Sagan Om Kärleken. Erotik, Känslor Och Berättarkonst I Norrön Litteratur. By Daniel Sävborg. Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Historia Litterarum, Vol. 27. Uppsala: Uppsala Universitet, 2007. Pp. 661.

Sävborg's volume is not a thin book in any sense of the word. It may in fact be the most detailed investigation of the Icelandic sagas ever, although it singles out the relatively narrow topic of love. In its descriptive stance it is remotely reminiscent of Richard Heinzel's now ancient Beschreibung der isländischen Saga (1880), but the coverage is far more extensive and far more probing. Sävborg's command of the material is equally impressive in its mastery of the texts (he seems to have read every scrap of narrative writing) and its total familiarity with the critical literature, which has grown extravagantly in the last fifty years. His book deserves a much fuller review than it will get here, since a journal review does not provide latitude for even a recapitulation of all the most important points.

Theodore M. Andersson
Indiana University