Grettir the Outlaw: A Story of Iceland — A Closer Reading

The Author’s Method: From Saga to Story

The preface reveals Baring-Gould’s editorial choices. He explains that the original saga contains “a great deal more” than he has retold, including ancestral material and “other incidents introduced of no great importance and very confusing to the memory.” He has therefore taken “the leading points” and given them. This is not a translation but a selective adaptation aimed at clarity and narrative momentum. A first-time reader should expect a streamlined plot, with genealogical digressions trimmed. The author’s voice—colloquial, occasionally humorous—permeates the prose, as when he writes that the labour of translation “became rapidly lighter” once he was hooked. The book’s structure mirrors the serialized telling: each chapter feels like a discrete episode, building toward Grettir’s outlawry.

The Settlement Prelude: Onund’s Voyage as Context

The narrative does not begin with Grettir but with his grandfather Onund’s voyage to Iceland around A.D. 900. The excerpt shows Baring-Gould grounding the story in historical migration: Norwegian chiefs flee “the rapacity and the vengeance of King Harald Fairhair.” Onund’s ship is driven north into the Polar Sea, then south to the north coast of Iceland. The description is precise—the “rocks and glaciers of the Drang Jokull,” the “long promontory” separating Hunafloi from Skagafiord—and matches the author’s claim to have visited these sites. The negotiation with Eric Trap, who offers land freely, establishes the code of hospitality and gift-giving that will recur. Readers unfamiliar with saga conventions will see how land claims, kinship, and generosity drive the plot long before Grettir appears.

Landscape as Character: The Fiords and Glaciers

Baring-Gould’s descriptions of Iceland are not mere backdrop. In the Onund episode, the coast is rendered with specific landmarks: “quaint spikes of rock,” a mountain “like a horn,” boiling springs that “poured up in the sea out of its depths.” The author notes that the fiord’s north side is so steep that “the only habitable ground lay at the head of the firth and on the south side.” This attention to topography serves a dual purpose: it authenticates the saga’s geography and foreshadows the harsh, isolated settings where Grettir will later be outlawed. A first-time reader should watch for how each new location—whether a farm, a valley, or a glacier—is introduced with similar physical detail, often tied to the characters’ movements. The land itself becomes a silent participant in the conflicts.

From Settler to Outlaw: Tracing the Arc

The excerpts provided do not include Grettir’s own adventures, but the table of contents hints at the trajectory: “How Grettir played on the Ice,” “The Slaying of Biorn,” “The Horse-fight,” “How Grettir fought with Glam,” “The Hostel-burning,” “The Ordeal by Fire.” The chapter titles suggest a series of escalating confrontations, both with supernatural foes (Glam) and human antagonists. The preface’s emphasis on the author’s selective retelling implies that these episodes are the “leading points” he chose to highlight. A reader beginning the book should expect a picaresque structure: Grettir moves from one challenge to the next, each chapter a self-contained story that nonetheless builds toward his eventual outlawry. The early chapters on Onund establish the family’s claim to land and honour, which Grettir will both inherit and jeopardize.

Baring-Gould’s adaptation is best approached as a storyteller’s version, not a scholarly edition. Readers who know the original saga will notice omissions and simplifications; those new to the material will find a clear, episodic narrative driven by action and landscape. Pay attention to the author’s asides—he occasionally steps in to explain a custom or to note that he has visited a site. These moments are the thread that connects the medieval source to the Victorian schoolroom, and they give the book its distinctive, personal character.

That rainy afternoon, Grettir’s far-off fiords felt closer than my window’s grey. His stubborn loneliness stayed with me, a quiet ache. Later, rummaging for something else, I found Gleanings from Chinese folklore — Text and Context and lingered on its ghosts—so differently haunted, yet equally alive with that same longing for home.