Echoes of Valhalla: The Afterlife of the Eddas and Sagas - Hardcover

Helgason, Jón Karl

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1780237154 ISBN 13: 9781780237152

Publisher: Reaktion Books, 2017

Synopsis

Tolkien’s wizard Gandalf, Wagner’s Valkyrie Brünnhilde, Marvel’s superhero the Mighty Thor, the warrior heading for Valhalla in Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song,” and Donald Crisp’s portrayal of Leif Eriksson in the classic film The Viking—these are just a few examples of how Icelandic medieval literature has shaped human imagination during the past 150 years. Echoes of Valhalla is a unique look at modern adaptations of the Icelandic eddas (poems of Norse mythology) and sagas (ancient prose accounts of Viking history, voyages, and battles) across an astonishing breadth of art forms.

Jón Karl Helgason looks at comic books, plays, travel books, music, and films in order to explore the reincarnations of a range of legendary characters, from the Nordic gods Thor and Odin to the saga characters Hallgerd Long-legs, Gunnar of Hlidarendi, and Leif the Lucky. Roaming the globe, Helgason unearths echoes of Nordic lore in Scandinavia, Britain, America, Germany, Italy, and Japan. He examines the comic work of Jack Kirby and cartoon work of Peter Madsen; reads the plays of Henrik Ibsen and Gordon Bottomley; engages thought travelogues by Frederick Metcalfe and Poul Vad; listens to the music of Richard Wagner, Edward Elgar, and the metal band Manowar; and watches films by directors such as Roy William Neill and Richard Fleischer, outlining the presence of the eddas and sagas in these nineteenth- and twentieth-century works.  

Altogether, Echoes of Valhalla tells the remarkable story of how disparate, age-old poetry and prose originally recorded in remote areas of medieval Iceland have come to be a part of our shared cultural experience today—how Nordic gods and saga heroes have survived and how their colorful cast of characters and adventures they went on are as vibrant as ever.
 

About this title

About the Author:

Jón Karl Helgason is professor in the Department of Icelandic and Comparative Cultural Studies at the University of Iceland. He is the author of several books on the modern afterlife of Icelandic medieval literature, including The Rewriting of Njáls Saga.

Review:

“From the fascinating history of Viking myths, legends, and sagas to their refashioning in opera, plays, novels, films, comic-books, and heavy metal. . . . Jón Karl Helgason’s compelling study is simultaneously learned, insightful, and highly entertaining.” (Martin Arnold, University of Hull)

“Echoes of Valhalla effectively underlines the ways in which many of our favorite modern narratives are interwoven with enduring ancient Nordic threads.” (Terry Gunnell, University of Iceland)

About this edition

• Publisher: Reaktion Books
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1780237154
• ISBN 13: 9781780237152
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 256