Paranormal Encounters in Iceland 1150-1400

Description

This anthology of international scholarship offers new critical approaches to the study of the many manifestations of the paranormal in the Middle Ages. The guiding principle of the collection is to depart from symbolic or reductionist readings of the subject matter in favor of focusing on the paranormal as human experience and, essentially, on how these experiences are defined by the sources. The authors work with a variety of medieval Icelandic textual sources, including family sagas, legendary sagas, romances, poetry, hagiography and miracles, exploring the diversity of paranormal activity in the medieval North. This volume questions all previous definitions of the subject matter, most decisively the idea of saga realism, and opens up new avenues in saga research. Introduction: The Paranormal Encounter 1 Part I: Experiencing the Paranormal Ármann Jakobsson / "I See Dead People": The Externalization of Paranormal Experience in Medieval Iceland 9 Miriam Mayburd / It Was a Dark and Stormy Night: Haunted Saga Homesteads, Climate Fluctuations, and the Vulnerable Self 21 Ásdís Egilsdóttir / Happy Endings: The (Para)Normality of Miracles 39 Andrea Maraschi / Þórgunna’s Dinner and Other Medieval Liminal Meals: Food as Mediator between this World and the Hereafter 49 Marion Poilvez / A Troll Did It?: Trauma as a Paranormal State in the 'Íslendingasögur' 71 Sarah Bienko Eriksen / Traversing the Uncanny Valley: Glámr in Narratological Space 89 Anna Katharina Heiniger / On the Threshold: The Liminality of Doorways 109 Sean B. Lawing / The Burial of Body Parts in Old Icelandic 'Grágás' 131 Daniel C. Remein / Paranormal Prose: 'Para-Narrative' and Ice in the Icelandic Sagas 151 Part II: Figures of the Paranormal Andrew McGillivray / Encounters with Hliðskjálf in Old Norse Mythology 175 Sandra Ballif Straubhaar / 'Ok flýgr þat jafnan': Icelandic Figurations of Böðvarr bjarki’s Monster 193 Arngrímur Vídalín / Demons, Muslims, Wrestling Champions: The Semantic History of 'Blámenn' from the Twelfth to the Twentieth Century 203 Kent Pettit / The New Faith vs. The Undead: Christmas Showdowns 227 Zuzana Stankovitsová / Following up on Female 'fylgjur': A Re-Examination of the Concept of Female 'fylgjur' in Old Icelandic Literature 245 Rebecca Merkelbach / 'Dólgr í byggðinni': Meeting the Social Monster in the Sagas of Icelanders 263 Part III: Literature and the Paranormal Christopher Crocker / Even a Henchman Can Dream: Dreaming at the Margins in 'Brennu-Njáls saga' 279 Þórdís Edda Jóhannesdóttir / A Normal Relationship?: Jarl Hákon and Þorgerðr Hǫlgabrúðr in Icelandic Literary Context 295 Gunnvör S. Karlsdóttir / Priest Ketill’s Journey to Rome 311 Ingibjörg Eyþórsdóttir / 'Darraðarljóð' and Its Context within 'Njáls saga': Sorcery, Vision, 'Leizla'? 327 Martina Ceolin / Paranormal Tendencies in the Sagas: A Discussion about Genre 347 Shaun F. D. Hughes / Reading the Landscape in 'Grettis saga': Þórhallur, the 'meinvættur', and Glámur 367 Yoav Tirosh / Trolling Guðmundr: Paranormal Defamation in 'Ljósvetninga saga' 395 Védís Ragnheiðardóttir / 'Meir af viel en karlmennsku': Monstrous Masculinity in 'Viktors saga ok Blávus' 421 Index 433