The Poetic Edda
The Poetic Edda, translated by Carolyne Larrington (Oxford World’s Classics Hardback Collection) / 347 pages / ISBN 9780198834571
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“She sees, coming up a second time, / earth from the ocean, eternally green; / the waterfalls plunge, an eagle soars above them, / over the mountain hunting fish.”
After the terrible conflagration of Ragnarok, the earth rises serenely again from the ocean, and life is renewed. The Poetic Edda begins with The Seeress’s Prophecy which recounts the creation of the world, and looks forward to its destruction and rebirth. In this great collection of Norse-Icelandic mythological and heroic poetry, the exploits of gods and humans are related. The one-eyed Odin, red-bearded Thor, Loki the trickster, the lovely goddesses, and the giants who are their enemies walk beside the heroic Helgi, Sigurd the Dragon-Slayer, Brynhild the shield-maiden, and the implacable Gudrun. This translation also features the quest-poem The Lay of Svipdag and The Waking of Angantyr, in which a girl faces down her dead father to retrieve his sword.
Comic, tragic, instructive, grandiose, witty, and profound, the poems of the Edda have influenced artists from Wagner to Tolkien and speak to us as freely as when they were first written down seven hundred and fifty years ago.
“This is a lovingly presented translation of one of the most important works of Norse mythology … A fabulous collection worthy of multiple readings.” — Arthur Chappell, Concatenation.org
Carolyne Larrington has published widely on Old Norse myth, legends, and literature, inlcuding co-editing two volumes of essays on eddic poetry wiht Paul Acker. Her books include King Arthur’s Enchantresses: Morgan and Her Sisters in Arthurian Tradition (IB Tauris, 2006), Magical Tales: Myth, Legend, and Enchantment in Children’s Books (with Diane Purkiss, Bodleian Library, 2013), and The Norse Myths: A Guide to the Gods and Heroes (Thames and Hudson, 2017).
