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    The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga)
    The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga)
    The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga)
    Ebook293 pages2 hours

    The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga)

    By William Morris

    4.5/5

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    About this ebook

    This early work by William Morris was originally published in 1899 and we are now republishing it with a brand new introductory biography. William Morris was born in London, England in 1834. Arguably best known as a textile designer, he founded a design partnership which deeply influenced the decoration of churches and homes during the early 20th century. However, he is also considered an important Romantic writer and pioneer of the modern fantasy genre, being a direct influence on authors such as J. R. R. Tolkien. As well as fiction, Morris penned poetry and essays. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRead Books Ltd.
    Release dateMay 6, 2015
    ISBN9781473395862
    The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga)
    Author

    William Morris

    William Morris has worked on international tax policy matters in the public and private sectors for over twenty years. He is also a member of the clergy team at St Martin-in-the-Fields, having been ordained a priest in the Church of England in 2010. He has degrees in history, law and theology, and is the author of 'Where is God at Work?'

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    Reviews for The Story of the Volsungs, (Volsunga Saga)

    4.5/5

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    • 3/5
      Incest, murder, more murder, dragons, high level smithing, treason, revenge, and Attila the Hun. Also, short, pleasant to read, and not obsessed with silly details. What exactly is there not to like?
    • 5/5
      Morris took the Völsunga saga, a late 13th century Icelandic prose mixture of heroic deeds, vendetta, court intrigue, the revenge of queens, dragon slaying and a cursed ring, and using this as his source turned it into a powerful and moving English epic poem. I enjoyed this far more than I thought I would. The characters are vivid. The dramatic tension at the center of the poem where the conflicting values of honor, political necessity, love and envy that lead to tragic conclusions is portrayed realistically in rhyming verse with the flavor of a bygone era.Morris made his Victorian adaptation sound more medieval by liberally sprinkling his modern English with archaic words, for example it’s always held instead of yard or courtyard, and dight instead of ordered, thee and thou instead of you, and clingeth instead of clings. However having access to the Oxford English Dictionary—Thank you to the Houston Public Library for making this available online—made it easy for me to decipher these. This work greatly exceeded my expectations of it.
    • 3/5
      I plan on re-reading this now that I'm more interested in this mythology.
    • 4/5
      Wow. Well, this was certainly action packed! Magic rings, swords in trees (like swords in anvils, only different), and nearly endless duplicitous in-laws. Loads of good stuff, and loads of weird stuff, too. The ending seemed rather abrupt, but that might just have been because it ended as soon as everyone was dead. The notes are good, and the translation is modern and very readable. I enjoyed this, but I have to say that I can't remember ever reading Anything before in which the cast of characters was so consistently bloodthirsty!
    • 3/5
      The Story of the Volsungs, or the Volsunga Saga, is a 13th century Norse epic (by an unknown author) that chronicles the struggles of the Volsung clan/family over the course of a few generations. The most notable member of this family, Sigurd, is the protagonist for around half of the book. The rest of the story features his ancestors, romantic interests, and descendants.I originally decided to read this saga because of its use in other media- especially J.R.R. Tolkien's poetic "The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún" and Richard Wagner's Ring Cycle of operas, "Der Ring des Nibelungen." In Tolkien and Wagner, it is a tale involving Gods, heroes, Valkyries, Giants, and a magic ring. Rather than start with Tolkien's book or performances of the operas, I decided to begin by reading the original material. I selected the 1888 translation by William Morris and Eirikr Magnússon because it was conveniently and freely available from Project Gutenberg.The legend, at least in its original form, isn't quite what I expected. The presence of Gods is slight, and aside from a single (important) scene involving the dragon Fafnir, no other fantastical creatures appear. It is primarily a tale of warriors and kings- it has some of the same fantasized historical feeling as other old legends, histories, and religious tales. (Three examples that come to mind are the Old Testament, China's "Romance of the Three Kingdoms," and "Sundiata: An Epic of Old Mali.") Although the Volsunga Saga takes place in the 13th century, the setting and characters feel like they come out of the Bronze Age. Politics is very localized- there are numerous "kings" who each rule small areas, more like warlords or chiefs of big clans than the medieval European conception of a "king."The story is exceptionally violent, and from a modern perspective, the morality is quite twisted. Heroes are praised in proportion to the number of men (especially kings) they have killed. Honor belongs to the strong, and weakness is not deserving of empathy or pity. Not once, but twice, different women of the Volsung clan (generally regarded as positive protagonists) who were forced to marry kings that they did not like choose to have their own children murdered (and in one case, personally murders them with a knife), though the children were innocent of any wrongdoing. The great hero, Sigurd, also performs acts that a modern reader might consider immoral- his treatment of a king's advisor, Regin, comes to mind.The saga has a few small continuity problems. For example, in one chapter near the middle of the book, the hero Sigurd meets the wise woman Brynhild and, after a time, they swear their love for one-another. In the next chapter, Sigurd has come to a castle. Brynhild arrives there and acts as if she has no memory of swearing to love Sigurd in the preceding chapter, and Sigurd re-acquaints himself with her. Since the saga was assembled out of various oral histories, I'd guess this was a breakpoint between two stories about Sigurd and Brynhild, and the end of one slightly overlaps the beginning of the next.One bizarre aspect of this story is the way in which more than one character shrugs off immediate and dire verbal threats- well past the point of ridiculousness. For example, after the husband of one woman of the Volsung clan kills her brothers, she directly tells him that she's going to kill him. He blows off the threat and offers her some gold, which she angrily refuses. Shortly thereafter, she runs him through with a sword while he's sleeping. If this happened once, maybe it would be attributable to an exceptionally prideful and foolish character- but the way threats are not acted upon repeatedly by different people seems to make little sense.I'll close this review by retelling a tidbit of the story that is disconnected from other parts of the story (and so provides no significant spoilers), but which is emblematic of some of the story's weirdness, violence, and morality.At one point, Gudrun tells her two sons to avenge the death of their sister by killing the king who murdered her. Her two sons dutifully gear themselves for war and begin riding toward the neighboring king's castle. On the way, they meet their brother Erp, who was never previously mentioned and has (apparently) been away and is unaware of recent events. The two sons explain their errand and ask if their brother will come along and help them.Erp answers, "I shall help you as one hand helps the other hand, or as one foot helps the other foot."The two sons considered this answer, decided that it meant that Erp would provide no help at all, and slew him. Then they rode on. (Later, they realize that Erp's answer probably meant that he was willing to help.)While there are certainly interesting historical and cultural things to be learned from reading a story like the Volsunga Saga, as a work of fiction, it is a disappointment. The plot is a meandering set of struggles against numerous petty kings. It is filled with bizarre and flat characters, conversations are either summarized in a sentence or stilted exchanges, and you never feel like you get to know the thoughts or personality of any character. I think a modern retelling of the story (rather than a translation of a very old text) would provide for a better experience. Unless you're primarily interested in historical authenticity, I'd consider going for J.R.R. Tolkien's version rather than the original.
    • 4/5
      This version of the Nibelungenlied is very popular (perhaps because it's shorter?) than the German original. Byock's translation moves along nicely, but I prefer the Hatto translation of the Nibelungenlied or Stephen Grundy's modern redaction of the corpus.
    • 5/5
      Wave runes shall you makeIf you desire to wardYour sail-steeds on the sound.On the stem shall they be cutAnd on the steering bladeAnd burn them on the oar.No broad breaker will fallNor waves of blue,And you will come safe from the sea. In the Saga of the Volsungs, revenge is the only thing that matters and children are just pawns to be sacrificed without a second thought if it will help you in your quest for vengeance. It's eleven years since I first read it and I remembered quite a lot of what happens, as it's a memorable story taking place over two generations, with the story of twins Signy and Sigmund being followed by that of Sigmund's son, Sigurd the dragon slayer.I read the Penguin Classics edition of this saga. The introduction describing the origins of the saga in conflicts between the Huns, Burgundians and Goths in the fourth and fifth centuries during the migration period, which are replayed on a smaller scale in the saga as conflicts between families rather than tribes. There is also an interesting section about Wagner, and his use of parts of the Saga of the Volsungs in the Ring Cycle.
    • 4/5
      Jesse Byock's translation of this is pretty good, as in, clear and readable. Like the other sagas, it's not like a novel: the tone is matter of fact, and for the most unemotional and non-committal. That gets a bit weird to read, sometimes, with abrupt lines like "And he is out of the saga". The story itself is interesting and has obviously been influential (The Lord of the Rings).
    • 4/5
      The Saga of the Volsungs was written in the thirteenth century by an unknown Norse author. The story itself, however, is much older and parts are found throughout many Norse stories prior to this version. The story tells of Sigurd the dragonslayer, a man unlike any in the world, and unsurpassed in any way. His familial heritage is recounted, as is his marriage with Gudrun and their children, and after his death, the fates of Gudrun, her brothers, children, and many others including Attila the Hun and Ermanaric, King of the Goths.The value of this saga on literature is enormous. It influenced the German Nibelungenlied, Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen, and Tolkien's Lord of the Rings and his recently published The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun, among others. Many aspects of the saga are reminiscent in literature - a ring of power; a broken sword that is reforged to perform a specific task; a group of kings and warriors attempting to pull a sword out of a tree with only one person succeeding; a horse descended from Odin's Sleipnir making it one of the best horses in the world; a dragon guarding a vast amount of gold and wealth.As entertainment, The Saga of the Volsungs is up there, with a wonderful story. Of course, the writing is a bit different than most people are accustomed to, being several centuries old and written much differently than today. While some versions may prove a tad difficult and uninteresting to the casual reader, Jesse Byock does an excellent job making it accessible to the common reader while still staying relatively true to the original.Aside from the entertainment value of the saga, it offers insight into the world of the Norse and Norse literature such as kennings, which replaced a noun with a circumlocution - "battle-sweat" instead of "blood", "sleep of the sword" instead of "death", "bane of wood" replacing "fire", etc. This specific translation of the saga maintains many of the kennings which liven up the saga and aid in its unique style. And, of course, it offers glimpses of Norse mythology as Odin plays many roles in the story, as do the norns and valkyries, as well as magic runes and Norse sorcery and, humorously, a senna - that is, a contest of insults including this zinger:Sinfjotli replied: You probably do not remember clearly now when you were the witch on Varinsey and said that you wanted to marry a man and you chose me for the role of husband...I sired nine wolves on you at Laganess, and I was the father of them all. (As can be surmised, he is speaking to another man)The Saga of the Volsungs is an entertaining read, and at roughly 110 pages is not very time consuming and offers a quick glimpse into what some of the Norse valued and how they perceived kingship, courtship, and war.
    • 4/5
      I recall my father reciting the apparence of Odin in this "one-eyed, and seeming ancient, but in his hand a brand" --that may not be verbatim
    • 5/5
      This is one of my favorite sagas. It has interesting themes, and great characters. I am particularly drawn to Signy, though I can't quite put my finger on why. This translation, however, is not one of my favorites. It doesn't scan as well as the Kaaren Grimstad translation but as the Grimstad book is harder to find, this is not a bad substitution.

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