Riesen: Von Wissenshütern und Wildnisbewohnern in Edda und Saga by Katja Schulz

Abstract

6o8 Reviews de Simine addresses the most recent kind of Vergangenheitsbewzdltigung in 'Theme Park GDR?' (pp. 253-80), and Karen Leeder provides readers with a foretaste of her forthcoming book on contemporary German poets by focusing on poems about the First World War by Thomas Kling and Raoul Schrott in her essay "'Rhythmische historia": Contemporary Poems of the First World War' (pp. 28I-305). Why these poets should want to revisit a subject already treated by somany notable poets is a question which she attempts to address in her essay: terms such 're-contextualize' and 'lautrhythmische heterophonie' go some way towards making the reader realize that this topic, too, is one to be taken seriously. New approaches may need new terminology, yet toomuch jargon indiscriminately drawn from Anglo-American and German sources impedes clarity of insight here and in several other contributions. One further point calls out for comment. With the honourable exceptions of two Austrians, the poet Raoul Schrott and themonarch Joseph II, the 'German-speaking world' of the volume's title is confined to the Federal Republic. Is Switzerland not part of that world? On the contrary, no part of that world has amore retentive cultural memory than Switzerland, or amore acute consciousness of historical developments since I500 and the age of Erasmus. Its omission here ismost unfortunate. UNIVERSITYOFBRISTOL PETERSKRINE Riesen: VonWissenshuitern undWildnisbewohnern inEdda und Saga. By KATJA SCHULZ. (Skandinavistische Arbeiten, 20) Heidelberg: Winter. 2004. 332 pp. E48. ISBN 3-8253-1570-3. True to its title, Katja Schulz's book offers an extensive study of the depiction of giants in the Old Norse Edda and sagas-more precisely in one specific group of sagas, the fornaldarsdgur, to which approximately half the book is devoted. Apart from a brief look at the picture of giants presented in the narratives and kennings of some of the longer skaldic poems, the remainder of the study is spent on an analysis of the Eddic lays and on an introductory section-impressive in its thoroughness and attention to detail-on the extensive terminology used to designate the race of giants inOld Norse literature. A wealth of information is a characteristic not only of this introductory chapter, but of the study as awhole. The author presents her findings with many and sometimes extensive quotations and numerous examples, both in the main text and in the foot notes (which frequently occupy up to half of the entire page). Schulz's conclusions from these data (what she calls at one point a 'bringing together of threads' from the samples analysed (p. 134)), sometimes already anticipated in the introductions to the subchapters, are at times a little buried under themountain of facts. Ostensibly a for mal legacy of the doctoral dissertation of which this book presents a 'lightly revised' version, the division into these many sub- (and sub-sub-)chapters, some of them no longer than a single paragraph, leads to such monstrosities as a subchapter headed 'V.2.i.8.4-Example i' (P. 24I). In combination these two factors, the copious subdivisions and the sheer volume of material presented, have the effect that for the most part Schulz's Riesen strikes one asmore of a reference book, a thematic or motif-index, than an analytical study. The main section of Schulz's discussion of the fornaldarsogur is actually called 'Riesen Motive und Riesen-Thematik', and it records and discusses Norse giants of every conceivable variation: ugly and beautiful giants, wise and stupid giants, old giants and giants with supernatural abilities; giantesses who seduce human heroes, giants who test aChristian hero's faith, and giants who are the founders of ruling dynasties. Unfortunately, any actual use of Riesen as a reference book ismade problematic by the rather carelessly compiled index: the mere four pages at the end of the book list MLR, IOI.2,2006 609 only a very limited number of keywords, and do not even (by a long way) contain a complete record of all the primary texts mentioned in this study. Schulz's observa tions, for example, on the discrepancies between descriptions of giants in the stories of the Edda and the actions they perform, or on the changes and continuities in...