Few speakers of English have ever been able to read the Icelandic sagas
in the original language, and published saga translations have played a
major role in shaping attitudes towards Viking Age Scandinavia and the
great literary achievements of medieval Iceland in the English-speaking
world. This book is the first publication to provide an extended
examination of the history and development of Icelandic saga
translations into English from their beginnings in the eighteenth
century to today. It explores reasons for undertaking saga translation,
and the challenges confronting translators. Chapters are devoted to the
pioneering saga translations, the later Victorian and Edwardian eras,
the often-neglected period of the two World Wars and their aftermath,
and the upsurge of saga translation in the second half of the twentieth
century. The contributions of individual translators and teams are
reviewed, from James Johnstone in the 1780s through major Victorians
such as Samuel Laing, George Webbe Dasent, and William Morris,
distinguished twentieth century figures such as Lee M. Hollander, Gwyn
Jones, Magnus Magnusson and Hermann Palsson, and George Johnston, and
the great co-operative project which produced The Complete Sagas of
Icelanders at the century's end. The book concludes with saga
translation facing interesting new possibilities and challenges, not
least those generated by information technology.