by Tom Birkett
Non-Eddic Influences
It is not simply poetry from the Poetic Edda that is used in Vikings.28 In the fourth episode of season one, Ragnar and his followers successful y raid a Northumbrian
vil age but as they attempt to return to their ship, their path is blocked by a party
of King Aelle’s men. A battle ensues on the beach off which the vikings’ boat is
anchored. The vikings form a shield-wall and, as the battle progresses, Rollo cal s
out a battle chant (13:30–13:46):
Up onto the overturned keel,
Clamber, with a heart of steel.
Cold is the ocean’s spray,
when your death is on its way.
27 Ibid., p. 17.
28 Nor is it only Old Norse Poetry that is drawn upon. In episode ten of the third season, King Ecbert quotes from the opening stanza of the first of T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. See T. S.
Eliot, Four Quartets (London, 2001), p. 3.
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Gareth Lloyd Evans
With maidens you have had your way.
Each must die some day!
The verse is adapted from a skaldic stanza attributed to the thirteenth-century
Icelander Þórir jǫkull in Íslendinga saga. The saga suggests that he spoke the verse prior to his execution. In Old Norse, the verse runs as follows:
Upp skaltu á kjǫl klífa,
kǫld er sævar drífa;
kostaðu hug þinn herða,
hér skaltu lífit verða.
Skafl beygjattu skalli
þótt skúr á þik falli.
Ást hafðir þú meyja;
eitt sinn skal hverr deyja.
Or, in English, it could be rendered thus:
You must climb up on to the keel,
cold is the sea-spray’s feel;
let not your courage bend:
here your life must end.
Old man, keep your upper lip firm
though your head be bowed by the storm.
You have had girls’ love in the past;
death comes to all at last.29
The stanza has clearly been selected for transformation into a battle cry for its suggestion that one’s death should be faced with courage, and for its heroic acceptance of
the possibility of impending doom. Although abbreviating the stanza slightly – and
removing a jarring reference to a skalli (bald man) that does not work well in the new context into which it is placed – the rendering into English in Vikings is largely faithful. And, crucial y, it retains the end rhyme of what is a relatively rare example of a runhent (‘end-rhymed’) verse, which is another feature of the stanza that makes it particularly suitable for transformation into a battle chant.30 What might also
be noted by an attentive viewer is that this poem when used as a battle cry – even
accepting the omission of skalli – still does not necessarily seem to work perfectly in context, at least not literal y: there is no keel on which Rollo’s audience might climb, nor does the sea’s spray fall onto them (despite the battle taking place on the shore).
But this is also the case in the poem’s context within Íslendinga saga. Þórir jǫkull, as he speaks this verse, is certainly not shipwrecked: he is said to have been decapi-tated outside a church. We must instead understand the motif of shipwreck in this
poem – in both its medieval and televisual contexts – as working metaphorical y to
convey seemingly universal feelings toward impending death. That the details do
29 Text and translation from Anthony Faulkes, What Was Viking Poetry For?
(Birmingham, 1993), p. 3.
30 For a discussion of runhent, see Kari Ellen Gade, The Structure of Old Norse Dróttkvætt Poetry (London, 1995), pp. 10–11.
Vikings and Old Norse Poetry
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not align perfectly with the situation – and indeed that there is a mismatch in date
between the medieval poem and the early Viking Age – is of little consequence, and
is instead testament to the adaptability of the verse and the seeming universality of
the emotions upon which it depends.31 As with the sensitive translations of eddic
poems into new contexts discussed above, this skaldic verse has also been treated
with great care and sensitivity: the televisual context into which the verse has been
placed is mindful of, and reflects, the verse’s original context.
Not all Old Norse verses used in Vikings seem to have a great deal of either
thematic or narrative significance, however. In the seventh episode of the third
season, while most of the inhabitants of Kattegat are involved in the siege on
Paris, Aslaug remains at home. Here, we see her speak a chant in Old Norse as she
bathes a garment in what appears to be blood. The words she speaks are as follows
(16:48–17:14):
Þér annk serk enn síða
ok saumaðan hvergi
við heilan hug ofnu
ór hársíma gránu.
Mun eigi ben blœða,
né bíta þik eggjar
í heilagri hjúpu;
var hón goðum signuð.32
In English, this verse could be rendered thus:
I give you a shirt
with seams nowhere,
woven with a hale heart
from grey strands.
Wounds will not bleed,
nor edges bite you
in this holy garment;
it has been blessed by the gods.
Where the verse is found, in Ragnars saga loðbrókar, it is spoken by Áslaug to her husband Ragnarr before he travels to England with the intention of raiding there.
The verse accompanies a gift of a shirt which prevents the wearer from being injured
by weapons.33 Here, in Vikings, however, although we may assume that Aslaug is enchanting the garment as she bathes it in blood, we do not see her presenting it as
a gift to any other character. Nor is this scene recalled later in the series, or at least not in those episodes that have been released thus far. To the viewer – who likely
does not understand Old Norse – the verse serves to create a sense of otherness
(which, of course, is crucial to the production of historical drama). However, in
31 Faulkes, What Was Viking Poetry For? , pp. 6–9.
32 ‘ Ragnars saga loðbrókar’, in Vǫlsunga saga ok Ragnars saga loðbrókar, ed. Magnus Olsen (Copenhagen, 1906–8), pp. 111–222, at p. 212.
33 Ibid., p. 156.
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spite of the absence of a literal translation, we may go so far as to say that the context of the recitation of this verse – in which Aslaug bathes a garment – itself functions
as a vague translation of the content of the poem, which refers to an enchanted
shirt. The audience is able to infer a relation between the verse spoken softly by
Aslaug and her treatment of the garment, and to draw the conclusion that Aslaug
is partaking in some form of magical ritual. The televisual medium, then, does not
need to simply rely on linguistic translation, but is also able to convey information
and detail through other means and other forms of translation.
Conclusions
In Vikings, Michael Hirst draws on a range of Old Norse poems. Some are given in Old Norse with no translation provided for the viewer, some are given in English
translation, and some are simply referenced al usively. In almost all cases, however
– whether or not audiences are likely to understand the literal meaning of verses
spoken or to be aware of the references made – great care has clearly been taken to
ensure that the verses are deployed with artistic sensitivity. The poems are drawn on
in a number of ways: to struct
ure character interactions, to provide mythological
detail, to give a particular view of viking society, to forge intertextual meaning, and to produce a sense of inexorable fate. But in addition to these functions, all of the
Old Norse poems used in Vikings also contribute to the sense of alterity – to the impression that the world of Vikings is fundamental y different to our own – that is essential for the efficacy of the series as a historical drama.
What also becomes clear is that a narrow view of translation that only recognises
the literal translation of words and phrases from source language to target language
is too limited a conceptualisation to encompass the variety of modes of transla-
tion in evidence in Vikings. This is not to say that literal translation is not of great importance – it is, of course, relied upon throughout the series. However, we also
see evidence of contextual translation, in which a snippet or stanza of poetry is
chosen for inclusion in the series not only for its localised literal meaning but also for the significance it holds within the wider context from which it was borrowed, as
well as a form of translation that appears peculiar to televisual or cinematic media.
In both the funerary procession for Ragnar and the scene in which Aslaug enchants
a garment, Old Norse is performed or spoken without any literal translation being
given. Yet the contexts in which these verses are performed enable the viewer to
understand the significance, the valency and – to an extent – even some of the
content of the Norse poems. This mode of translation affords the viewer untrained
in Old Norse a new point of access into the world of Old Norse poetry: one can hear
and see Old Norse poems being performed in the original while also, to an extent,
understand their meaning and significance. Such a method of translation, which
relies on the visual possibilities of this medium, pushes the translation of Old Norse poetry into new territory, while simultaneously making it accessible to a far wider
audience than is usual y the case.
Afterword
Bernard O’Donoghue
What exactly are we doing when we set out on a translation? Wel,
it depends; the first thing to establish is for what purpose and reader-
ship we are doing it. Since the early nineteenth century when there
was a reinforced emphasis on the theory of translation in works such as Friedrich
Schleiermacher’s ‘On the Different Methods of Translating’1 it has been essential
for translators to recognise precisely what kind of version they were aiming at –
most immediately whether the objective was correspondence to the original in a
new language (what degree of ‘equivalence’ we are aiming at, in Lawrence Venuti’s
terms), or to produce a new work which was prompted by the original. Not that
such considerations were new in the nineteenth century: in the Alfredian Preface to
the Anglo-Saxon translation of Gregory’s Cura Pastoralis the translator will proceed
‘ hwilum word be worde, hwilum andgit of andgiete’ (‘sometimes word for word;
sometimes sense for sense’). And of course there are other contexts too: in her very
enlightening essay on Borges here, M. J. Toswell refers to Umberto Eco’s summary
idea of ‘translation as a negotiation involving original text, publisher, economic
matters, the target text, various kinds of approaches to the translation and reader
responses’.2
Not all of these factors are the primary concern for the context here. In her
essay on translations of Old English poetry into Modern English and Russian, Inna
Matyushina reminds us of a crucial distinction: ‘Translation has traditional y been
divided into two types: that on a spatial axis, from one language to another, and
that on a chronological axis, within one language of different periods.’3 The chrono-
logical axis of course is fundamental for translations of Old English to modern –
the sole concern of four of the twelve essays here – as it is also for the two essays
concerned with translations of early Irish texts into modern languages: Irish in the
case of Tadhg Ó Siocháin and English by Lahney Preston Matto. A substantial part
of what verse translators do is the recasting of earlier texts in their own language.
1 Friedrich Schleiermacher, Über die verschiedenen Methoden des Übersezens (Berlin, 1813); trans. Susan Bernofsky, ‘On the Different Methods of Translating’, in The Translation Studies Reader, ed. Lawrence Venuti (London, 2000), pp. 43–63.
2 See p. 73.
3 See p. 46.
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Bernard O’Donoghue
The eald languages in the twelve essays here are Old English, Old Norse, and
Middle Irish. The ‘new’ languages are Modern English, Modern Irish, Spanish,
Scots and Russian, so this is not only a matter of chronological translation. In the
essay I have quoted from already, Matyushina concludes that ‘it is less rewarding to
follow the principles of etymological translation than to make use of all the riches
of a modern language’ in rendering the vocabulary of the original.4 This is already
expressing an aesthetic preference in the debate about equivalence: a preference
which arises too with the question of translation into prose or verse. Elizabeth
Boyle in arguing for an extension to the operational canon of medieval Irish poetry
beyond nature and monasticism – beyond Pangur Bán and the Belfast Blackbird
– cites Micheál Ó Siadhail’s trenchantly expressed view of language opposition: ‘a
scientific or systematic view of language and its grammar is often thought of by
poets as boring, objective or without feeling. On the other hand, for linguists all this poetry stuff is emotional, subjective and lacking in rigour.’5 This is an overstatement at best, but it does establish an opposition between two kinds of target language that texts can be translated into.
A striking thing in this book is that some of the translators who say they are
not poets display more style in their versions than some solemnly claimed ‘transla-
tions into verse’ elsewhere. Carolyne Larrington says her translations of the Poetic
Edda are ‘not into poetry, but not exactly into prose either’.6 As with the appel ation of poet general y, the designation cannot be left to the claimant. For instance,
Lahney Preston Matto’s sparkling translation of MacConglinne is a kind of cross
between The Land of Cokaygne and ‘Goblin Market’, and it has far greater claim to the poetic than many ‘verse’ translations. The same is true of Tadhg Ó Siocháin’s
admirable translation of his Fiannaiocht text into lucid modern Irish (this time set
out as verse). We are reminded of Sidney’s trenchant pronouncement that ‘David’s
Psalms are a divine poem’, though written in a kind of prose, and that verse is ‘but an ornament and no cause to Poetry, since there have been many most excellent poets
that never versified’.7
My experience of translating medieval texts connects with the more eminent
practitioners here in various ways. All the translations I have done are described
as ‘verse translations’ which begs the questions I have just raised. I have translated short pieces of Dante and Virgil, always to produce a poem that can be included
in a collection of modern lyrics. I have translated extracts from Piers Plowman for the same purpose. But when I translated Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, responsibility for the work as a whole required a different kind of approac
h, centring on
narrative development. Seamus Heaney does the same thing with Beowulf: his
translation of the whole has a sustained epic power, but he translated some extracts
as separate lyrics. For example, Electric Light in 2001, his first collection of lyrics 4 See p. 60.
5 Micheal O’Siadhail, Say But the Word: Poetry as Vision and Voice, ed. David F. Ford and Margie M. Tolstoy (Dublin, 2015), p. 33. See p. 98.
6 See p. 170.
7 Sir Philip Sidney, An Apology for Poetry (Or The Defence of Poesy), 3rd edn, ed. Geoffrey Shepherd and R. W. Maslen (Manchester, 2002), p. 84.
Afterword
215
after the Beowulf translation in 1999, includes ‘The Fragment’, a translation of part of Beowulf’s response to the accusations of Unferþ, as well as the tragedy of the
father of the executed son (Edwin Morgan’s ‘The Auld Man’s Coronach’ in Scots,
quoted and discussed by Hugh Magennis in this volume).8 Heaney’s version of the
tragedy of Hrethel and of the father’s lament (sections 3 and 4 of ‘On His Work in
the English Tongue: In Memory of Ted Hughes’)9 keep fairly close to the letter of
the original (diverging slightly from his own version in Beowulf), in the same way that his poem ‘The Golden Bough’ in Seeing Things in 1991 diverges from the corresponding passage in his translation of the whole of Aeneid 6 in 2016.
In a similar way, from Morgan’s whole translation of Beowulf into Modern
English verse Magennis quotes the section corresponding to the Scots of ‘The Auld
Man’s Coronach’. It is an interesting case of the two axes, chronological or spatial.
Shifting the Old English into Standard Modern English verse is a classic instance of
a diachronic or chronological translation – and a particularly graceful one. But the
further shift into Scots, as Magennis shows, is spatial and cultural too, raising questions of audience. Magennis notes the significance of the Scots poem’s first publica-
tion in The Glasgow Herald.
Ó Siocháin concludes by drawing on Weaver: ‘in translating ... there are no
perfect solutions. You simply do your best.’10 This is perhaps too defeatist a depar-
ture from Ó Siocháin’s fierce epigraph from Schlegel: ‘Translation is a fight to the
death in which either the translator or the translated inevitably dies.’11 Transla-