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The Sea Road
A haunting, compelling historical novel, The Sea Road is a daring re-telling of the 11th-century Viking exploration of the North Atlantic from the viewpoint of one extraordinary woman. Gudrid lives at the remote edge of the known world, in a starkly beautiful landscape where the sea is the only connection to the shores beyond. It is a world where the old Norse gods are still invoked, even as Christianity gains favour, where the spirits of the dead roam the vast northern ice-fields, tormenting the living, and Viking explorers plunder foreign shores. Taking the accidental discovery of North America as its focal point, Gudrid's narrative describes a multi-layered voyage into the unknown, all recounted with astonishing immediacy and rich atmospheric detail.
244 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2000
About the author
Margaret Elphinstone
34 books43 followersMargaret Elphinstone is a Scottish novelist. She studied at Queen's College in London and Durham University. She was until recently, Professor of Writing in the Department of English Studies at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, now retired. Her academic research areas are Scottish writers and the literature of Scotland's offshore islands.
She did extensive study tours in Iceland, Greenland, Labrador and the United States. She lived for eight years in the Shetland Islands and is the mother of two children.
She did extensive study tours in Iceland, Greenland, Labrador and the United States. She lived for eight years in the Shetland Islands and is the mother of two children.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 95 reviews
November 21, 2022
This is a novel of an important character in two Norse sagas, The Saga of the Greenlanders and Erik the Red’s Saga which take place in the eleventh century. Both sagas were based on oral tradition and lore and then written down in the thirteenth century . As well as appearing in the sagas, Gudrin Thorbjarnadottir is the central character in Margaret Elphinstone’s novel. Sagas were intended to entertain as well as to tell history and genealogy to their audiences and this novel does that as well even if it is not strictly told in saga style.
The Sea Road is a very creative way to tell the woman’s side of the story. Gudrin is shown telling her life and travels to an Icelandic speaking monk in Rome. She has come on a pilgrimage. Gudrin’s early story comes at a time in Icelandic history when the belief in the old pagan gods is transitioning into Christianity. The monk is transcribing her story at the request of his superior. Agnar is obviously fascinated by this old woman (maybe in her 50s). She’s quite the character, strong, earthy, and direct.
Gudrin tells Agnar at one point that the men lives are full of war, hunting and trading. She might also have included raiding, not a very Christian idea. Gudrin’s job is running the farm and raising children, no small thing as if the farm fails or is not well maintained many will starve in the harsh winters.
If you have read any sagas it is striking how most of the action is taken up with head splitting and men with swinging axes. Not here, this is a woman’s story. Gudrin is the wife of two successive husbands who lead voyages. She is the most travelled woman in the world. By her choice she has accompanied them on the “sea road.”
Although the expeditions were ultimately failures (Viking presence in Vinland only lasted about 20 years) they were there about 500 years before Columbus “discovered” America. Gudrin’s story points towards a new attitude. Norse peoples code of conduct and notion of peaceful commerce was about to change away from the raids we’re all familiar with.
Terrific story.
The Sea Road is a very creative way to tell the woman’s side of the story. Gudrin is shown telling her life and travels to an Icelandic speaking monk in Rome. She has come on a pilgrimage. Gudrin’s early story comes at a time in Icelandic history when the belief in the old pagan gods is transitioning into Christianity. The monk is transcribing her story at the request of his superior. Agnar is obviously fascinated by this old woman (maybe in her 50s). She’s quite the character, strong, earthy, and direct.
Gudrin tells Agnar at one point that the men lives are full of war, hunting and trading. She might also have included raiding, not a very Christian idea. Gudrin’s job is running the farm and raising children, no small thing as if the farm fails or is not well maintained many will starve in the harsh winters.
If you have read any sagas it is striking how most of the action is taken up with head splitting and men with swinging axes. Not here, this is a woman’s story. Gudrin is the wife of two successive husbands who lead voyages. She is the most travelled woman in the world. By her choice she has accompanied them on the “sea road.”
Although the expeditions were ultimately failures (Viking presence in Vinland only lasted about 20 years) they were there about 500 years before Columbus “discovered” America. Gudrin’s story points towards a new attitude. Norse peoples code of conduct and notion of peaceful commerce was about to change away from the raids we’re all familiar with.
Terrific story.
February 4, 2022
Wonderful historical novel based on the Icelandic sagas. It’s set in 1050 and Gudrid is an Icelandic woman in Rome on pilgrimage telling her life story to the Icelandic priest, Agnar. Her extraordinary life extends from Iceland to Greenland then on to Vinland travelling with her husband. The narrative from a woman’s point of view is done really well, there’s plenty of detail with regards to life and landscape. I was totally drawn into the story, it’s a fascinating period from exploration and settlement to the rise of Christianity replacing the old gods. An excellent read.
March 20, 2016
‘The Sea Road' is an imaginative and beautifully written attempt to recreate the life of an Icelandic woman called Gudrun Thorbjarnadottir. If you have no idea who that is, that's ok. Not many will know who she is. She is a Norse woman, who appears in the Icelandic Sagas, the wife of Karsefni, of the few Norse adventurers to have visited North America - five hundred years before Columbus.
The story begins though, in Rome in 1051 and Gudrun is at the end of a pilgrimage. She is relating her life story to a fellow Icelander, a monk, called Agnar. She is of interest to the Church, because of her travels. She is "...one of those who have gone beyond the confines of the mortal world, in the body. She has dwelt for over a year in the lands outside the material world."
The theme, the idea, of her having been ‘outside the world’ is just one of the many layers to this wonderful book. She has, by having visited and lived in the Norse settlement in North America, been ‘outside’ the world as it was known at the time. She too was of the opinion that she had been outside the world and subscribed to the Viking view, that this was the land that ran round the edge of the world as they knew it and that if you sailed along the coast far enough south, you’d reach Africa. This feeling of being ‘outside,’ is also used to symbolise both the position of the Norse Pagan beliefs being outside those of the arrogant up-start new religion of Christianity and the flight of the old Norse beliefs, out of the ‘old world’ they once ruled. There is no room for them in the new, Old World and they, along with the remaining Norse believers, find themselves being pushed further and further west. But can the New World be a new home for an old world religion?
Despite Gudrun’s own conversion to Christianity, there is a sense of sadness, mixed with longing, for the old ways. The story she relates has it too. A sadness, a regret, that a time, a productive, sensible, well-founded, earthy, functioning culture has passed. Through no fault of its own. A connection to the world around them, now lost to the peoples of Christianity. Forced to the edges of the world and then beyond, as the story says several times. Others seem to have converted to the new religion, for more practical reasons: “”It’s all very well for a man at sea to pray to Thor, but here on land we’re overrun by demons, and more and more people are being driven off their land by the dead who refuse to lie quiet. This new power might be just the thing we need.”” They clearly saw the new god first as an addition to, rather than a replacement for, the older gods. A new solution, to some old problems!
Gudrun tells of the arrival in Iceland when she was a child, of a wild, red-haired adventurer called Eirik Raudi. Regarded by most as a notorious outlaw, he convinces several Icelanders, including Gudrun’s father, to move to a new land he has found, that he has deliberately enticingly called the Green Land. Though Eirik’s wife is now a devoted Christian, he is old school Norse: “The very mention of a new god made Eirik flame. "Take away your milk-and-water gods, your gods for infants!" he used to shout. "What kind of man do you want if you fancy a god who hasn't the guts to lift a hand to save himself? Don't tell me stories about flocks of sheep! I want men like wolves! What kind of country do you think this is?” Life is hard in the Green Land and the eastern and western settlements struggle along, but gradually, through being blown off course by storms trying to reach the settlements, sailors come in with reports of even more lands sighted to the west. Their desire for the new land, is purely practical. Trees have been sighted and trees are a scarce to non-existant in the Green Land.
It is Eirik’s son, Leif, who first makes inroads into the new land and he builds houses (‘Leif’s Houses’) there. It seems however, like they never really intended settling in the new lands, merely using them to supply Greenland and to sell what they flound in the New World, to the Old.
Gudrun and Karsefni also travel to America and remain there for around a year, but problems with the local inhabitants - not clear if it was Inuit or ‘Indians’ - mean they have to return earlier than expected to Greenland. She refers to the final voyage that is mentioned in the sagas, though only in passing, because she wasnt a part of it and it didn’t end well. Margaret Elphinstone is obviously using the actual Viking remains found in northern Canada, at L’Anse aux Meadows, as her - the Icelandic Sagas’ - ‘Leif’s Houses.’ She also has Gudrun suggesting that they sailed a lot further south from Leif’s Houses, definitely what is now the USA (material has been found at L’Anse aux Meadows, which points to other, southerly explorations), maybe even into the St. Lawrence seaway. She does make it clear that there were other voyages, apart from the ones she mentions - the ones the sagas mention - and that is also without doubt true.
And there’s a twist in the end of the tale, so you’ll want to have kept your wits about you and have an eye for detail…I’ll say no more.
‘The Sea Road’ is based on the mentions of what we now know to be North America, in the Icelandic Sagas. The Sagas were written after the oral story-telling tradition of the Vikings. If you’re thinking ‘Chinese whispers,’ it should maybe be pointed out that they are, in that respect, at least as accurate as Homer’s tales of Ancient Greece. People were selected (or selected themselves) for their ability in story-telling. As in, remembering what they were told and how the story should be told. There was no TV, no internet, no newspapers, no radio. Telling stories in the evenings was what they did. They knew the stories by heart and loved them told in the right way. You read a child their favourite story each night, then try changing a word or a scene - see how far you get. The Vikings didn’t write that much down at the time (unfortunately), remembering was what they were good at. Stories of their gods or ancestors, or also as in 'The Sea Road’, sailing directions to places. Get one of those wrong and you don’t sail any more. It’s interesting too , that the Danish word for ‘speak’ is ‘tale.’ As the book points out, once a story was written down, it was dead. Telling and re-telling kept the story alive, the people and the places involved alive too.
I remember thinking several times, that this was not so much an idea of what it must have been like, but that this was how it was. She has surely come that close. I began thinking about it and analysing the story as if it were an actual record of what happened. Speaking of which, it was a good one to read having just come off the back of reading Robert Enterline’s ‘Viking America.’ A happy accident. ‘The Sea Road’ fits very well with and develops much of the conjecture, possibilities and evidence that put forth. ‘The Sea Road’ would even, I think, make more sense, give even more pleasure, if you had read ‘Viking America’ first. It’s by no means essential, you’d just know that more of ‘The Sea Road' could actually be true than you might otherwise have thought.
It doesn't feel like reading a work of fiction. This is like reading their diary, their thoughts. It came over as if Gudrun is trying to remember what happened in her dreams. Trying to glimpse the events through the mists, through the trees. Like trying grab hold of smoke. The idea of the story being told once again to, or by, a monk did raise a few groans from me at the start. It’s been surely done to death. But as, to be fair, the only ones who could write back then were monks and because it in no way got in the way and the monk, being a fellow Icelander, understands her better than a lot of the monks do in similarly related books, it works an absolute treat.
’The Sea Road’ is a much more ‘honest,’ moving, thought-provoking and ultimately satisfying ‘Viking’ book, than ever your Giles Kristians and Robert Lows are. A beautifully written glimpse, full of longing, of regret and of happiness of a time and a people lost forever.
More world-class reviews on Speesh Reads
The story begins though, in Rome in 1051 and Gudrun is at the end of a pilgrimage. She is relating her life story to a fellow Icelander, a monk, called Agnar. She is of interest to the Church, because of her travels. She is "...one of those who have gone beyond the confines of the mortal world, in the body. She has dwelt for over a year in the lands outside the material world."
The theme, the idea, of her having been ‘outside the world’ is just one of the many layers to this wonderful book. She has, by having visited and lived in the Norse settlement in North America, been ‘outside’ the world as it was known at the time. She too was of the opinion that she had been outside the world and subscribed to the Viking view, that this was the land that ran round the edge of the world as they knew it and that if you sailed along the coast far enough south, you’d reach Africa. This feeling of being ‘outside,’ is also used to symbolise both the position of the Norse Pagan beliefs being outside those of the arrogant up-start new religion of Christianity and the flight of the old Norse beliefs, out of the ‘old world’ they once ruled. There is no room for them in the new, Old World and they, along with the remaining Norse believers, find themselves being pushed further and further west. But can the New World be a new home for an old world religion?
Despite Gudrun’s own conversion to Christianity, there is a sense of sadness, mixed with longing, for the old ways. The story she relates has it too. A sadness, a regret, that a time, a productive, sensible, well-founded, earthy, functioning culture has passed. Through no fault of its own. A connection to the world around them, now lost to the peoples of Christianity. Forced to the edges of the world and then beyond, as the story says several times. Others seem to have converted to the new religion, for more practical reasons: “”It’s all very well for a man at sea to pray to Thor, but here on land we’re overrun by demons, and more and more people are being driven off their land by the dead who refuse to lie quiet. This new power might be just the thing we need.”” They clearly saw the new god first as an addition to, rather than a replacement for, the older gods. A new solution, to some old problems!
Gudrun tells of the arrival in Iceland when she was a child, of a wild, red-haired adventurer called Eirik Raudi. Regarded by most as a notorious outlaw, he convinces several Icelanders, including Gudrun’s father, to move to a new land he has found, that he has deliberately enticingly called the Green Land. Though Eirik’s wife is now a devoted Christian, he is old school Norse: “The very mention of a new god made Eirik flame. "Take away your milk-and-water gods, your gods for infants!" he used to shout. "What kind of man do you want if you fancy a god who hasn't the guts to lift a hand to save himself? Don't tell me stories about flocks of sheep! I want men like wolves! What kind of country do you think this is?” Life is hard in the Green Land and the eastern and western settlements struggle along, but gradually, through being blown off course by storms trying to reach the settlements, sailors come in with reports of even more lands sighted to the west. Their desire for the new land, is purely practical. Trees have been sighted and trees are a scarce to non-existant in the Green Land.
It is Eirik’s son, Leif, who first makes inroads into the new land and he builds houses (‘Leif’s Houses’) there. It seems however, like they never really intended settling in the new lands, merely using them to supply Greenland and to sell what they flound in the New World, to the Old.
Gudrun and Karsefni also travel to America and remain there for around a year, but problems with the local inhabitants - not clear if it was Inuit or ‘Indians’ - mean they have to return earlier than expected to Greenland. She refers to the final voyage that is mentioned in the sagas, though only in passing, because she wasnt a part of it and it didn’t end well. Margaret Elphinstone is obviously using the actual Viking remains found in northern Canada, at L’Anse aux Meadows, as her - the Icelandic Sagas’ - ‘Leif’s Houses.’ She also has Gudrun suggesting that they sailed a lot further south from Leif’s Houses, definitely what is now the USA (material has been found at L’Anse aux Meadows, which points to other, southerly explorations), maybe even into the St. Lawrence seaway. She does make it clear that there were other voyages, apart from the ones she mentions - the ones the sagas mention - and that is also without doubt true.
And there’s a twist in the end of the tale, so you’ll want to have kept your wits about you and have an eye for detail…I’ll say no more.
‘The Sea Road’ is based on the mentions of what we now know to be North America, in the Icelandic Sagas. The Sagas were written after the oral story-telling tradition of the Vikings. If you’re thinking ‘Chinese whispers,’ it should maybe be pointed out that they are, in that respect, at least as accurate as Homer’s tales of Ancient Greece. People were selected (or selected themselves) for their ability in story-telling. As in, remembering what they were told and how the story should be told. There was no TV, no internet, no newspapers, no radio. Telling stories in the evenings was what they did. They knew the stories by heart and loved them told in the right way. You read a child their favourite story each night, then try changing a word or a scene - see how far you get. The Vikings didn’t write that much down at the time (unfortunately), remembering was what they were good at. Stories of their gods or ancestors, or also as in 'The Sea Road’, sailing directions to places. Get one of those wrong and you don’t sail any more. It’s interesting too , that the Danish word for ‘speak’ is ‘tale.’ As the book points out, once a story was written down, it was dead. Telling and re-telling kept the story alive, the people and the places involved alive too.
I remember thinking several times, that this was not so much an idea of what it must have been like, but that this was how it was. She has surely come that close. I began thinking about it and analysing the story as if it were an actual record of what happened. Speaking of which, it was a good one to read having just come off the back of reading Robert Enterline’s ‘Viking America.’ A happy accident. ‘The Sea Road’ fits very well with and develops much of the conjecture, possibilities and evidence that put forth. ‘The Sea Road’ would even, I think, make more sense, give even more pleasure, if you had read ‘Viking America’ first. It’s by no means essential, you’d just know that more of ‘The Sea Road' could actually be true than you might otherwise have thought.
It doesn't feel like reading a work of fiction. This is like reading their diary, their thoughts. It came over as if Gudrun is trying to remember what happened in her dreams. Trying to glimpse the events through the mists, through the trees. Like trying grab hold of smoke. The idea of the story being told once again to, or by, a monk did raise a few groans from me at the start. It’s been surely done to death. But as, to be fair, the only ones who could write back then were monks and because it in no way got in the way and the monk, being a fellow Icelander, understands her better than a lot of the monks do in similarly related books, it works an absolute treat.
’The Sea Road’ is a much more ‘honest,’ moving, thought-provoking and ultimately satisfying ‘Viking’ book, than ever your Giles Kristians and Robert Lows are. A beautifully written glimpse, full of longing, of regret and of happiness of a time and a people lost forever.
More world-class reviews on Speesh Reads
September 28, 2012
It's not very often that we get to see from a woman's viewpoint in a work of historical fiction in this time period (early middle ages). Margaret Elpinstone's brilliantly researched book The Sea Road portrays the life of Gudrid Thorbjornsdottir, now a national hero of Iceland. She lived in the household of Erik the Red and married his son, but after his death she married Thorfinn Karlsefni, a great explorer in his own right. She went to Vinland after Leif Ericson discovered it, and lived what must have been very harsh conditions there. And she did so many things later in life, including a trip to Rome!
Elphinstone brings Gudrid alive. The character is very believable, and I felt like the author had plucked her out of history so that I could sit down with her at the kitchen table.
Fine piece of writing. I'd recommend it to any lovers of historical fiction.
Elphinstone brings Gudrid alive. The character is very believable, and I felt like the author had plucked her out of history so that I could sit down with her at the kitchen table.
Fine piece of writing. I'd recommend it to any lovers of historical fiction.
October 1, 2014
I felt this book had such promise but it didn't deliver. I thought it would be more enthralling than it was: one woman's journeys in the Viking Age. In Rome, an Icelandic priest at the behest of a cardinal, is transcribing the life's story of an old woman, Gudrid. She has come there on a pilgrimage.
We read of her girlhood, two marriages, children, and widowhood both times, the customs of those settlers, and, I must admit, beautiful descriptions of Iceland and Greenland. Most of the book was dull but it picked up where Gudrid describes her settling on Vinland and events during their stay. The name had been bestowed because of the wild grapes found there from which wine was made. The Norse finally left after they found they couldn't get along with the natives, called by them, "skraelings" [wretched ones] and after killings during a skirmish ensued.
The book was well written and based on the true account of a woman of those times who went to Vinland. I didn't like the book switching back and forth from first person to third. Gudrid tells her story, but goes off on so many tangents, her mind wanders, and it's not completely chronological. Then the narration abruptly changes to third person, where it's as though a third person is commenting on what Gudrid has just told or is about to tell. Gudrid's whole narration feels like a dialogue with the priest, only his words are left out. That was confusing to me. I'm sorry I cashed in a gift certificate on this book.
We read of her girlhood, two marriages, children, and widowhood both times, the customs of those settlers, and, I must admit, beautiful descriptions of Iceland and Greenland. Most of the book was dull but it picked up where Gudrid describes her settling on Vinland and events during their stay. The name had been bestowed because of the wild grapes found there from which wine was made. The Norse finally left after they found they couldn't get along with the natives, called by them, "skraelings" [wretched ones] and after killings during a skirmish ensued.
The book was well written and based on the true account of a woman of those times who went to Vinland. I didn't like the book switching back and forth from first person to third. Gudrid tells her story, but goes off on so many tangents, her mind wanders, and it's not completely chronological. Then the narration abruptly changes to third person, where it's as though a third person is commenting on what Gudrid has just told or is about to tell. Gudrid's whole narration feels like a dialogue with the priest, only his words are left out. That was confusing to me. I'm sorry I cashed in a gift certificate on this book.
March 28, 2010
This is a wonderful novel, based on the travels of Gudrid who was the furthest travelled woman in the Viking era. The reader feels really absorbed into the story and experiences the discomforts of the travel (sleeping in damp cloaks in the boats, living through hard winters with little food) and the beauty and harshness of the natural world:
We climbed up past the caves where the giants live, right to the glacier itself. Close to, the glacier isn't the smooth white cone you see from out at sea. It's streaked with spines of larva and the snow is dusty with ash. There was cloud over the mountian, where the icedisappeared into a clammy mist that caught us in its breath as we passed. Our ponies trudged through patches of snow and picked their way among boulders through streams of meltwater. The glacier took a long time to pass. Then we climbed down by a river with may waterfalls.
Gudrin really comes alive in the narrative and I found myself really empathising with her. She's also a fascinating historical character and this novel gives insight into her role in Viking explorations of Greenland and the eastern coasts of north America, where they cut down the forests to make boats and then left.
We climbed up past the caves where the giants live, right to the glacier itself. Close to, the glacier isn't the smooth white cone you see from out at sea. It's streaked with spines of larva and the snow is dusty with ash. There was cloud over the mountian, where the icedisappeared into a clammy mist that caught us in its breath as we passed. Our ponies trudged through patches of snow and picked their way among boulders through streams of meltwater. The glacier took a long time to pass. Then we climbed down by a river with may waterfalls.
Gudrin really comes alive in the narrative and I found myself really empathising with her. She's also a fascinating historical character and this novel gives insight into her role in Viking explorations of Greenland and the eastern coasts of north America, where they cut down the forests to make boats and then left.
April 25, 2015
This haunting book, set in Iceland, Greenland and Vinland, and on the sea that connects these lands, transports the reader a thousand years back through time. Back to when ordinary people didn't read or write or have access to mirrors. When people improvised to build seaworthy ships. It's a spiritual journey, too. Near the end of her life, Gudrid made a pilgrimage to Rome, where a cardinal decided he wanted an account of her life, presumably because she converted to Christianity while living among Vikings who still worshiped the old Norse gods. An Icelandic priest, Agnar, was assigned to write down her riveting life story, exactly as she told it to him over three months of daily interviews. Gudrid reminisces about what she learned from the people she lived with, from the natural world and the sea, and how her own beliefs were formed along the way.
January 18, 2015
Magical. In Rome, Gudrid, widow of Karlsefni, daughter in law of Erik the Red and sister in law of Leif Eriksson, tells the story of her life to Agnar, a monk from Iceland. She tells of life in Iceland in the 11th century, of the great sea journeys made by her countrymen, and of the journeys she made herself. She lived in Greenland, in the Eastern Settlement, for many years and then travelled to Vinland in North America which had been discovered by Leif Eriksson and further explored by her husband and herself. She tells of battles with the indigenous people, arising from misunderstandings between two alien cultures without a shared language. Finally, after a spell living in the Norwegian court, she and her family returned to Iceland. We're not told why or how she made her pilgrimage to Rome after her husband, Karlsefni, died but hope that she made her final journey back. This is a beautifully written, magical tale. I was completely engrossed and sad to finish it when there was so much still to learn. It's told as a conversation between Gudrid and the monk, Agnar, who become friends as time goes by. 'Age is only the husk that grows around us, Agnar; I am still myself inside this shell, and when I die I think I shall be just as he (Karlsefni) remembered me.'
October 29, 2008
This book was a wonderful indulgence as I've been recovering from a cold this week. With the wind howling outside, The Sea Road took me to medieval Iceland, the first settlement of Greenland and beyond... to North America.
This fascinating historical novel is the story of Gudrid of Iceland, daughter-in-law to the explorer Erik the Red, as she accompanies her countrymen to the newly discovered land of Vinland.
Gudrid of Iceland was the furthest travelled woman in the world during the Viking Age... and for a thousand years she has deserved a saga in her own right, says the back of the book.
I was happy to see the note in the front that the characters and events in the novel are based on accounts recorded in those times, around the year 1050. The discovery of a new world is riveting--all the more so for the real sense I got of how these people lived and where they had come from.
I think even more than by the exploration of a new land, I was most intrigued by the way of life in Iceland, this only the third generation of settlement on that island. The ghosts, plagues, witchcraft and long, dark winters with their stories and folktales were vividly portrayed through Gudrid's words.
Also interesting is the description of the meeting of human cultures when Icelanders and Native Americans encounter each other for the first time. Gudrid describes the natives as savages and skraelings, or demons or devils. The Icelanders were predisposed to fight and kill when encountering anything new or strange, and so you can guess what the outcome was. Violent conflict.
But because we experience these encounters through the eyes of the Icelandic witch (as Gudrid was), knowing their cultural assumptions and biases enables us (me anyway) to imagine a different encounter where violent suspicion and bloodshed are not the first resort.
This was the perfect time of year to read this book, with the encroaching darkness and cold, the time of witches and magic, of howling wind and wandering ghosts. I'd recommend it to anyone fascinated by stories of the Far North and of Viking exploration.
This fascinating historical novel is the story of Gudrid of Iceland, daughter-in-law to the explorer Erik the Red, as she accompanies her countrymen to the newly discovered land of Vinland.
Gudrid of Iceland was the furthest travelled woman in the world during the Viking Age... and for a thousand years she has deserved a saga in her own right, says the back of the book.
I was happy to see the note in the front that the characters and events in the novel are based on accounts recorded in those times, around the year 1050. The discovery of a new world is riveting--all the more so for the real sense I got of how these people lived and where they had come from.
I think even more than by the exploration of a new land, I was most intrigued by the way of life in Iceland, this only the third generation of settlement on that island. The ghosts, plagues, witchcraft and long, dark winters with their stories and folktales were vividly portrayed through Gudrid's words.
Also interesting is the description of the meeting of human cultures when Icelanders and Native Americans encounter each other for the first time. Gudrid describes the natives as savages and skraelings, or demons or devils. The Icelanders were predisposed to fight and kill when encountering anything new or strange, and so you can guess what the outcome was. Violent conflict.
But because we experience these encounters through the eyes of the Icelandic witch (as Gudrid was), knowing their cultural assumptions and biases enables us (me anyway) to imagine a different encounter where violent suspicion and bloodshed are not the first resort.
This was the perfect time of year to read this book, with the encroaching darkness and cold, the time of witches and magic, of howling wind and wandering ghosts. I'd recommend it to anyone fascinated by stories of the Far North and of Viking exploration.
December 14, 2011
Love Love Love. This just might be my favorite 2011 read. I love Gudrid, I love her story, and I can not get over how much I enjoyed this book.
It's the story of the 11th centrury Islandic woman Gudrid Thorbjarnardottir(Guðríður Þorbjarnardóttir) as transcribed by the fictive Icelandic monk Agnar, when they are both in Italy - she for her pilgrimage, he for church government. Gudrid tells Agnar of her childhood in Iceland, her early days of womanhood in Greenland, and her travels to the place we now know as Canada. Slowly, a friendship between the old woman and the young monk develops and the stories become more personal and Gudrids thoughts start to drift. Though Agnar writes down the story exactly as Gunnar tells it (complete with her thoughts and questions on their current roundabouts, life, death and God) and leaves out his repsonses, still, this becomes the story of Agnar too, I think, as in between there are little cursive bits in present tense which appear to be him painting the picture, but it is never quite clear who's telling these things and you can leave them out and the interview would simple continue. But nevermind.... this is a most interesting, wonderful story and though I usually do not mind finishing a book as it means I can go on new adventures by reading a new book, this one leaves me longing for just a bit more of Gudrids wonderful presence.
p.s. Google Arnarstapi, Snæfellsnes and Glaumbær and get a little taste of Gudrids Icelandic surroundings.
It's the story of the 11th centrury Islandic woman Gudrid Thorbjarnardottir(Guðríður Þorbjarnardóttir) as transcribed by the fictive Icelandic monk Agnar, when they are both in Italy - she for her pilgrimage, he for church government. Gudrid tells Agnar of her childhood in Iceland, her early days of womanhood in Greenland, and her travels to the place we now know as Canada. Slowly, a friendship between the old woman and the young monk develops and the stories become more personal and Gudrids thoughts start to drift. Though Agnar writes down the story exactly as Gunnar tells it (complete with her thoughts and questions on their current roundabouts, life, death and God) and leaves out his repsonses, still, this becomes the story of Agnar too, I think, as in between there are little cursive bits in present tense which appear to be him painting the picture, but it is never quite clear who's telling these things and you can leave them out and the interview would simple continue. But nevermind.... this is a most interesting, wonderful story and though I usually do not mind finishing a book as it means I can go on new adventures by reading a new book, this one leaves me longing for just a bit more of Gudrids wonderful presence.
p.s. Google Arnarstapi, Snæfellsnes and Glaumbær and get a little taste of Gudrids Icelandic surroundings.
February 7, 2012
Not only is this a wonderful book, it's a great example of what good historical fiction looks (and reads!) like. I would say that if you are a fan of Medieval European/Viking Age history, this book will be right up your alley. Bookend it with Donna Jo Napoli's Hush and you have yourself a nice little reading list that is the next best thing to time travel.
My only complaint with this book is that Ms. Elphinstone kept on calling the Icelandic Horses ponies. Anyone who has ever been to Iceland knows that this is a major faux paus. Outside of that, this book is an absolute gem that will have you living and breathing right alongside the intrepid Viking explorers and settlers of Iceland, Greenland, and Vinland.
Highly recommended.
My only complaint with this book is that Ms. Elphinstone kept on calling the Icelandic Horses ponies. Anyone who has ever been to Iceland knows that this is a major faux paus. Outside of that, this book is an absolute gem that will have you living and breathing right alongside the intrepid Viking explorers and settlers of Iceland, Greenland, and Vinland.
Highly recommended.
November 18, 2019
Just so slow, too literary. When I found myself skimming whole pages while still in the first 10%, I knew this wasn't the book for me. Nothing was happening, just a long, indulgent stroll through the POV character's childhood.
Here are some paragraph opening lines: "The daily business of our lives lay in Orm's pastures and hayfields." " We caught mostly guillemots from the clifss, but also kittiwakes, gulls and puffins." "Orm used to take me about the country with him too." "Most of our gatherings happened in the winter." "As a child I adored the sun."
Those were first lines of paragraphs, and the long paragraphs that followed were all in the same vein.
In the author's defense, given the cover and the title, and the quick blurb about the book I ready, I was expecting a good Viking romp, but with a different flavor or focus. Maybe this book is that, but it's not for me.
Here are some paragraph opening lines: "The daily business of our lives lay in Orm's pastures and hayfields." " We caught mostly guillemots from the clifss, but also kittiwakes, gulls and puffins." "Orm used to take me about the country with him too." "Most of our gatherings happened in the winter." "As a child I adored the sun."
Those were first lines of paragraphs, and the long paragraphs that followed were all in the same vein.
In the author's defense, given the cover and the title, and the quick blurb about the book I ready, I was expecting a good Viking romp, but with a different flavor or focus. Maybe this book is that, but it's not for me.
August 25, 2022
The Sea Road
by Margaret Elphinstone
Review by Galen Weitkamp
The Sea Road is an engaging retelling of the Vinland Sagas. Yet it is much more than that. It imagines the life of Gudrid who is documented to have been one of the few women on the last Vinland voyage. The story is set down in Icelandic and translated into Latin by Agnar, an Icelandic monk in Rome, who interviews a much older Gudrid about her journey beyond the world. As we eavesdrop on their conversation we learn her story, delight in her personality and discover her deeper thoughts. This is a truly remarkable novel based upon a truly remarkable life.
by Margaret Elphinstone
Review by Galen Weitkamp
The Sea Road is an engaging retelling of the Vinland Sagas. Yet it is much more than that. It imagines the life of Gudrid who is documented to have been one of the few women on the last Vinland voyage. The story is set down in Icelandic and translated into Latin by Agnar, an Icelandic monk in Rome, who interviews a much older Gudrid about her journey beyond the world. As we eavesdrop on their conversation we learn her story, delight in her personality and discover her deeper thoughts. This is a truly remarkable novel based upon a truly remarkable life.
September 12, 2024
2.5 stars rounded down. I don't have a very good base of information on Viking history or sagas. I know the gist and a few of the characters, such as Leif. Maybe I would have enjoyed this more if I had more background knowledge or reading on this subject.
I did enjoy the setting a lot! It was a different time period than I normally read so it was refreshing to not only get some uniqueness, but also from a woman's perspective.
I just felt disconnected from her story. She tells it as an old woman looking back on her life so it makes sense in some of that telling, it wouldn't be as emotional. It fell a little flat for me. There was also not really a clear trajectory of story, but it's possible I just missed it completely.
I did enjoy the setting a lot! It was a different time period than I normally read so it was refreshing to not only get some uniqueness, but also from a woman's perspective.
I just felt disconnected from her story. She tells it as an old woman looking back on her life so it makes sense in some of that telling, it wouldn't be as emotional. It fell a little flat for me. There was also not really a clear trajectory of story, but it's possible I just missed it completely.
March 28, 2024
As a someone who is obsessed with Greenland and, to a lesser extent, Iceland, this book was a joy to read. I don't usually like historic fiction, as you know what's going to happen, but this was a really good exception.
Like a lot of reviewers, I wondered why some parts were in the third person, and why the monk's responses weren’t shown, but neither of these particularly jarred. A literary idiosyncrasy, perhaps.
It certainly saved me having to learn Old Icelandic to read the sagas, and I enjoyed seeing a woman lead the narrative. I didn't understand the ending though i.e. who it was who was found in Vinland so if you have worked it out, please let me know.
Like a lot of reviewers, I wondered why some parts were in the third person, and why the monk's responses weren’t shown, but neither of these particularly jarred. A literary idiosyncrasy, perhaps.
It certainly saved me having to learn Old Icelandic to read the sagas, and I enjoyed seeing a woman lead the narrative. I didn't understand the ending though i.e. who it was who was found in Vinland so if you have worked it out, please let me know.
January 27, 2014
This wonderful, evocative novel tells the story of a remarkable woman. In her youth, Gudrid was one of a small company of settlers who sailed west beyond the known world to the shores of Vinland, a country of grain, grapes and timber, with the ambition of setting up a traders' camp there. Now an old woman, she has turned her face east and made a pilgrimage from the borders of the world to its centre, in Rome, where she is invited to tell her life story to a young Icelandic monk so that it can be written down for the edification of the Church. Gudrid's world is one where the boundary between the human and the spirit worlds is fluid, and where a voyage beyond the charted waters of the mortal realm might well take you into the domain of the gods. Over the course of a long Roman summer she conjures up the ice and bleak beauty of her childhood and youth in Iceland and Greenland, and the community of brave men and women who lived there, culminating in the story of one of the greatest expeditions into the unknown in history.
Elphinstone adds conviction to her story by steeping every page in a sensitivity to the cultural mores and the folklore of 11th-century Iceland. This is a period when Christianity is still finding a foothold in these wild places, and Gudrid's world is one where the new Christ sits uneasily alongside the enduring traditions of Thor, Hel and the ghosts and demons whose unquiet souls roam the landscape. It's eerie in parts, adventurous in others, but never less than captivating; and Gudrid is an attractive and compelling narrator. Highly recommended for anyone interested in early medieval Europe and fans of the sagas - but also for those who simply enjoy fine writing. A dignified, elegant treat of a book.
For a longer review, please see my blog:
http://theidlewoman.blogspot.co.uk/20...
Elphinstone adds conviction to her story by steeping every page in a sensitivity to the cultural mores and the folklore of 11th-century Iceland. This is a period when Christianity is still finding a foothold in these wild places, and Gudrid's world is one where the new Christ sits uneasily alongside the enduring traditions of Thor, Hel and the ghosts and demons whose unquiet souls roam the landscape. It's eerie in parts, adventurous in others, but never less than captivating; and Gudrid is an attractive and compelling narrator. Highly recommended for anyone interested in early medieval Europe and fans of the sagas - but also for those who simply enjoy fine writing. A dignified, elegant treat of a book.
For a longer review, please see my blog:
http://theidlewoman.blogspot.co.uk/20...
March 2, 2012
This is a novel of Eric the Red and the adventurers who sailed from Iceland to the Green Land, told from the point of view of Gudrid. We've followed her childhood and she is now at an age when she could be married so the tension has increased. It is not lessened by Gudrid's father announcing that he is going to sail with Eirik Raudi (Eric the Red). Gudrid goes along and we follow her through two marriages and the birth of her son. She goes to Vinland and sees the conflict with the Skraelings, as they call the people. Gudrid narrates the story to an Icelandic monk in Rome, where she has come on pilgrimage in her later years. You have to imagine what the monk says to her because you only see her responses. For a calligrapher one of the most moving passages is when she is allowed to look at a real book with illustrations in norse/celtic form. It is magically beautiful to her and she is amazed that she is allowed to turn the pages. The author has kept the narration true to its time frame as far as I can tell so Gudrid doesn't have thoughts that belong in some other time or place. There is a very telling bit when she talks about the colour she sees in every place other than Iceland. Other places can dye their wool and there is jewelry with coloured stones so that there is a lift from browns and greys that dominated her life. A fascinating book
May 22, 2012
It appears that I'm obsessed with historical fiction about Vikings. Sadly, 99 out of hundred books in this teensy genre are bodice-rippers, which don't interest me at all. This one is no bodice-ripper, and I liked it a lot. The Sea Road is based on the true story of a woman named Gudrid, who was born in Iceland, lived near Eric the Red and Leif Ericson in Greenland for a while, and traveled as far as Labrador (Markland) and Newfoundland (Vinland). She spent most of her married life in Iceland, but traveled to Norway, and later, as an old lady, to Italy.
The Vikings were so tough. They lived in Greenland on little more than buttermilk and seal meat. They sailed insanely long distances through wild northern seas in small boats with almost nothing in the way of navigational equipment. I find it so interesting that they lived in Greenland for something like 300 years, then almost completely disappeared, and that they made it all the way to Newfoundland.
Plus, when they weren't exploring or making war, their lives were mostly those of subsistence farmers in pretty harsh circumstances, which is interesting, as well.
The Sea Road tells the story of a people's conversion from paganism to Christianity, and how sometimes, the two coexisted, and it offers interesting things to say about marriage and all the different feelings that coexist in a long marriage.
The Vikings were so tough. They lived in Greenland on little more than buttermilk and seal meat. They sailed insanely long distances through wild northern seas in small boats with almost nothing in the way of navigational equipment. I find it so interesting that they lived in Greenland for something like 300 years, then almost completely disappeared, and that they made it all the way to Newfoundland.
Plus, when they weren't exploring or making war, their lives were mostly those of subsistence farmers in pretty harsh circumstances, which is interesting, as well.
The Sea Road tells the story of a people's conversion from paganism to Christianity, and how sometimes, the two coexisted, and it offers interesting things to say about marriage and all the different feelings that coexist in a long marriage.
November 23, 2011
This book truly shows the origins of Historical Viking fiction by demonstrating how any good historical novel doesn't just focus on the events featured but on the people those events effect.
In this case it was the life and travels of a young Icelandic womam called Gudrid and the transformation and dramatic shift her life takes as she grows up in Iceland where Christianity still vyes with the beliefs of the Nordic Gods, to then set sail with her father in the hope of meeting up with an old friend who left many years before, in the newest found lands of Greenland. From there she finds herself fated to marry several times after tragic deaths before the biggest challenge awaits her with her soon to be future and lifelong merchant husband, the journey to and settling over Vinland (North America). A land that is so foreign it has dangers that not even the old gods can protect them from
It is a remarably captivating book depsite the way it is narrated through several persepctives and reveals the life of nordic people in such magnificance and beauty you couldn't ever think of them as being related to those that raided and invaded Englands costs only a few hundred years ago when the story is set.
Definitely a classic to look into for any viking fiction fans.
In this case it was the life and travels of a young Icelandic womam called Gudrid and the transformation and dramatic shift her life takes as she grows up in Iceland where Christianity still vyes with the beliefs of the Nordic Gods, to then set sail with her father in the hope of meeting up with an old friend who left many years before, in the newest found lands of Greenland. From there she finds herself fated to marry several times after tragic deaths before the biggest challenge awaits her with her soon to be future and lifelong merchant husband, the journey to and settling over Vinland (North America). A land that is so foreign it has dangers that not even the old gods can protect them from
It is a remarably captivating book depsite the way it is narrated through several persepctives and reveals the life of nordic people in such magnificance and beauty you couldn't ever think of them as being related to those that raided and invaded Englands costs only a few hundred years ago when the story is set.
Definitely a classic to look into for any viking fiction fans.
February 22, 2019
Reading The Sea Road in conjunction with The Vinland Sagas gives this story a rich context. I found it fascinating. Gudrid tells her story to Agnar, an Icelandic monk, and through her we learn about the Norse Greenlanders and how they came to North America. The conversion from the old beliefs to Christianity and the resulting friction threads through the book as does the role of women. Gudrid is a strong character holding her own in the larger than life tales of Eirik the Red and his son Leif Eiriksson the Lucky.
On a different but connected note, if you find yourself in Newfoundland, go and visit L’Anse Aux Meadows. It is the one verified location proving that the Norse landed in North America. The remains of the original buildings are buried so what you see are low lying mounds showing the shape and location and size of what is believed to be a winter and boat repair encampment. The nearby recreated peat, wood and thatch buildings give a good sense of Viking life and seeing it on the Newfoundland shore with the surrounding sea (even though the water is lower 1000 years later) brings the Sagas and Gudrid’s story to life.
On a different but connected note, if you find yourself in Newfoundland, go and visit L’Anse Aux Meadows. It is the one verified location proving that the Norse landed in North America. The remains of the original buildings are buried so what you see are low lying mounds showing the shape and location and size of what is believed to be a winter and boat repair encampment. The nearby recreated peat, wood and thatch buildings give a good sense of Viking life and seeing it on the Newfoundland shore with the surrounding sea (even though the water is lower 1000 years later) brings the Sagas and Gudrid’s story to life.
June 13, 2013
Another marvelously, almost preternaturally evocative novel from Margaret Elphinstone. She has such a gift for situating her readers in the eras and environments about which she writes -- it's a bit like time travel, really, and like entering into and navigating the souls of those about whom she writes. This treatment of the life of a woman, Gudrid, whose life has been either largely absent from the thoroughly examined historical record or largely seen through the scrim of the men who were her contemporaries, feels something like a conferred blessing. It's a lovely work of imagemaking, of wisdom, of suspense and empathetic immersion.
January 19, 2013
I took a while to warm up to this book. I found the style distracting - Gudrid as an old woman, telling her story to a monk, who is supposedly writing down everything she says (including her little asides about the weather in Italy, her questions about monk life, etc).
But there's no question about it, she had an amazing life, and this book does well to speculate on who Gudrid was and fill in the gaps as to what happened along the way.
I was compelled to read it in one day (finishing at 11.58!) so even after a slow start, this book grabbed me and wouldn't let go. I do wish I'd read it in winter though. I think I would have appreciated the cold, hard Iceland/Greenland/Vinland winters more.
But there's no question about it, she had an amazing life, and this book does well to speculate on who Gudrid was and fill in the gaps as to what happened along the way.
I was compelled to read it in one day (finishing at 11.58!) so even after a slow start, this book grabbed me and wouldn't let go. I do wish I'd read it in winter though. I think I would have appreciated the cold, hard Iceland/Greenland/Vinland winters more.
March 21, 2019
Slow to start, but ultimately gripping. I loved the voice of the heroine, Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir, a woman who travelled further than any other of her time. I enjoyed the narrative structure, where an elderly Gudrid tells her story to a scribe (at one point, she stops the narrative in amazement at how his scribblings will represent her words, showing the value of literacy in a society where it is rare). The sea voyages and the brutality of the Northern winter made me shiver at times, and moments of beauty and happiness were all the more precious for being hard-won. An unusual and brilliant book.
January 25, 2021
This book is a tough read - dense and descriptive writing. It takes a few chapters to get into it - but much like her voyageurs novel - once I got going I was hooked on finding out what would happen next. Some very good commentary about the impermanence of life and what our lives ultimately might, or might not, mean in the end. Good book and worth the extra reading effort necessary versus the average popular novel.
January 29, 2020
I started this book on the Isle of Mull (Scotland). And seeing the neolithic/native Celtic remnants on Mull made me so inspired that I picked up this book, which was recommended to me by a friend of the author and just fell right into it. It's taken me a while to read, but it was a similar experience to when I read Sky in the Deep in France, when I read I was so invested and couldn't stop, but when I did stop I had to really convince myself to pick it back up. The world Margaret Elphinstone builds in this book is so tangible and realistic to imagine. It feels like a true historical text and not an interpretation. The descriptions of setting and cultural patterns, and just general application of historical elements is so incredibly done, it feels as though Gudrid herself has written this in Elphinstone's place.
The settings are so dynamic. And the genuine curiosity and shift, seen when the Icelanders make it to North America and find all these new woods and materials, it felt so natural. Like how Gudrid tells her story to the monk, Agnar, with all the details she remembers from where she was. Such as her bond with her son Snorri, or how she comes to love Thorstein and then Karlsefni and know them as well as she knows herself. And also her regret for not sharing the same bond with Thorbjorn as Snorri. Also the details, such as the native americans coming upon their camp, and her communication with the woman. It doesn't seem outlandish or two worlds colliding, it felt like a natural exploration and overlapping of cultures of the past.
I love the transition between her being old and in sunny Rome, thinking back to times that were almost always cold and snowing in Greenland and then in North America. I also loved how natural it felt when she went on tangents, it was written so well and genuinely that I loved it. My one critisism is that is does get confusing but I also understand that because, it is written with such detail (which is why it feels like Elphinstone would have had to do extensive research) that I don't expect myself to truly understand everything in Gudrid's life or the viking culture or practices.
The aspect of them being super connected to the land and its energy and spirits, was weird at first but I realize now it's probably realistic. I don't actually doubt that Gudrid did see the ghost of Thorstein in the hut at Sandnes. Or at least that she perceived it that way, because things weren't as known then as they are now. Adds to that realism which I have to give immense credit to, even if it was a challenge to pick it up at times.
Moral of the Story. Behind every great Karlsefni, is a faithful Gudrid.
The settings are so dynamic. And the genuine curiosity and shift, seen when the Icelanders make it to North America and find all these new woods and materials, it felt so natural. Like how Gudrid tells her story to the monk, Agnar, with all the details she remembers from where she was. Such as her bond with her son Snorri, or how she comes to love Thorstein and then Karlsefni and know them as well as she knows herself. And also her regret for not sharing the same bond with Thorbjorn as Snorri. Also the details, such as the native americans coming upon their camp, and her communication with the woman. It doesn't seem outlandish or two worlds colliding, it felt like a natural exploration and overlapping of cultures of the past.
I love the transition between her being old and in sunny Rome, thinking back to times that were almost always cold and snowing in Greenland and then in North America. I also loved how natural it felt when she went on tangents, it was written so well and genuinely that I loved it. My one critisism is that is does get confusing but I also understand that because, it is written with such detail (which is why it feels like Elphinstone would have had to do extensive research) that I don't expect myself to truly understand everything in Gudrid's life or the viking culture or practices.
The aspect of them being super connected to the land and its energy and spirits, was weird at first but I realize now it's probably realistic. I don't actually doubt that Gudrid did see the ghost of Thorstein in the hut at Sandnes. Or at least that she perceived it that way, because things weren't as known then as they are now. Adds to that realism which I have to give immense credit to, even if it was a challenge to pick it up at times.
Moral of the Story. Behind every great Karlsefni, is a faithful Gudrid.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 3, 2020
I bought The Sea Road on the back of enjoying Les voyageurs which I enjoyed immensely.
With The Sea Road, I immediately felt lacking in understanding which is not a nice feeling. Rome? Really? Sometimes the author did that really annoying thing of mentioning place-names which don't appear in the map and the characters' names were often very similar. Vinland s not Finland at all but , I don't know Nova Scotia or somewhere. You could say, I felt all at sea myself.
Despite this, I carried on because I liked this Gudrid character and the memories of her life in a distant period of history. I was interested by the easy way in which householders welcomed in strangers for a whole season at a time. I admired the resourcefulness of tenth century Norse peoples to survive, simply to know how to hunt, weave, build boats and so on. Something our culture needs to take seriously.
I think Margaret Elphinstone was saying something about the power of the written word to transport us to unknown worlds. Of course, that happens in oral tradition too.
I was very uncomfortable with the words Gudrid uses to describe some indigenous people. I know Margaret Elphinstone would argue that it reflected the view of the first-person narrator in a different age from ours but I still felt offended, thinking of any readers from that particular heritage. I would rather Elphinstone had not done that. It wasn't neccesary either.
In summary, interesting but marred by considerable weaknesses.
With The Sea Road, I immediately felt lacking in understanding which is not a nice feeling. Rome? Really? Sometimes the author did that really annoying thing of mentioning place-names which don't appear in the map and the characters' names were often very similar. Vinland s not Finland at all but , I don't know Nova Scotia or somewhere. You could say, I felt all at sea myself.
Despite this, I carried on because I liked this Gudrid character and the memories of her life in a distant period of history. I was interested by the easy way in which householders welcomed in strangers for a whole season at a time. I admired the resourcefulness of tenth century Norse peoples to survive, simply to know how to hunt, weave, build boats and so on. Something our culture needs to take seriously.
I think Margaret Elphinstone was saying something about the power of the written word to transport us to unknown worlds. Of course, that happens in oral tradition too.
I was very uncomfortable with the words Gudrid uses to describe some indigenous people. I know Margaret Elphinstone would argue that it reflected the view of the first-person narrator in a different age from ours but I still felt offended, thinking of any readers from that particular heritage. I would rather Elphinstone had not done that. It wasn't neccesary either.
In summary, interesting but marred by considerable weaknesses.
March 11, 2019
I enjoyed the story, and the story-telling followed a woman's thinking very well: circular. By the end, she had already told us of her life post-"trip out of the world of mortals." It was tempted to skim those parts, but with the reading of the previous journal entries, I know she would not be coming back. I think Gudrid told the story of her life like any of us might tell the story of ours: skipping around a bit even though we are trying to go chronologically, avoiding the tough portions and going on and on about the things that were good. I liked how the beginning prologue was written years after the ending epilogue and everything in between.
I was a little confused by the scenes that were depicted in 3rd person and italics. Were those taken from somewhere? Or are they just supposed to be setting? I don't know. I think they clarified some scenes, but also were unnecessary in other places.
I found the parts where Gudrid and Agnar have a conversation to be also quite interesting. It helped me picture the story-telling place clearly, and I could envision Agnar writing with his head bowed every time Gudrid spoke, but looking up and his quill paused above the parchment or re-set in ink while he answered Gudrid or asked her questions.
I liked the tale. We studied what we know about the trips of Erik the Red and Leif Erikson quite a bit in elementary schoo.
I was a little confused by the scenes that were depicted in 3rd person and italics. Were those taken from somewhere? Or are they just supposed to be setting? I don't know. I think they clarified some scenes, but also were unnecessary in other places.
I found the parts where Gudrid and Agnar have a conversation to be also quite interesting. It helped me picture the story-telling place clearly, and I could envision Agnar writing with his head bowed every time Gudrid spoke, but looking up and his quill paused above the parchment or re-set in ink while he answered Gudrid or asked her questions.
I liked the tale. We studied what we know about the trips of Erik the Red and Leif Erikson quite a bit in elementary schoo.
February 24, 2021
This work Wasabi a huge disappointment I really want to read it because the author is a scholar and a medieval scholar that. And I was really hoping it would have storyline focussed on North America Newfoundland and the Vikings interactions with the native Americans however those events only take up three chapters of the end of the book the rest of the book is endless endless description of people places and things with absolutely no plot! I was halfway through the book and wondering where the hell the story was going and when they were even going to set sail for North America the writing just drones on and on going nowhere for pages and pages and before you know what you're halfway through the book before anything happens. Given the author is a scholar I was definitely expecting more from this story. One thing I did enjoy was her descriptions of Iceland on the Icelandic horses for anyone who's never encountered them it is a treat. It was quite a struggle to finish this book and I nearly quit halfway through but was desperate to see what her portrayal of North America would be when it finally appeared on the pages however it was overall disappointing and the biking interactions with the natives are way too short. If you're about to drop a pretty penny for this book think twice before you do it its not worth the 30 i paid.
November 30, 2024
Detta är en roman om Erik den röde och äventyrarna som seglade från Island till Gröna landet, berättad ur Gudrids synvinkel. Vi har följt hennes barndom och hon är nu i en ålder då hon kunde vara gift så spänningen har ökat. Det blir inte mindre av att Gudrids pappa meddelar att han ska segla med Eirik Raudi (Eric den röde). Gudrid följer med och vi följer henne genom två äktenskap och födelsen av hennes son. Hon åker till Vinland och ser konflikten med skrälingarna, som de kallar folket. Gudrid berättar historien för en isländsk munk i Rom, dit hon har kommit på pilgrimsfärd under sina senare år. Du måste föreställa dig vad munken säger till henne eftersom du bara ser hennes svar. För en kalligraf är en av de mest gripande passagerna när hon får titta på en riktig bok med illustrationer i nordisk/keltisk form. Det är magiskt vackert för henne och hon är förvånad över att hon får vända blad. Författaren har hållit berättelsen trogen sin tidsram så vitt jag kan säga så Gudrid inte har tankar som hör hemma i någon annan tid eller plats. Det är mycket talande när hon pratar om färgen hon ser på alla andra ställen än på Island. Andra ställen kan färga sin ull och det finns smycken med färgade stenar så att det blir ett lyft från brunt och grått som dominerade hennes liv. En fascinerande bok!
June 6, 2022
I struggled to get through this book, though that likely had something to do with the fact that I got sick while I was reading it has some brain fog.
While I definitely appreciated the concise writing in this book, I'll admit that I thought the linguistic tone left something to be desired for me. I kept thinking back to Jane Smiley's "Greenlanders", and how that book had a rhythmic quality to its narration, and I missed that in "The Sea Road".
That said, I really did like the framing device in this book, of the narrator retelling her life's story of reaching North America to a priest, with the ultimate assumption at the end that the Catholic Church will just end up filing it away and never realizing the information in the document.
It should be said, as I often feel about narratives about Viking settlement and exploration in North America, that the depiction of the First Nations was a little ...lacking and, honestly, in my (settler) opinion seemed a bit dehumanizing. I get that this book is striving to depict actual historic events, including altercations, which is FINE, but that is how I felt about it.
While I definitely appreciated the concise writing in this book, I'll admit that I thought the linguistic tone left something to be desired for me. I kept thinking back to Jane Smiley's "Greenlanders", and how that book had a rhythmic quality to its narration, and I missed that in "The Sea Road".
That said, I really did like the framing device in this book, of the narrator retelling her life's story of reaching North America to a priest, with the ultimate assumption at the end that the Catholic Church will just end up filing it away and never realizing the information in the document.
It should be said, as I often feel about narratives about Viking settlement and exploration in North America, that the depiction of the First Nations was a little ...lacking and, honestly, in my (settler) opinion seemed a bit dehumanizing. I get that this book is striving to depict actual historic events, including altercations, which is FINE, but that is how I felt about it.
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