Tolkein's a piece of cake by comparison

After finishing the splendid read that was Symphony, I cast along my now-depleted bookshelves for something else. Luckily, I picked up a couple of books that were looking for a new home at Jessica's house-warming party last week. The one that caught my eye yesterday? "Kristin Lavransdatter" -- a stirring tale of a woman's life in 14th century Norway, by the Nobel Prize-winning* novelist Sigrid Undset. It sounds like a rip-roaring read. Let's check out the first page:

When the lands and goods of Ivar Gjesling the younger, of Sundbu, were divided after his death in 1306, his lands in Sil of Gudbrandsdal fell to his daughter Ragnfrid and husband Lavrans Bjorgulfson. Up to then, they had lived on Lavrans' manor of Skog at Follo, near Oslo; but now they moved up to Jorundgaard at the top of the open lands of Sil. Lavrans was of the stock that was known in this country as the Lagmandssons. It had come here from Sweden with that Laurentius, Lagmand of East Gothland, who took the Belbo Jarl's sister, the Lady Bengta, out of Vreta convent, and carried her off to Norway...

Blimey! There are two endnotes in that first paragraph, one of which is three pages long, outlines the typical setup of a Norwegian manor house in the 14th century, the development of masonry chimneys, and has diagrams! It's not what you'd call a gripping opening. However, I've started so I'll (attempt to) finish. Let's hope it gets less confusing and less wordy as it goes on.

*Not that winning a Nobel Prize for literature in 1928 means that much. After all, the Nobel committee probably handed these things out to anyone writing in Norwegian -- a bit like all Norwegians are on Olympic teams at some point in their life. What? It's true!