Response to The Saga of Gunnlaug Sperent-Tongue

I was surprised to find, at the beginning of this saga, an introduction by a narrator--the very element we found missing in our discussions last class. It certainly helped me to have someone give me the outline of the story upfront and highlight the important events to note and the moral significance the story attempts to portray.

When I began the actual saga, I had to ask, how many Thorsteins are we going to meet in the course of this book?! There appears to be multiple Thorsteins in every saga. Another thing I found interesting at the beginning of the tale was that they made note that Thorstein's wife Jofrid was only 18 when he married her, yet she was already a widow with a child. I guess this make sense seeing as back in those days they married early. I liked this little glimpse into the ways of their people, because sometimes I felt in the last stories that they acted so much like us their agespan and the time and setting of major events in their lives would mirror ours as well. Apparently not.

Reading Response 2

Even though I was forewarned by the introduction about some of the various topics and issues addressed in these first "tales," I was still surprised by the intesity with which the Vikings valued honor. To the point where Thorstein Staff-struck's father tells him he, "would rather loose you [Thorstein], than have a coward for a son." I was also surprised at the longevity when dealing with personal matters. Several times throughout the readings, "all remained quiet until Yule," or "until the next fall." Problems were dealt with almost leisurly, as though everyone knew no one was going to flee or go anywhere soon.

Another surprising part of the Thorstein tale for me was the moral I got out of the story. At one point towards the end, Throstein tells Bjarni, "everyone is eager to live through a struggle if he has the power to." At first, I was confused about whether or not Thorstein was being "cowardly" under Icelandic standards. Especially when he tells Bjarni, "I will not strike eagerly." I was under the impression that his father wanted him to fight Bjarni with all this strength, or otherwise be considered a coward. I didn't think that being "eager to live through a struggle" was necessarily an opinion the Icelandic society held at this point and time, because all the occurances up until this point had been solved with a simple murder (well, as simple as murder can be). After Bjarni dies, "no man was thought to be equal in integrety and bravery [to Thorstein]," presumably for surviving through battle and spending the remainder of Bjarni's life by his side.

The overall moral I got out of this tale is that it takes more courage not to kill, than to solve issues with a blatent slaughtery. I thought this was somewhat deep or progressive thinking for the time in which these tales took place, and it interested me to see how this line of thinking progressed over time.

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