ABSTRACT

This book presents a range of approaches to the study of Old Norse poetry in performance.

The contributors examine both eddic and skaldic poems and consider the surviving evidence for how they were originally recited or otherwise performed in medieval Scandinavia, Iceland and at royal courts across Europe. This study also engages with the challenge of reconstructing medieval performance styles and examines ways of applying the modern discipline of Performance Studies to the fragmentary corpus of Old Norse verse. The performance of verse by characters who appear in the Old Icelandic saga tradition is also considered, as is the cultural value associated not only with the poems themselves but with their various means of transmission and reception.

This book will be of great interest to students and scholars in the fields of Old Norse studies, Performance and Theatre History.

chapter |15 pages

Introduction

part I|28 pages

The Social Dynamics of Performance

chapter 1|26 pages

Framing Old Norse Performance Contexts

The Wedding at Reykjahólar (1119) Revisited

part II|63 pages

Voice and Performance

chapter 3|22 pages

… með skarða skjöldu ok skotnar brynjur

The Distribution and Function of Aural Sense Impressions in Old Norse Poetry

part IV|59 pages

Material Culture

chapter 7|32 pages

Performing Old Norse Poetry in Visual Art

A Comparative Perspective with the Islamic World and a Scandinavian Box in Spain

chapter 8|25 pages

How the Hell Do You Read This?

The Evolution of Eddic Orality Through Manuscript Performance

part V|87 pages

Modern Approaches to Performing Old Norse Poetry

chapter 9|21 pages

Old Norse Poetry in Performance

Perils, Pitfalls and Possibilities 1

chapter 12|14 pages

Beowulf, the Edda and the Performance of Medieval Epic

Notes from the Workshop of a Reconstructed ‘Singer of Tales' 1

chapter 13|22 pages

‘ıð Beſta eꝛ quæðeð fm̄ flutt' 1

Kveðnar Drápur og Kveðnar Rímur