Sigrid Undset

Sigrid Undset 1928

Sigrid Undset (1882-1949) was a Norwegian writer, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1928.

Quotes

Kristin Lavransdatter

All quotes are from the Tiina Nunnally translation, published by Penguin Books

All ellipses as in the books

The Wreath (1920)

Page numbers from the trade paperback edition, ISBN 0-14-118041-2

• It felt like a terrible burden upon her when she realized for the first time that people could have such different opinions about so many things. And not just evil, godless people disagreeing with good people, but also good people such as Brother Edwin and Sira Eirik—or her mother and father. She suddenly realized that they too thought differently about many things.
  • Part I, “Jørundgaard”, Chapter 3 (p. 45)

• “It’s good when you don’t dare do something that doesn’t seem right,” said Fru Aashild with a little laugh. “But it’s not so good if you think something isn’t right because you don’t dare do it.”
  • Chapter 4 (p. 52)

• It could be that the woman knew more than was good for the health of her soul—and yet one should not forget that ignorant people often spoke of witchcraft as soon as a woman showed herself to be wiser than the councilmen.
  • Chapter 4 (p. 56)

• And yet she had the feeling this evening that it was as Brother Edwin had said—that if someone had enough faith, then he could indeed work miracles. But she did not want that kind of faith; she did not love God and His Mother and the saints in that way. She would never love them in that way. She loved the world and longed for the world.
  • Chapter 5 (p. 68)

• No one has the same color of hair or temperament in the rain as in the sun.
  • Chapter 7 (p. 94)

• “But is he still a handsome man, my kinsman Bjørn?”
  “No,” said Kristen. “He looks like a mound of hay that has lain on the ground all winter long.”
  • Part II, “The Wreath”, Chapter 3 (p. 130)

• “Why do you laugh?”
  “Oh, I’m thinking about something that Fru Aashild once said,” replied Kristen. “I was only a child back then. But it was something about good days being granted to sensible people, but the grandest of days are enjoyed by those who dare to act unwisely.”
  • Chapter 8 (p. 184)

• “The ale is good, Lavrans Bjørgulfsøn” said Haakon. “But a slut must have made the porridge for us today. Overly bedded cooks make overly boiled porridge, as the saying goes, and this porridge is scorched.”
  “It’s a shame for me to give you burned porridge, said Lavrans. But I hope that the old saying isn’t always true, because it was my daughter herself who made the porridge.”
  • Part III, “Lavrans Bjørgulfsøn”, Chapter 1 (p. 199)

• Father, Mother, you were both young once. Don’t you remember that it’s not easy to guard yourself against the sin that love provokes?
  • Chapter 2 (p. 207)

• They sat in silence for a while, and then Ragnfrid asked, “What does he look like, this Erlend of Husaby?”
  “Oh,” said Lavrans, hesitating, “he’s a handsome fellow—in a way. But he doesn’t look as if he were much good for anything but seducing women.”
  • Chapter 2 (p. 209)

• “You are the best husband,” she said with a little sob, pressing herself against him.”
  Ardently he embraced her.
  “Tonight I want to sleep with you, Ragnfrid. And if you would be toward me the way you were in the old days, then I wouldn’t be…such a fool.”
  His wife stiffened in his arms and pulled away a little.
  “It’s fasting time,” she said quietly, her voice strangely hard.
  “So it is.” Her husband chuckled. You and I, Ragnfrid, we have observed all the fast days and have tried to live by God’s commandments in all things. And now it almost seems to me…that we might have been happier if we had had more to regret.”
  • Chapter 2 (p. 212)

• Sir Munan burst out laughing and said, “My dear Lavrans, are you complaining that the maiden is not headstrong enough?”
  And Sir Baard said with a little smile, “It seems to me that your daughter has demonstrated that she is not lacking in will. For two years she has stood by Erlend, in spite of your wishes.”
  Lavrans said, “I know that quite well, and yet I know what I’m talking about. It has been hard for her during the time she has defied me, and she won’t be happy with a husband for long unless he can rule her.”
  “The Devil take me,” said Sir Munan. “Then your daughter must be quite unlike all the women I have known, for I’ve never found a single one who didn’t prefer to rule over both herself and her husband.”
  • Chapter 5 (pp. 248-249)

• It must be bitter for a woman of good family to arrive on the arm of the landowner, only to leave with the farm hand.
  • Chapter 5 (p. 249)

The Wife (1921)

Page numbers from the trade paperback edition, ISBN 978-0-14-118128-8

• The Devil himself must have a hand in it when a man’s wife goes to his brother for confession!
  • Part I, “The Fruit of Sin”, Chapter 6 (p. 94)

• Handsome he was not, although he had well-formed features. But his hair had a reddish tinge, and his eyelashes and brows were white; even his eyes were a very pale blue. That people nevertheless found Sir Erling to be good-looking was perhaps due to the fact that everyone knew he was the wealthiest knight in Norway.
  • Part II, “Husaby”, Chapter 1 (p. 122)

• He rammed one fist against the other. “I don’t understand why our Lord should think we need a new son every year.”
  Gunnulf looked up at his brother.
  “Well…I have no idea what our Lord thinks you may need. But what Kristin no doubt needs most is for you to be kind to her.”
  “Yes, I suppose she does,” murmured Erlend.
  • Chapter 2 (p. 163)

• Peace—perhaps the king’s peace would be possible up there someday, but in his lifetime there would be peace only when the Devil attended mass.
  • Chapter 3 (p. 184)

• With this last ring, she felt as if he were marrying her again. Now the she would soon sit beside his lifeless body, he wanted her to know that with this ring he was committing to her the strong and vital force that had lived in this dust and ashes.
  • Chapter 7 (p. 253)

• Through the great darkness that would come, she saw the gleam of another, gentler sun, and she sensed the fragrance of the herbs in the garden at world’s end.
  • Chapter 7 (p. 253)

• “Just wait until you have a wife of your own, Haavard, my foster son. Then you will truly be told how little you know,” he said, and all the men in the room laughed and agreed.
  • Chapter 8 (p. 266)

• “I’ve never seen anything like it—you’ve squandered all your wealth….”
  “Well, I was never the kind of man who would go to Hell with a bare backside merely to save my breeches from being burned.”
  • Part III, “Erlend Nikulaussøn”, Chapter 7 (p. 401)

The Cross (1922)

Page numbers from the trade paperback edition, ISBN 0-14-118235-0

• Many a man is given what was intended for another, but no one is given another man’s fate.
  • Part I, “Honor Among Kin”, Chapter 5 (p. 88; repeated on p. 105)

• Was this how she would see her struggle end? Had she conceived in her womb a flock of restless fledgling hawks that simply lay in her nest, waiting impatiently for the hour when their wings were strong enough to carry them beyond the most distant blue peaks? And their father would clap his hands and laugh: Fly, fly, my young birds.
  They would take with them bloody threads from the roots of her heart when they flew off, and they wouldn’t even know it. She would be left behind alone, and all the heartstrings, which had once bound her to this old home of hers, she had already sundered. That was how it would end, and she would be neither alive nor dead.
  • Part II, “Debtors”, Chapter 2 (p. 154)

• No, I won’t say anything about your father except that he was pious and noble, and you are too; I know that. But often when you speak so gently and sweetly, as if your mouth were full of honey, I fear that you’re thinking mostly about old wrongs, and God will have to judge whether you’re as pious in your heart as you are in words.
  • Chapter 2 (p. 158)

• Yes, I’ve had to learn to ration out the solace sparingly, Kristin. There’s been a cruel shortage of it for several years now. We have to save it up because we don’t know how long it might have to last.
  • Chapter 2 (p. 162)

• Her eyes have been opened to the fact that after the burdens and toil of a young mother comes a new kind of fear and concern for the aging mother.
  • Chapter 3 (p. 164)

• All fires burn out sooner or later.
  • Chapter 4 (p. 201; repeated on pp. 283 and 284)

• Ever since the infant had died, she had wondered why she should pray.
  • Chapter 7 (p. 255)

• After her husband’s death the widow had behaved as if she neither heard nor saw a thing. Stronger than pain or sorrow was the feeling she had of a numbing chill and a dull lassitude in both her body and soul, as if she herself were bleeding to death from his mortal wounds.
  • Part III, “The Cross”, Chapter 1 (pp. 286-287)

• It was easy for someone to stay young if he refused to learn, refused to adapt to his lot in life, and refused to fight to change his circumstances in accordance with his will.
  • Chapter 1 (p. 287)

• Kristin felt as if she were now an old woman. It seem to her that a woman was young as long as she had little children sleeping in her arms at night, playing around her during the day, and demanding her care at all times. When a mother’s children have grown away from her, then she becomes an old woman.
  • Chapter 1 (p. 291)

• Everyone expected the greatest benefits for the realm of Norway now that they would once again have a king who was reared and lived among them, who would protect the laws and rights and interests of the country instead of squandering his time, energies, and the wealth of the kingdom on incursions in other lands.
  • Chapter 1 (p. 306)

• “It has been the fate of many a man,” said Naakkve, “that those who were his fiercest opponents in life found success on the road he had pointed out to them—but only after they had made him into fodder for the worms. After his mouth was stuffed with earth, the lesser men no longer shrank from affirming the truth of his words.”
  • Chapter 1 (p. 306)

• Lord, if only you would give me this and this and this, then I will thank you and ask for nothing more except for this and this and this.…
  • Chapter 4 (p. 371)

• She had not come to God with her wreath or with her sins and sorrows, not as long as the world still possessed a drop of sweetness to add to her goblet. But now she had come, after she had learned that the world is like an alehouse: the person who has no more to spend is thrown outside the door.
  • Chapter 4 (p. 371)

• Brother Nikulaus was also overjoyed. But at the same time Kristin heard other news about him that was not as good. He had laid hands on several farmers over by Steinker; they were in the midst of a dispute with the monastery about some fishing rights. When the monks came upon them one night as they were proceeding to destroy the monastery’s salmon pens, brother Nikulaus had given one man a beating and thrown another into the river, at the same time sinning gravely with his cursing.
  • Chapter 6 (p. 392)

• With the words Sira Eiliv had spoken the day before still in her mind, she suddenly realized that as fearful as she had been for her reckless sons and as sternly as she had often admonished them because she was tormented with anguish for their sakes, she would have been less content with her children if they have been meek and timid.
  • Chapter 7 (p. 399)

• It’s useless to be frightened; fearful men are half dead already.
  • Chapter 7 (p. 401)

• She opened her eyes and looked at the ring lying in the dark palm of the smith. And her tears burst forth in torrents, for she felt as if she had never before fully understood what it signified. The life to which this ring had married her, over which she had complained and grumbled, raged and rebelled. And yet she had loved it so, rejoicing over it, with both the bad and the good, so that there was not a single day she would have given back to God without lament or a single sorrow she would have relinquished without regret.
  • Chapter 7 (p. 421, referring to her wedding ring)

• They headed across the courtyard and over toward the cookhouse. Without thinking, they both walked as lightly and carefully as they could in the new snow.
  • Chapter 7 (p. 424; closing words)

Quotes about Sigrid Undset

• In her extensive work, an Iliad of the North, Sigrid Undset has resurrected in a new and visionary light the ideals which once guided our forefathers who built that community from which our Germanic culture derived. To an age in which it may be easier to acknowledge that the right to the greatest happiness is the duty of renunciation – to this age Sigrid Undset has shown the ideals of our forefathers: duty and faithfulness.
  • Speech at the banquet celebrating the Nobel Prizes of December 10, 1928.
  • Nobel Lectures, Literature 1901-1967, Publisher Horst Frenz, Elsevier Publishing Company , Amsterdam, 1969.