영어로 읽는 고전 _ 헨리크 입센의 헬겔란의 전사들
『헬겔란의 전사들』은 1857년에 쓰인 희곡이다. 옛 노르드 전통이 그리스도교로 넘어가던 10세기 노르웨이를 배경으로, 외르눌프와 그의 일곱 아들이 납치되어 강제로 혼인한 딸과 수양딸을 찾아 나서는 이야기를 따라간다. 명예와 의무라는 오래된 관념이 혈육에 대한 사랑과 충돌하고, 그 충돌은 지그문트와 브륀힐데의 게르만 신화를 되울리는 사건들을 불러온다. 입센의 이 초기작은 이교적 가치와 새롭게 밀려오는 그리스도교적 이상 사이의 격렬한 충돌을 파고든다.
Classics Read in English _ The Vikings of Helgeland by Henrik Ibsen
Five years ago two men came in the night to Ørnulf's house in Iceland and carried off two women. Sigurd took Dagny, Ørnulf's daughter, and married her. Gunnar took Hjørdis, his foster-daughter, and married her — after, it was said, killing the white bear that guarded her door, a deed that was the condition of winning her. Now the old man has crossed the sea to Helgeland with his seven sons to demand blood-payment, and the two households are about to sit at the same table.
The trouble is that the story everyone has lived by for five years is not true. It was Sigurd who killed the bear and went into Hjørdis's chamber in Gunnar's clothing, because Gunnar could not, and because Sigurd had already promised Dagny to his foster-brother's friendship and would not take for himself what he had won for another. So Hjørdis has spent five years married to a decent, cautious man she despises, and Sigurd has spent them married to a woman he is fond of while carrying the knowledge that the one person on earth built to his own scale is in the next house.
Hjørdis is the first of Ibsen's great destroyers. She wants a death worth having — hers, his, everyone's — and she works patiently to bring the men to killing. Ørnulf's sons die one by one, and the old man, who has come for honour, ends by doing the only thing left to a father: he sits down and makes a poem for them. It is the strangest and best moment in the play. Then Hjørdis, having at last understood which man came to her chamber that night, shoots Sigurd with an arrow so that they may ride together in the wild hunt — and learns as he dies that he has taken Christian baptism, and that wherever he is going she cannot follow.
Ibsen was twenty-nine and had been reading the sagas for years. It shows in the prose, which is flat, hard, and free of ornament — the first time his language sounds like nobody else's.
Summary
SIGURD (enters first, looks around, sees the boat-shed, goes quickly
up to it, and tries to burst open the door.)
ORNULF (appears among the rocks, starts on seeing SIGURD, seems to
recognise him, descends and cries:) Give place, Viking!
SIGURD (turns, lays his hand on his sword, and answers:) 'Twere the
first time if I did!
ORNULF. Thou shalt and must! I have need of the shelter for my
stiff-frozen men.
SIGURD. Then must outlaws be highly prized in Helgeland!
ORNULF. Dearly shalt thou aby that word!
SIGURD. Now will it go ill with thee, old man!
(ORNULF rushes upon him; SIGURD defends himself.)
(DAGNY and some of SIGURD'S men come up from the strand; Ornulf's
six sons appear on the rocks to the right.)
DAGNY (who is a little in front, clad in a red kirtle, blue cloak, and fur hood, calls down to the ships:) Up, all Sigurd's men! My husband is fighting with a stranger!
