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Um morðsöguna Gísla sögu Súrssonar

Abstract

Gísla saga Súrssonar is one of the most famous murder stories in Icelandic literature. Occasionally, in recent decades it has been compared with classic detective stories. The murder of Vésteinn Vésteinsson has been regarded as a murder mystery, even though both versions of the saga make it clear that he fell at the hands of fiorgrímur go›i. In the shorter version, which is discussed here, fiorgrímur is declared to be the murderer only in a chapter heading. We may thus consider that this heading is one of many ‘clues’ to the murderer of Vésteinn. If we compare Gísla saga with “whodunnits” in terms of structure and character (cf. Todorov, Barthes, Cawelti et al.), it becomes apparent that the differences are great: the medieval saga is very ambiguous and seems in many ways more modern than the classical detective story; it has, for example, features in common with cinematic novels (filmischer Roman) and with post-modern fiction.