of the Glittering Plain_
(Chap. I) say these words: "And as for Lord, I knew not this word, for
here dwell we the Sons of the Raven in good fellowship, with our wives
that we have wedded, and our mothers who have borne us, and our sisters
who serve us." Almost may this description serve for Iceland in its
golden age, and so it is no wonder that the socialist, the priest, and
the philosopher of our own disjointed times go back to the sagas for
ideals to serve their countrymen.
We have no other poets to mention by name in connection with this Old
Norse influence, although doubtless a search through the countless
volumes that the presses drop into a cold and uncaring world would
reveal other poems with Scandinavian themes. We close this section of
our investigation with the remark already made, that, in the tables of
titles in volumes of contemporary verse, acknowledgment to Old Norse
poetry and prose are not the rarity they once were, and in poems of any
kind allusions to the same sources are very common.
RECENT TRANSLATIONS.
We have already noted the beginning of serial publications of saga
translations, namely, Morris and Magnusson's _Saga Library_ which was
stopped by the death of Morris when the fifth volume had been completed.
By the last decade of the nineteenth century Icelandic had become one of
the languages that an ordinary scholar might boast, and in consequence
the list of translations began to lengthen very fast. Several English
publishers with scholarly instincts were attracted to this field, and
so the reading public may get at the sagas that were so long the
exclusive possession of learned professors. _The Northern Library_,
published by David Nutt, of London, already contains four volumes and
more are promised: _The Saga of King Olaf Tryggwason,_ by J. Sephton,
appeared in 1895; _The Tale of Thrond of Gate_ (_Færeyinga Saga_), by F.
York Powell, in 1896; _Hamlet in Iceland_ (_Ambales Saga_), by Israel
Gollancz, in 1898; _The Saga of King Sverri of Norway_ (_Sverris Saga_),
by J. Sephton, in 1899. If we cannot give to these the praise of being
great literature though translations, we can at least foresee that this
process of turning all the readable sagas into English will quicken
adaptations and increase the stock of allusions in modern writings.
An example of the publishers' feeling that the reading public will find
an interest in the saga itself, is the translation of _Laxdæla Saga_ by
Muriel A.C. Press (London, 1899, J.M. Dent & Co.). William Morris made
this saga known to readers of English poetry by his magnificent "Lovers
of Gudrun." Mrs. Press lets us see the story in its original form.
Perhaps this translation will appeal as widely as any to those who read,
and we may note the differences between this form of writing and that to
which the modern times are accustomed.
This saga is a story, but it is not like the work of fiction, nor like
the sketch of history which appeals to our interest to-day. It has not
the unity of purpose which marks the novel, nor the broad outlook over
events which characterizes the history. Plotting is abundant, but plot
in the technical sense there is none. Events are recorded in
chronological order, but there is no march of those events to a
_denouement_. While it would be wrong to say that there is no one hero
in a saga, it would be more correct to say that that hero's name is
legion. From generation to generation a saga-history wends its way, each
period dominated by a great hero. The annals of a family edited for
purposes of oral recitation, or the life of the principal member of that
family with an introduction dealing with the great deeds of as many of
his ancestors as he would be proud to own--this seems to be what a saga
was--_Laxdæla_, _Grettla_, _Njala_.
This form permits many sterling literary qualities. Movement is the
most marked characteristic. This was essential to a spoken story, and
the sharpest impression left in the mind of an English reader is that of
relentless activity. Thus he finds it necessary to keep the bearings of
the story by consulting the list of _dramatis personæ_ and the map, both
indispensable accompaniments of a saga-translation. The chapter headings
make this list, and a glance at them for _Laxdæla_ reveals a procession
of notable personages--Ketill, Unn, Hoskuld, Olaf the Peacock, Kiartan,
Gudrun, Bolli, Thorgills, Thorkell, Thorleik, Bolli Bollison and Snorri.
Each of these is, in turn, the center of action, and only Gudrun keeps
prominent for any length of time.
Character-portraiture, ever a remarkable achievement in literature, is
excellently done in the sagas. There was a necessity for this; so many
personages crowded the stage that, if they were not to be mere puppets,
they would have to be carefully discriminated. That they were so a
perusal of any saga will prove.
In a novel love is almost indispensable; in a saga other forces are the
impelling motives. Love-making gets the novelist's tenderest interest
and solicitude, but it receives little attention from the sagaman.
Wooing under the Arctic Circle was a methodical bargaining, and there
was little room for sentiment. When Thorvald asked for Osvif's daughter
Gudrun, the father "said that against the match it would tell that he
and Gudrun were not of equal standing. Thorvald spoke gently and said he
was wooing a wife, not money. After that Gudrun was betrothed to
Thorvald.... He should also bring her jewels, so that no woman of equal
wealth should have better to show.... Gudrun was not asked about it and
took it much to heart, yet things went on quietly." (Chap. XXXIV of
_Laxdæla_.) In Iceland, as elsewhere, love was a source of discord, and
for that reason love is always present in the saga. It is not the tender
passion there, silvered with moonlight and attended by song. The saga is
a man's tale.
The translation just referred to is in _The Temple Classics_, published
by J.M. Dent & Co., London, 1899, and edited by Israel Gollancz. The
editor promises (p. 273) other sagas in this form, if Mrs. Press's work
prove successful. He speaks of _Njala_ and _Volsunga_ as imminent. It is
to be hoped that the intention is to give the Dasent and the Morris
versions, for they cannot be excelled.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: Quoted in Gray, by E.W. Gosse, English Men of Letters, p.
163.]
[Footnote 2: B. Hoff. Hovedpunkter af den Oldislandske
litteratur-historie. København. 1873.]
[Footnote 3: Pp. xli-l in Selections from the Poetry and Prose of Thomas
Gray, edited by W.L. Phelps. Ginn & Co., Boston. 1894.]
[Footnote 4: Life of Gray, pp. 160 ff.]
[Footnote 5: Wm. Sharp in Lyra Celtica, p. xx. Patrick Geddes and
Colleagues. Edinburgh. 1896.]
[Footnote 6: Of Heroic Virtue, p. 355, Vol. III of Sir William Temple's
Works. London. 1770.]
[Footnote 7: Of Heroic Virtue, p. 356.]
[Footnote 8: Of Poetry, p. 416.]
[Footnote 9: Spelling and punctuation are as in the original.]
[Footnote 10: Stopford Brooke, English Literature. D. Appleton & Co.,
New York. 1884. p. 150.]
[Footnote 11: Vol. 3, pp. 146-311.]
[Footnote 12: Quoted in Introduction, p. vii.]
[Footnote 13: Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart., Vol. I, p.
231. Boston, Houghton, Osgood & Co. 1879.]
[Footnote 14: Edinburgh Review, Oct., 1806.]
[Footnote 15: Quoted in Lockhart's Life, Vol. III, p. 241.]
[Footnote 16: In G.W. Dasent's Life of Cleasby, prefixed to the
Icelandic-English Dictionary. Based on the MS. collection of the late
Richard Cleasby, enlarged and completed by Gudbrand Vigfusson. Oxford.
1874.]
[Footnote 17: In another work by Carlyle, _The Early Kings of Norway_
(1875) he takes special delight in revealing to Englishmen name
etymologies that hark back to Norse times. Of this sort are Osborn from
Osbjorn; Tooley St. (London) from St. Olave, St. Oley, Stooley, Tooley,
(Chap. X).]
[Footnote 18: _The Early Kings of Norway_ bears a later date--1875--than
the works we are considering just now, and it is dealt with here only
because Carlyle's _Heroes and Hero-Worship_ belongs in the decade we are
considering.]
[Footnote 19: Chap. V of Preliminary Dissertation.]
[Footnote 20: Letters, Vol. I, p. 55, dated Dec. 12, 1855.]
[Footnote 21: Home of the Eddic Poems, p. xxxix. London, 1899. David
Nutt.]
[Footnote 22: Introduction to the Cleasby Dictionary.]
[Footnote 23: Oxford Essays, 1858, p. 214.]
[Footnote 24: Lectures delivered in America in 1874, by Charles
Kingsley. London. 1875. p. 71.]
[Footnote 25: P. 78.]
[Footnote 26: P. 89.]
[Footnote 27: P. 90.]
[Footnote 28: P. 91.]
[Footnote 29: P. 96.]
[Footnote 30: The Life of William Morris, by J.W. Mackail. London, New
York, Bombay. Vol. I, p. 200.]
[Footnote 31: Edmond Scherer. Essays on English Literature, p. 309.]
[Footnote 32: Citations are from the 3d edition. Boston. 1881.]
[Footnote 33: Preface to Vol. I, p. v.]
[Footnote 34: The Wooing of Hallbiorn.]