yetanotherlemontree

[yetanotherlemontree]

me and the bestie celebrating the ides of march

[yetanotherlemontree]

Hello! I was wondering... Do you have a favorite saga? I want to read one but not sure where to start...

Hello!

I have only read a few (Gunnlaugs saga ormstungu, an abridged version of Laxdæla saga, Gísla saga Súrssonar, Brennu-Njáls saga, and part of Völsunga saga), but my favorite was definitely Brennu-Njáls saga (or just Njáls saga), which is often regarded as the best one. In fact, I happened to reread it last summer and had a great time doing it! You do have to go with the sagas a bit - these are premodern narratives, and sometimes they're making what would be pretty odd choices in any modern narrative (hello, meticulously introducing 500 characters and their family trees only some of which will be in any way relevant for more than a chapter). But if you're prepared to take it as it is, it's a lot of fun. Strongly recommend an actual modern translation if you're going to read it translated, incidentally - there's a public domain English translation from 1861 that's easy to find, but it's really not very comprehensible for a modern reader. (It also appears to be based on a manuscript that added a lot of additional poetry for some reason, so it reads amusingly like "Njáls saga the musical"; everyone's just bursting into song all the time.)

Njáls saga features fun things like

A man has a curse laid on him that later leads to the dissolution of his marriage. What does the curse do? Well, you see, any time he so much as touches his wife, his erection becomes so massive that they cannot actually have sex. This is unacceptable. His wife's father hatches an elaborate deceptive scheme to arrange a divorce while he's not present to object. (The 1861 English translation censors the nature of the curse, which is tragic, because this is very funny.)

Two men are the best of friends, but their wives are feuding. The wives keep sending their staff off to murder people on the other's staff in vengeance for previous murders. The husbands miserably pay each other the same silver in reparations back and forth, helpless to stem the wrath of their wives.

In the middle we go off on a several-chapter tangent about the Christianization of Iceland, featuring a highly scientific experiment to prove which religion is right involving fire blessed in the name of Jesus, fire blessed in the name of the old gods, and a control fire with no blessing, as well as a delightfully childish dialogue where one character asserts that Thor challenged Jesus to a duel but Jesus was too scared to fight him, followed by the other character going yeah well Jesus could kick Thor's ass if he wanted to.

The author obviously adores legal shenanigans worthy of Better Call Saul and repeatedly writes heroic characters engaging in the most hilariously shady of legal schemes with great enthusiasm and approval. After the action climax of the story, we get to the legal climax, an extended trial where two lawyers pull a series of increasingly batshit technicalities on each other, and it's great.

That said, it is also the longest one, so if you'd like to start off with a shorter saga, you could also go for something like Gunnlaugs saga ormstungu which is only around 10k words. I haven't read that one since I was thirteen but I did enjoy it.

[yetanotherlemontree]

Hannibal 3.01 Antipasto | 3.02 Primavera

[yetanotherlemontree]

Good night and remember, Will was never able to feel hatred for Hannibal

[yetanotherlemontree]

MADS MIKKELSEN as LE CHIFFRE Casino Royale (2006) dir. Martin Campbell

[yetanotherlemontree]

Do you have a favourite Hatari moment? Like the funniest, most iconic, anything like that

I think one of my favorites is the wholesome baking video parodying one of Bjarni Ben's political ads. I also enjoyed challenging Netanyahu to a match of Icelandic trouser wrestling and Einar presenting Iceland's points in Eurovision 2023.

But also, I think the inevitable most iconic Hatari moment is pulling out Palestine flags when receiving their televote points.

[yetanotherlemontree]

Is there a way to know which verbs trigger which cases? Like if you come across a new verb/preposition, how would you figure it out without looking it up?

There are some, let's say, vague vibes to which verbs prescribe which cases. But you can't really know without hearing it used. For a 'new' verb, it's likely you're going to instinctively use it with the accusative, unless you sort of analogize it to another verb that's similar in meaning or feel and use the case that goes with that one.

There was actually an interesting discussion related to this in Icelandic Facebook group Málspjall the other day, regarding the use of the word 'negla' (to nail) in reference to kicking a football (it's basically a slangy way of saying they kicked it very hard, usually into the net). Usually, when speaking of nailing as in hammering in a nail, it takes the accusative - but when it comes to football people tend to instinctively go for the dative, probably because most verbs that are about applying force to send an object flying (such as sparka (kick), kasta (throw) and their many, many synonyms and nuances) take the dative. It sounds odd to me to speak of nailing the ball into the net in the accusative, because that just makes me think of the actual literally hammering it in there with a nail. But using it with the dative is not actually in the dictionary - it's just native speakers getting the feeling that for this sense it should be the dative.

[yetanotherlemontree]

Hannibal Vampire au where he is called Dr. Acula

[yetanotherlemontree]

A little Hannibal Lecter headcanon: Hannibal was a cannibal before he was born. He ate his twin in the womb.

[yetanotherlemontree]

Will as Clarice!

PRINTS on my bio!

[yetanotherlemontree]

Hannibal 3x06 - “Dolce”

[yetanotherlemontree]

Hannibal 3x06 - “Dolce”

Hannibal saying both the most and the least romantic things he could possibly say in the same damn scene

[yetanotherlemontree]

Hannibal 3x06 - “Dolce”

friendly reminder that the intimacy is striking

[yetanotherlemontree]

“It can all turn to blood in the blink of an eye.”

[yetanotherlemontree]

Hannibal 3x13 - “The Wrath of the Lamb”

[yetanotherlemontree]

Hannibal 3x13 - “The Wrath of the Lamb”