SAGA-BOOK - Viking Society Web Publications

On Arons saga Hjorleifssonar
Aron so bravely at Svinafell. The author tries to insist
that his hero has the same personal force, but he fails to
depict it fully in action. Nowhere is Aron drawn into
a sufficiently tragic dilemma. In the episode at
Geirpjofsfjaroareyrr, although Aron emerges the physical
victor and master of the situation, the moral show is
stolen by Siguror and Egill, who elect to join a conflict
in which they have no apparent personal interest, simply
because they are unwilling to face the self-reproach which
flight would entail. In all these instances the reader's
sympathies are more solidly engaged for the individuals
concerned than they are at any time for the nominal hero
of the piece. The author lived at a time when the heroic
age was certainly over, yet he shows in his handling of
these scenes that his aesthetic sensibility was fully
alive. It is significant that it inspires him to his best
writing.
It is difficult to speak with absolute confidence about the
artistic merits of a work preserved in the composite form
of this saga, as also of one which is at least semihistorical
in its nature, for one cannot finally separate
what is due to the author's own powers from what is due
to his sources.
The author's ability to use his data to good literary and
dramatic effect has already been illustrated. His style is
that of a fairly plain pragmatic narrator who wastes few
words on unessentials, though this statement must be
modified by reference to the personal intrusions of the
author himself.
There is no dialogue, and very little reported speech,
until the time when Aron and Eyj6lfr break the silence
with their conversation on the foreshore at Grimsey. It
is at this point that the actors seem to burst into life upon
the scene, as though the author himself is reacting to the
drama of the moment. His description of the landingplace,
with its deep waters, seaweed-lined shore and steep
cliffs, is brief but sufficient, and seems to narrow the