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.
Well said Rachel! I agree, she was a victim to herself, and i mourned that with her. It's amazing that she knew the power of her "shield" and yet was surprised when she was utterly defenseless after she tossed it away so carelessly?! I feel like she never learned to think objectively or think ahead-she completely let her emotions take over which is such the stereotype but also so true with women throughout the ages. Part of me admired the reckless abandon of doing what you want to do, what you are passionate about, heedless of consequences. Just like i admire ski bums and people that pick up and travel the world for a year, camping and working as they go-there is a romance to it all, a spirit that they can let go so easily i don't have that...but at the end of the day i don't think Kristin did either as she matured. Life wasn't the romance she thought it would be.
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