Review (PDF) Eirik The Red And Other Icelandic Sagas (Oxford World's Classics)
Selected by Gwyn Jones--the eminent Celtic scholar--for their excellence and variety, these nine Icelandic sagas include "Hen-Thorir," "The Vapnfjord Men," "Thorstein Staff-Struck," "Hrafnkel the Priest of Frey," "Thidrandi whom the Goddesses Slew," "Authun and the Bear," "Gunnlaug Wormtongue," "King Hrolf and his Champions," and the title piece.About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
Series: Oxford World's Classics
Paperback: 336 pages
Publisher: Oxford University Press; Reissue edition (February 15, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0199539154
ISBN-13: 978-0199539154
Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 0.7 x 5 inches
Shipping Weight: 8.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
Best Sellers Rank: #367,272 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #47 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Poetry > Regional & Cultural > European > Norse & Icelandic Sagas #364 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Poetry > Ancient, Classical & Medieval > Ancient & Classical #3127 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Short Stories & Anthologies > Anthologies
This is a review of "Eirik the Red and Other Icelandic Sagas," a mid-twentieth-century translation of medieval literature, with some reflections on the word "saga," and the various uses of it. (I've re-read the volume from time to time since the early 1970s, so I am more familiar with the contents than the limited amount of detail -- or of spoilers -- included here may indicate.)Gwyn Jones (1907-1999) was a medievalist, a translator (from Welsh and Old Norse), a novelist and short-story writer, and at times an editor who published pieces by T.S. Eliot and J.R.R. Tolkien (in "The Welsh Review"). He should not be confused with, e.g., the Welsh novelist, short story writer, and poet Glyn Jones [1905-1995] -- See Wikipedia for both, plus several others with one or another of the two similar names (disambiguations).Gwyn Jones' "Eirik the Red and Other Icelandic Sagas" (1961) is a short (318 pages of text), but remarkably varied, collections of both Sagas proper and shorter stories (thattr) usually founded embedded in other, longer, works. It was originally published as a small, blue-bound hardcover, in the original "World's Classics" series from Oxford University Press, and re-issued as a mass-market paperback in 1980. The present edition is under the "Oxford World's Classics" series title, in its slightly larger paperback format.All of the material has been translated by others -- some pieces several time -- but Gwyn Jones' translations read well (I think), and are regarded as reliable representatives of the text editions he had available over half a century ago.
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