This book gives a comprehensive account of Icelandic literature form the earliest times to the Reformation, still accessible to modern Icelanders as living literature. The early poetry and the sagas were a unique literary achievement in the European middle ages and represent Scandinavia's most important contribution to world literature as a whole. As well as being a gifted writer and sympathetic critic, Dr Jónas Kristjánsson, recently retired as Professor and Director of the Árni Magnússon Institute of the University of Iceland, has few rivals in eminence as a scholar in the field of Old Icelandic studies. This English version of his work was undertaken by Peter Poote, sometime Professor of Scandinavian Studies at University College London. First edition 1988. This edition 1997 443 pages. Paperback.
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