SOURCE: Kalinke, Marianne E. “A Paradigm for Bridal-Quest Romance.” In Bridal-Quest Romance in Medieval Iceland, pp. 25-30. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990.

In the following excerpt, Kalinke examines the influence of the Volsunga Saga on the “May-December” marriage trope as it appears in Hrólfs saga Gautrekssonar.

The Tristan tale may justifiably be considered the medieval European bridal-quest romance par excellence. Neither Brother Robert's Tristrams saga ok Ísondar, however, nor the anonymous Tristrams saga ok Ísoddar is exemplary for bridal-quest narrative in Iceland. The acme of Icelandic bridal-quest romance is Hrólfs saga Gautrekssonar, which was presumably composed toward the end of the thirteenth century.¹ The bridal quest is the saga's raison d'être, and in the quadripartite structure, each section dominated by a bridal quest, the author realized the narrative potential of the bridal quest as the generating force of the plot. The saga evinces a skillful blending...