Hrafnkel or the Ambiguities Hard Cases, Hard Choices

William Ian Miller presents a close reading of one of the best known of the Icelandic sagas, showing its moral, political, and psychological sophistication. Hrafnkel tells of a fairly simple feud in which a man rises, falls, and rises again with a vengeance, so to speak. The saga deals with complex issues with finely layered irony: who can one justifiably hit, when, and by what means? It does this with cool nuance, also taking on matters of torture and pain-infliction as a means of generating fellow-feeling. How does one measure pain and humiliation so as to get even, to get back to equal? People are forced to set prices on things we tell ourselves soporifically are priceless, such as esteem, dignity, life itself. Morality no less than legal remedy involves price-setting. This book flies in the face of all the previous critical literature which, with very few exceptions, imposes simplistic readings on the saga. A translation of the saga is provided as an appendix.

William Ian Miller, Thomas G. Long Professor of Law, University of Michigan

William Ian Miller is the Thomas G. Long Professor of Law at the University of Michigan and Honorary Professor of History at the University of St. Andrews. He has written extensively on the bloodfeud, mostly as manifested in saga Iceland: Bloodtaking and Peacemaking (1990), Eye for an Eye (2006),
Audun and the Polar Bear (2008); 'Why is your Axe Bloody?': A Reading of Nj?ls saga (2014). He has also written books about various emotions, mostly unpleasant ones: Humiliation (1993), The Anatomy of Disgust (1997), The Mystery of Courage (2000), Faking It (2003), and Losing It (2011) about the
loss of mental acuity that comes with age

Note to Readers
Abbreviations
Genealogies
Key Farms
Part I: Introduction
1. A Somewhat Querulous Introduction: Hrafnkel and the Critics
2. Of Names and Manageability
Part II. Economic, Social, and Geological Context
3. The Saga's Economics (ch. 14)
4. New-found Land and Setting up Households (chs. 1-2)
Part III. Horse, Vow, and Killing
5. Freysgo?i, Frey, and Freyfaxi
6. The ?jafna?arma?r (the 'Unevenman')
7. Sam, Einar, and Hrafnkel (chs 3-6)
8. Freyfaxi and Hrafnkel: More on the Vow and its Price (chs 5-6)
9. Hrafnkel's Offer (ch. 7)
10. Thorbjorn's Rejection (ch. 7 cont.)
Part IV. Lawsuit Ab Ovo to 'Final' Settlement
11. Mustering Support and Going Public (ch. 7 cont.)
12. The Lawsuit: Preparatory Stages (chs 8-9)
13. Thorkel's Homily on Fellow-feeling and Commensurating Pain (ch. 10)
14. The Trial (chs 11-12)
15. Hanging Upside-Down and Sam's Self-judgment (ch. 13)
16. Farewell Freyfaxi and Frey (chs 15-16)
17. The 'True' Nature of Hrafnkel's Transformation (ch. 16)
Part V. Six Years Later
18. Eyvind Returns; a Gri?kona Takes Over (ch. 17)
19. Who in Hell Are We Rooting For? (ch. 18)
20. Hrafnkel's Judgment and Justification (ch. 19)
21. Sam's Last Gasp (ch. 20)
22. Sam and Morpheus: What Counts as Taking a Turn
23. Conclusion: Hard Cases, Hard Choices
Appendices
A. Hrafnkels saga Freysgo?i, translation of MS ?M 156, fol.
B. Glossary of Norse Terms
Works Cited
A.1 Hrafnkels saga, Editions and Translations Consulted
A.2 Sources and Translations
B. Secondary Works
Maps
Index