She behaves nobly, and also selfishly, but always like a flesh and blood woman. Her marriage is tumultuous, with political intrigue changing the destiny of her family (and with numerous boys, it’s quite a family). Kristin is headstrong, daring, passionate, pious, and at times exasperating. All I can tell you is that it is a pleasure to read, and the other one is not.Īnd what a pleasure it is! The novel spans the 14th-century life of its title character, the daughter of a prosperous farmer in Norway, from age seven until her death as an old woman. In 1997, Tiina Nunnally came out with a more modern translation, one that is said to be more faithful to Undset’s prose. The standard English translation, which has been around since the 1920s, is quite fusty. I’ve had the novels since a Norwegian friend gave them to me for Christmas 1992, but I’ve never been able to read them. This week I finished reading Sigrid Undset’s Nobel Prize-winning trilogy, Kristin Lavransdatter. Statue of Kristin Lavransdatter, Sel, Norway
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