The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún - Commentary

Commentary

The book's introduction draws a sharp distinction between epic poetry and the Skaldic and eddic poetry of Scandinavia. "...epic poetry never developed in those lands" . "...verse developed its local brief, pithy, strophic, often dramatic form not into epic, but into the astonishing and euphonious but formal elaborations of scaldic verse." There is also drawn a distinction, although not as sharply, between the later elaborate skaldic verse, and the simpler forms which the poems of the Elder Edda use. The verses in The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún use these simpler forms, which, the book says, arose earlier but persisted alongside the skaldic forms. "But The opposition between 'Eddic' and 'Skaldic' verse is quite unreal as one of time .... They are related growths, branches on the same tree, essentially connected, even possibly sometimes by the same hands." Tolkien also mentions that the use of the term "eddic" for this simpler style of verse is a later development, even an anachronism "Thus the term 'Eddaic', as now used, in opposition to 'Skaldic' is a perfect reversal of its former meaning."

The book contains extensive commentary by Christopher Tolkien on the sources behind J. R. R. Tolkien's verses printed here, and the ways in which the author used, mixed, and differed from those sources, as well as the larger background of legend and history behind the stories. Excerpts from notes for lectures that J. R. R. Tolkien gave on related topics are also included.