Andrew Wawn | |
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 Andrew Wawn addresses the 2013 Symposium in Honour of George Stephens (1813-1895) | |
| Born | October 1944 |
| Nationality | British |
| Alma mater | University of Birmingham |
| Known for | The Vikings and the Victorians (2000) |
| Title | Emeritus professor |
Andrew Nicholas Wawn (born October 1944) is emeritus professor of Anglo-Icelandic literature at the University of Leeds and an expert on Old Norse sagas and their reception in the modern era.
Andrew Wawn was born in Wirral, [1] Cheshire, England, in October 1944. He attended Birkenhead School, where he cultivated an interest in golf. [2] Following a BA at the University of Birmingham, [3] he completed his PhD there in 1969 with a thesis entitled "The Plowman's Tale: Critical Edition". [4] Alongside his studies of medieval English at Birmingham, he also took part in extramural classes in Old Norse. [5]
In 1972, Wawn gained a lectureship at the University of Keele, [5] where he taught Old and Middle English, the history of the English language, stylistics, and other subjects. [6] Finding that 'það var skemmtilegra að lesa fornar íslenskar bókmenntir heldur en þær ensku' ('more entertaining to read Old Icelandic literature than English'), he began teaching Old Icelandic at Keele, and in September 1978 paid his first, week-long visit to the island, finding its autumn drizzle congenial to his temperament. [6] His research interests shifted gradually to Iceland and he became a regular visitor; his work focused on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century English visitors to Iceland, and the reception of medieval Icelandic literature in Britain. [5]
In 1983, Wawn moved to the University of Leeds, [6] building on a heritage of Icelandic studies there dating back to the interwar teaching of J. R. R. Tolkien and E. V. Gordon, and the foundation of the Bogi Melsteð Collection there. [7] At Leeds, while continuing to teach medieval English, Wawn extended his teaching from Old to Modern Icelandic, succeeding in sustaining students' interest in the subject in the face of the introduction of shorter modules, which reduced the scope for language-learning, and the attractions of other literature on an increasingly diverse syllabus. [6] [5] Wawn was promoted from senior lecturer to reader in English and Icelandic studies in 1995, [8] and subsequently to Professor of Anglo-Icelandic Studies. [3] In 2007, he was awarded the Knight’s Cross of the Icelandic Order of the Falcon for services to Icelandic studies. [7] He retired in 2009 and was made a professor emeritus. [9]
Wawn's monograph The Vikings and the Victorians: Inventing the Old North in Nineteenth-century Britain (2000) was the first book-length treatment of the reception of the Vikings in the Victorian age. [10] [11] Roberta Frank found that 'in its broad canvas and energetic research, its pace and wit and its learning lightly worn, Wawn's book is exemplary, a work of humane and original scholarship'. [12]
Wawn edited the journal Leeds Studies in English solo from 1992 to 1994, and was co-editor from 2003 to 2008. He was president of the Viking Society for Northern Research from around 2000 to 2003, and was one of editors of the Society's journal, Saga-book, around the same period. [13] In the year of his retirement, his sixty-fifth birthday was marked by the publication of a Festschrift . [14]
The sagas of Icelanders, also known as family sagas, are a subgenre, or text group, of Icelandic sagas. They are prose narratives primarily based on historical events that mostly took place in Iceland in the ninth, tenth, and early eleventh centuries, during the so-called Saga Age. They were written in Old Icelandic, a western dialect of Old Norse. They are the best-known specimens of Icelandic literature.
Vinland, Vineland, or Winland was an area of coastal North America explored by Vikings. Leif Eriksson landed there around 1000 AD, nearly five centuries before the voyages of Christopher Columbus and John Cabot. The name appears in the Vinland Sagas, and describes Newfoundland and the Gulf of Saint Lawrence as far as northeastern New Brunswick. Much of the geographical content of the sagas corresponds to present-day knowledge of transatlantic travel and North America.
Njáls saga, also Njála ( ), or Brennu-Njáls saga ( ), is a thirteenth-century Icelandic saga that describes events between 960 and 1020.
In Icelandic literature, a ríma is an epic poem written in any of the so-called rímnahættir. They are rhymed, they alliterate and consist of two to four lines per stanza. The plural, rímur, is either used as an ordinary plural, denoting any two or more rímur, but is also used for more expansive works, containing more than one ríma as a whole. Thus Ólafs ríma Haraldssonar denotes an epic about Ólafr Haraldsson in one ríma, while Núma rímur are a multi-part epic on Numa Pompilius.
Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks is a legendary saga from the 13th century combining matter from several older sagas in Germanic heroic legend. It tells of wars between the Goths and the Huns during the 4th century. The final part of the saga, which was likely composed separately from and later than the rest, is a source for Swedish medieval history.
The Viking revival was a movement reflecting new interest in, and appreciation for Viking medieval history and culture. Interest was reawakened in the late 18th and 19th centuries, often with added heroic overtones typical of that Romantic era.
Thorfinn Karlsefni Thórdarson was an Icelandic explorer. Around the year 1010, he followed Leif Eriksson's route to Vinland in a short-lived attempt to establish a permanent settlement there with his wife Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir and their followers.
The Vinland Sagas are two Icelandic texts written independently of each other in the early 13th century—The Saga of the Greenlanders and The Saga of Erik the Red. The sagas were written down between 1220 and 1280 and describe events occurring around 970–1030.
Finnur Magnússon, sometimes referred to by the Danish version of his name under which he published, Finno Magnusun, Finn Magnussen or Magnusen, was an Icelandic scholar and archaeologist who worked in Denmark.
The Norrœna Society was an early 20th-century publishing house dedicated to Northern European culture. It published expensively produced reprints of classic 19th-century editions, mostly translations, of Old Norse literary and historical works, Northern European folklore, and medieval literature.
The Viking Society for Northern Research is a group dedicated to the study and promotion of the ancient culture of Scandinavia. Founded in London in 1892 as the Orkney, Shetland and Northern Society or the Viking Club, its name was changed in 1902 to the Viking Club or Society for Northern Research, and in 1912 to its present name. Its journal, Saga-Book, publication of editions, translations, and scholarly studies, and since 1964 the Dorothea Coke Memorial Lectures, have been influential in the field of Old Norse and Scandinavian-British Studies.
Eiríkr or Eiríkur Magnússon was an Icelandic scholar at the University of Cambridge, who taught Old Norse to William Morris, translated numerous Icelandic sagas into English in collaboration with him, and played an important role in the movement to study the history and literature of the Norsemen in Victorian England.
Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, often abbreviated Einar Ól. Sveinsson was an Icelandic scholar of Old Norse literature who was Professor of Icelandic Literature at the University of Iceland. His writings on and editions of sagas were particularly influential.
Sigrgarðs saga frœkna is a medieval Icelandic romance-saga, described by Finnur Jónsson as 'all in all ... one of the best and most worthy of reading' of the Icelandic 'stepmother-sagas'.
Viktors saga ok Blávus is a medieval Icelandic romance saga from the fifteenth century.
Þjalar-Jóns saga, also known as Saga Jóns Svipdagssonar ok Eireks forvitna is a medieval Icelandic saga defined variously as a romance-saga and a legendary saga. The earliest manuscript, Holm. perg. 6 4to, dates from around the first quarter of the fifteenth century, and the saga is thought to be from the fourteenth century.
Magnús Jónsson í Vigur (1637–1702) was a wealthy Icelandic landowner who is best known for his patronage of manuscripts and interest in Icelandic and foreign literature. Magnús is often referred to as Magnús í Vigur because his primary residence during his lifetime was at a farm on the small island of Vigur in Ísafjarðardjúp in the Westfjords of Iceland. He is also sometimes called Magnús digri.
Tómasarbók is a mid-sixteenth-century Icelandic manuscript. It was written between 1540 and 1560 by Ari Jónsson and his sons Jón and Tómas Arason.
Saulus saga ok Nikanors is a medieval Icelandic romance saga. Its style is said to combine that of a romance as well as that of Sagas of Icelanders. Thematically, the saga discusses issues of power, embodied by Nikanor's sister's name, Potentiana.
Beatrice Elizabeth Clay was a British head teacher and children's author known for her retellings of Arthurian and Old Icelandic literature.
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