Memorable Reality-Check Passages from The Wreath

Alternately titled: When bitterness takes root...

The following are two passages that capture Kristin's emotions when reality settles in regarding her relationship with Erlend.

"Kristin hesitated for a moment...Then bitterness rose up inside her for all those months of helplessness, and she said, 'Dear Erlend, did you think that we maidens would forget the man who so magnificently defended our honor?' She saw that he looked as if she had struck him...'It's odd,' he said in a low voice, 'how resourceful you are--I wouldn't have thought it of you.' 'I've had to learn to conceal things, as you might well imagine,' she said somberly." -- pp.164-165

How quickly Kristin's undying passion for Erlend cools to embers of resentment. When she encounters him at a banquet, betrothed to Simon and unable to behave freely with Erlend, the forced distance brings her emotions to the surface. After months of lying to those around her, Kristin demonstrates her newfound skill and Erlend witnesses his no-longer innocent lover in action. The passion between Kristin and Erlend cannot erase the months of silence between Kristin and Erlend. Kristin is left with the worrying and waiting to see if she conceived a child after their earlier meeting. She was still engaged to Simon and forced to behave as his betrothed, all the while yearning for Erlend. Yes, I would be angry and my tone would be pretty sharp if I were in her place at this point in the story!

"Erlend. She clenched her teeth in anger. He should have spared her this. She had not been willing. He should have remembered how it had been before, when everything had been uncertain for her, when she had had nothing to hold on to except his love; then she had always, always gladly yielded to his wishes. He should have left her alone this time, when she tried to refuse because she thought it improper for them to steal something in secret after her father had placed their hands together in the sight of all their kinsmen. But he had taken her, partly by force, but with laughter and with caresses too, so she had been unable to show him that she was serious in her refusal."

I burned with anger on Kristin's behalf, too. As much as she exerted her will to dissolve her betrothal to Simon and then obtain her father's blessing for her and Erlend, she was powerless in Erlend's arms. I hate to cry, "victim!" so freely, but Kristin was a victim...of her naive recklessness. Once Erlend had "had" her, to borrow the discreet phrasing of Undset, he saw no reason to deny himself the pleasure. What can you expect, though, Kristin? Her once spotless honor was no longer the shield it had been when she met Erlend. Reality check.

Sexuality in the Middle Ages and questions about the Wreath

When life is short and family lineage, power and property are what keeps the fittest surviving sex for the purpose of pro-creating becomes an obvious focal point, as is clearly evident in the Wreath. A virgin's protection is of uttermost importance and once you lost that you were a dead woman walking. Life was over, or at least your shot at success was. Although it was humorous that just like the Puritans, to have sex and conceive during engagement was funny but not a problem or even something to feel real shame about. So virginity was only important so far as your husband being able to possess it, less important for the biblical reasons. I know that in many cultures after one marries, family and friends help prepare the bride and groom for each other and in some cultures the men even watch to witness the big event. But i struggled to get past my 21st century prudishness to imagine being ok with my own father helping prepare me and talking and worrying about the event! Enough about that, on to some questions I hope you can help answer:

1) at the end of the wreath (pages 291-297) Kristin's parents have a very honest conversation in which Kristin's mom admits she didn't know if her husband was the father to their first son. Also, her husband acknowledges that he couldn't go through with the "event" at their wedding...i couldn't tell from their conversation if it implied they NEVER had done the deed? If so then who fathered the children? Or was it more Emotionally he had never opened up to his wife in that way? I felt for the mother, carrying around such a secret and shame for so many years-can you imagine how that would wear you down and fill you with self-loathing? And to be in such a culture that even admitting your truth to your husband so many years after the fact could have meant death or total ruination.

2) Page 95-right before Kirstin goes to the cloister Lavrens and Simon have a conversation in which Lavrens says he thinks Simon is fond of Kirstin and Simon laughs-what does the laugh denote? I couldn't help but feel in some of his comments that he admired Kirsten's naive girlishness, but was much more a man of the world who had had experience with other women. Anyone else get this vibe? Myabe i'm reading too much into it..i was still mourning Arne's death.

I: The Wreath

I've always loved history-from the historical fiction books I read as a grade schooler to my European history classes in college which earned me a degree in History-i love the stories of those who have gone on before us. I admit i was a bit hesitant to start in on something SO old, in my mind the 1300s Northern Europe are so hazy and far away i can't even picture real people or places being a part of it-and certainly not people are places that i could relate to or that could impact me..here..today. Any hesitation i had left just while reading the introduction about the book and learning about the author, Sigrid Undset. Her life itself was enough to write a book about and knowing how academic and historical of an approach she has taken here to respect the actual time period shows the way she honors her characters and story. Once i started reading part I i couldn't stop! I have become part of the story, somewhere in the backdrop and silently (not by choice) rooting our heroine on and wanting her to succeed in all the challenges which arose.

Life was treacherous in the middle ages, and i'm sure the life expectancy was quite short with only the strongest surviving past middle age. I know that this meant people grew up faster, they certainly worked much harder at a young age and it seemed like school wasn't even an option. It seems like Kristin was sheltered and had a "chidhood" in the sense of playing, being in a protective environment and having adventures as all kids do. Yet, as soon as she was a young teen she was struggling with love interests, fighting off a potential rapist, and needing to engage herself for marriage. I know that this was typical at this age and she was fully capable of running a home of her own, but it made me appreciate the weight of those life decisions that would forever alter the course of her life and starting at such a young age! I'm sure people in their teens have always been hormone ridden, still emotionally and mentally developing and learning to make good decisions with the help of those around them. Fast forward 700 years and people at that same age are treated so much differently and in a sense, childhood extends another decade! I guess i think of my first love, my high school boyfriend when i was 16-the passion, the desire, and love were there-but thank God that was an awkward "practice" for making the real decision about love for my adult life and is nothing more than a memory and photos. What if for all of us, those high school relationships were it and those decisions we made were possibly the most important we ever made? Can you even imagine!? All this to say i was really rooting for Arne, and was devastated when he was killed off early on..i was hoping for him to come back later but it's not a Jane Austen novel is it now!? I felt so-so about the engagement, and wanted to tell her NOT to get involved with Erlend. Thinking about her life and suddenly being cut off from her family in a foreign place, how it happened, and she experienced real passion and desire for the first time. But i think we could all spot the guy as bad news from a mile away...and she just couldn't help herself. I've been there, done that too and get it but now i fear that the rest of the novels will be about her reaping what she has sown.

More topics for other posts so that this one wasn't so long, but what are you feelings finishing the wreath and going into the next book? And did you want her to be with Simon or Erlend or neither? Do you think either man truly loved Kristin?