Join us on a literary world trip!
Add this book to bookshelf
Grey
Write a new comment Default profile 50px
Grey
Subscribe to read the full book or read the first pages for free!
All characters reduced
The Story of Burnt Njal - cover

The Story of Burnt Njal

Anonymous

Translator George Webbe Dasent

Publisher: e-artnow

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

Summary

The Story of Burnt Njal is a thirteenth-century Icelandic saga that describes events between 960 and 1020. The saga deals with a process of blood feuds in the Icelandic Commonwealth, showing how the requirements of honor could lead to minor slights spiraling into destructive and prolonged bloodshed. Insults where a character's manhood is called into question are especially prominent and may reflect an author critical of an overly restrictive ideal of masculinity. Another characteristic of the narrative is the presence of omens and prophetic dreams. It is disputed whether this reflects a fatalistic outlook on the part of the author. The principal characters in the saga are the friends Njáll Þorgeirsson, a lawyer and a sage, and Gunnar Hámundarson, a formidable warrior. Gunnar's wife instigates a feud that leads to the death of many characters over several decades including the killing by fire of the eponymous "Burnt Njáll".
Available since: 02/04/2021.
Print length: 467 pages.

Other books that might interest you

  • The Dead - A Novel - cover

    The Dead - A Novel

    Christian Kracht

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    In The Dead, the follow-up to his acclaimed novel Imperium (a Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year), Christian Kracht mines the feverish film culture of the 1930s to produce a Gothic tale of global conspiracy, personal loss, and historical entanglements large and small. 
     
     
     
    In Berlin, Germany, in the early 1930s, the acclaimed Swiss film director Emil Nägeli receives the assignment of a lifetime: travel to Japan and make a film to establish the dominance of Adolf Hitler's Nazi empire once and for all. But his handlers are unaware that Nägeli has colluded with the Jewish film critics to pursue an alternative objective—to create a monumental, modernist, allegorical spectacle to warn the world of the horror to come. 
     
     
     
    Meanwhile, in Japan, the film minister Masahiko Amakasu intends to counter Hollywood's growing influence and usher in a new golden age of Japanese cinema by exploiting his Swiss visitor. The arrival of Nägeli's film-star fiancée and a strangely thuggish, pistol-packing Charlie Chaplin—as well as the first stirrings of the winds of war—soon complicates both Amakasu's and Nägeli's plans, forcing them to face their demons . . . and their doom.
    Show book
  • Last Train From Cuernavaca - cover

    Last Train From Cuernavaca

    Lucia St.Clair Robson

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    In the Christmas season of 1913, Grace Knight’s elegant old hotel on Cuernavaca’s main plaza is the place to see and be seen. Mexico’s landed aristocracy, members of the foreign community, wealthy tourists, and young army officers with their wives flock to the Colonial. Under the ballroom’s hundreds of twinkling electric lights, they dance to old Spanish tunes and to the new beat of ragtime. Outside the city, in the shadows of the valley’s two volcanoes, a company of federal soldiers raids the hacienda of Don Miguel Sanche, hunting for men sympathetic to the cause of the charismatic rebel leader, Emiliano Zapata. In a hailstorm of rifle fire, sixteen-year-old Angela Sanchez’s life takes a horrifying turn. After the soldiers leave, she returns to the ruins of her family’s home. She collects her father’s old Winchester carbine, gathers the survivors among his workers, and rides off in search of Zapata’s Liberating Army of the South. Last Train from Cuernavaca is the story of two strong and ambitious women. For the sake of love, honor, and survival, they become swept up in a Revolution that almost destroys them and their country.
    Show book
  • Misérables Vol 1 - cover

    Misérables Vol 1

    Victor Hugo

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    This is book 1 of 5. An ex-convict breaks parole and starts a new life as a righteous man, but is pursued by a police inspector. Along the way, the ex-convict joins a revolution, adopts a daughter, and beats people up. Hooray. (Summary by smileyman457)
    Show book
  • Flight Of The Hawk: The River - A Novel of the American West - cover

    Flight Of The Hawk: The River -...

    W. Michael Gear

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    INTERNATIONAL BEST-SELLING AUTHOR W. MICHAEL GEAR TURNS HIS MASTER’S HAND TO THE FRONTIER WEST. 
    1812 Missouri Fur Trade – An intimate of the Burr conspiracy, the condemned and hounded John Tylor signs on as boatman with Manuel Lisa’s expedition. But the river is now contested as the British, Spanish, and other fur companies prepare to break Lisa’s hold. As the expedition battles its way up the violent river, Fenway McKeever lurks in Tylor’s shadow. Not only is the half-mad McKeever paid to kill Tylor, but he’s convinced himself that by destroying Lisa’s expedition, he can sell his services to the highest bidder. 
    “No one reads a Gear novel without being transformed in beautiful ways.” – Richard S. Wheeler
    Show book
  • In the Bishop's Carriage - cover

    In the Bishop's Carriage

    Miriam Michelson

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    Nancy 'Nance' Olden, a young and very pretty woman, is an accomplished liar and thief. Raised in a horrific orphanage, called the Cruelty by its occupants, Nance and her criminal boyfriend, Tom Dorgan, are pulling a con when the book begins. The results of their act propel Nance into a series of events that she could never have imagined. This was Miriam Michelson's first novel and it was considered a 'blockbuster' in its day. Ranked fourth on the list of bestsellers of 1904 by "Publishers Weekly," Michelson's book was a source of controversy due to the dubious ethics and morals of its heroine. (Summary by Lee Ann Howlett)
    Show book
  • The Aviary Gate - A Novel - cover

    The Aviary Gate - A Novel

    Katie Hickman

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    Elizabeth Staveley sits in the Bodleian library, holding in her trembling hands a fragment of ancient paper. It is the key to a story that has been locked away for four centuries—the story of a British sea captain's daughter held captive in the sultan's harem. 
     
    Constantinople, 1599. There are rumors and strange stirrings in the sultan's palace. The chief black eunuch has been poisoned by a taste of a beautiful ship made of spun sugar. The sultan's mother faces threats to her power from her son's favorite concubine. And a secret rebellion is rising within the palace's most private quarters. 
     
    Meanwhile, the merchant Paul Pindar, secretary to the English ambassador, brings a precious gift to the sultan. As he nears the palace, word comes to Pindar that the woman he once loved, Celia, may be alive and hidden among the ranks of slaves in the sultan's harem. Can this really be the same Celia who disappeared in a shipwreck? And if it is, can the two be reunited?
    Show book