In Undset's foreword to her own translation of Chesterton's Everlasting Man, she wrote of the challenge of rendering the master of paradox into Norwegian: " What some Frenchman said about translation particularly applies to translations of Chesterton: namely that they are like women - if they are beautiful, they are not faithful, but if they are faithful, they are not beautiful. I myself have time and again been at a loss as to how faithfully I should follow Chesterton's text

It's extraordinary, really. Very occasionally I look at the email of analytics I get sent that shows me there are a relatively high number of readers that come to this page - I presume in the hope of some profound insights into Undset. What is even more extraordinary is that despite no posts in such a long time, the visits are fairly stable. Hello to anyone who has stopped by over the last twelve months. Apologies if you dropped by twice, hoping for new content. The truth is

An excerpt from Undset's 1941 article "Kristen Kultur". We know that states built on democratic foundations are far from perfect – they...

"Positioning Undset has been a difficult task for researchers, because her Catholicism and realism fall outside the liberal-national,...

From the earliest times of Christianity, the Catholic Church has raised women to the highest honours by their veneration as saints....

Undset compares this biblical episode with paganism contemporary with and after Abraham. She derides the already fashionable idea of...

Here Sigrid writes of the book which had the greatest influence on her in childhood, and in fact helped shape her epic writing in the...

It's been almost a month since I returned from a recent four weeks' stay in Norway. The purpose of the visit was to improve my fluency in...

From Sigrid Undset's The Wild Orchid. While studying geology at university, Paul decides to move into the city from his mother Julie's...

Synopsis of the sequel to The Wild Orchid. In this second part of the Paul Selmer duology, Paul finally becomes a Catholic, he and Bjørg...

Here is my synopsis of the first part of Undset's tale of Paul Selmer, a young man in early twentieth century Christiania [Oslo] who is...

Another spoiler alert! Here is my synopsis of the third book of the great trilogy, for those who haven't the time to read it, or for...

Is it strange that we think that beneath the perspective of other Christians and non-Christians with their seeming reasonableness and...

Another spoiler alert! Here is my synopsis of the second book of the great trilogy, for those who haven't the time to read it, or for...

Another spoiler alert! Here is my synopsis of the first book of the great trilogy, for those who haven't the time to read it, or for...

Having re-read Kransen / The Wreath, the first of the Lavransdatter trilogy, I took to reading Kristin: A Reading by Andrew Lytle....

Here is an amusing tale from Kristin Lavransdatter (The Wreath), which has undertones of the Canterbury Tales. Medieval man might have...

I'm rereading Kristin Lavransdatter, since the first time I didn't take any notes. I am kicking myself, but at the time, I didn't quite...

Another article here, this time by Donald DeMarco at National Catholic Register.

Here you will find an interesting article about Kristin Lavransdatter's attitude to the pandemic of her own time: the Black Death. It...