Sigrid Undset

(Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)

Kristin Lavransdatter

Set in Norway and Iceland at the beginning of the 11th century, "Gunnar's Daughter" tells the story of a beautiful, spoiled young woman who, after being raped by the man she had wanted to love, raises the child conceived in violence. Alone she rebuilds her life and restores her family's honor--until an unremitting social code propels her to take the action that again destroys her happiness.

Gunnar's Daughter

Undset's "Catherine of Siena" is critically acclaimed as one of the best biographies of this famous 14th-century saint. Known for her historical fiction, which won her the Nobel Prize for literature in 1928, Undset was lauded for her meticulous research of medieval figures.

Catherine of Siena

In medieval Norway, spirited and passionate Kristin Lavransdatter must choose between the honor of her proud father and her own loyalty and devotion to the man she loves

The Bridal Wreath

The Master of Hestviken, Vol. 1

The Axe

À l'aube du xxe siècle, Jenny, une jeune peintre norvégienne vivant à Rome, goûte pour la première fois aux joies de l'indépendance. Alors qu'elle peut enfin se consacrer tout entière à son art, elle fait la connaissance de Helge Gram et son existence bascule. En apprenant à déchiffrer son propre désir, Jenny va tenter de mettre au jour le sens profond qu'elle souhaite donner à sa vie, quand bien même Helge n'est bientôt plus le seul à susciter en elle ces interrogations. 
À sa parution en Norvège en 1911, Jenny fit scandale. Jusqu'où pouvait donc se permettre d'aller une femme pour vivre la vie qu'elle avait choisie pour elle-même ? Passant outre certains des tabous les plus tenaces de son temps, Sigrid Undset livre une réflexion stupéfiante sur l'amour, l'art et la soif d'absolu, incarnée par une héroïne aussi puissante que fragile, aux prises avec son époque, ses propres contradictions et la violence des hommes. 

Sigrid Undset (1882-1949) est l'une des grandes voix de la littérature norvégienne du début du xxe siècle. Romancière et polémiste prolifique, elle obtient le prix Nobel de littérature en 1928.

Jenny

The initial volume in the Nobel Prize-winning author's tumultuous, epic story of medieval Norway--the first new English translation in nearly a century As a child, Olav Audunssøn is given by his dying father to an old friend, Steinfinn Toressøn, who rashly promises to raise the boy as his foster son and eventually marry him to his own daughter, Ingunn. The two children, very different in temperament, become both brother and sister and betrothed. In the turbulent thirteenth-century Norway of Sigrid Undset's epic masterpiece, bloodlines and loyalties often supersede law, and the crown and the church vie for power and wealth. Against this background and the complicated relationship between Olav and Ingunn, a series of fateful decisions leads to murder, betrayal, exile, and disgrace. In Vows, the first book in the powerful Olav Audunssøn tetralogy, Undset presents a richly imagined world split between pagan codes of retribution and the constraints of Christian piety--all of which threaten to destroy the lives of two young people torn between desires of the heart and the dictates of family and fortune. As she did when writing her earlier and bestselling epic Kristin Lavransdatter, Sigrid Undset immersed herself in the legal, religious, and historical documents of medieval Norway to create in Olav Audunssøn remarkably authentic and compelling portraits of Norwegian life in the Middle Ages. In this new English edition, renowned Scandinavian translator Tiina Nunnally again captures Undset's fluid prose, conveying in an engaging lyrical style the natural world, complex culture, and fraught emotional territory of Olav and Ingunn's dramatic story.

I. Vows

Olav Audunssøn

“I have been unfaithful to my husband.” Marta Oulie’s opening line scandalized Norwegian readers in 1907. And yet, Sigrid Undset had a gift for depicting modern women “sympathetically but with merciless truthfulness,” as the Swedish Academy noted in awarding her the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1928. At the time she was one of the youngest recipients and only the third woman so honored. It was Undset’s honest story of a young woman’s love life—“the immoral kind,” as she herself bluntly put it—that made her first novel an instant sensation in Norway. Marta Oulie, written in the form of a diary, intimately documents the inner life of a young woman disappointed and constrained by the conventions of marriage as she longs for an all-consuming passion. Set in Kristiania (now Oslo) at the beginning of the twentieth century, Undset’s book is an incomparable psychological portrait of a woman whose destiny is defined by the changing mores of her day—as she descends, inevitably, into an ever-darker reckoning. Remarkably, though Undset’s other works have attracted generations of readers, Marta Oulie has never before appeared in English translation. Tiina Nunnally, whose award-winning translation of Undset’s Kristin Lavransdatter captured the author’s beautifully clear style, conveys the voice of Marta Oulie with all the stark poignancy of the original Norwegian.

A Novel of Betrayal

Marta Oulie

First published in 1921, "The Wife" is the second book in the "Kristin Lavransdatter" trilogy by Sigrid Undset, the Norwegian author and winner of the 1928 Nobel Prize for Literature. Undset's award was primarily based on this series, which depicts the life of Norwegian woman from her childhood to her death in the 14th century. The first book in the series, "The Wreath", follows the young Kristin as she clashes with her family, who are religious and prosperous farmers, while she falls in love with, and eventually marries, a man that her parents do not approve of. In "The Wife,", Kristin finally faces adult responsibilities and concerns as she makes a life with her husband. She atones for the sins of her youth and rises to the challenges of raising a large family and running an estate while married to an irresponsible and impulsive man. Kristin's love and loyalty for her foolish husband is greatly tested and she learns the hard way what challenges await her and what sacrifices will be required of her. "The Wife" is a riveting and satisfying portrayal of a woman coming into her own as well as a fascinating glimpse into a long since past medieval world. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper and follows the translation of Charles Archer.

The Wife

In The Axe, we meet Olav Audunsson and Ingunn Steinfinnsdatter, who were betrothed as children and raised as brother and sister. Now, in the heedlessness of youth, they become lovers, unaware that their ardor will forge the first link in a chain of murder, exile, and disgrace. --From publisher's description.

Kristin Lavransdotter

The Wild Orchid

Completes the saga of Kristin Lavransdatter, from her life at Jorundgaard to her death.

The Cross

Kransen

La saga di Vigdis

السيدة مارتا أولي

Vigdis, a indomável

When Jenny was published in 1911, Undset found herself called immoral — “this is a side of the free, artistic life that the vast majority of citizens would rather not know.” The novel tells the story of Jenny Winge, a talented Norwegian painter who goes to Rome to seek artistic inspiration but ultimately betrays her own ambitions and ideals. After falling into an affair with the married father of a would-be suitor, Jenny has a baby out-of- wedlock and decides to raise the child on her own. Undset’ s portrayal of a woman struggling toward independence and fulfillment is written with an unflinching, clear-eyed honesty that renders her story as compelling today as it was nearly a century ago. This new translation by Tiina Nunnally captures the fresh, vivid style of Undset’s writing and restores passages omitted from the only previous edition to appear in English, which was published in 1921. Most famous for her later, historical fiction set in Catholic, medieval Scandinavia, Undset stands revealed with Jenny, her first major novel, as an unsparing, compassionate, magnificent realist, the creator of works that are at once thoroughly modern and of enduring interest.

Stages on the Road

Olav Audunsson and Ingunn Steinfinnsdatter became lovers when they were barely beyond childhood and endured a long and bitter separation before they could wed. Now they are beginning what each hopes will be a new life--but in Ingunn's past lies the shame of an illegitimate child and in Olav's past lies murder. And the guilt they carry may prove more destructive of their happiness than all the years they spent as outcasts. --From publisher's description.

Sigrid Undset

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