The Snake Pit (The Master of Hestviken, #2) by Sigrid Undset

The Snake Pit (The Master of Hestviken, #2) Reviews

• 
  Krista

  All the talk about misfortune plaguing certain estates and families. . .I’m willing to accept it may have been true in heathen times. But you are surely wise enough to place your life and fate in the hands of God the Almighty and not believe such things. May God have mercy on you, my Olav. I wish you both happiness and bliss in your marriage. And may your lineage be known as fortunate men from now on!

  
  The second volume in Sigrid Undset’s Olav Audunssøn series,
  Providence shows how the title character suffers the consequences of his unrepented actions from the first volume,
  Vows; and suffer he does (“Providence” is an appropriate title for the theme of this volume [and is a direct translation of Undset’s original] but I find it interesting that the first translation into English in 1925 named this novel “The Snake Pit”; also metaphorically appropriate, if melodramatic). Once again, Unset’s writing is immersively informative on time and place (Fourteenth Century Norway on the Oslo Fjord) without being didactic, and the pressures she puts her characters under allow for an organic exploration of the laws and customs of the day. As a middle volume (there are four in this series), I didn’t find Providence to be quite as fascinating as the premise-building in Vows — and as most of the struggle in this book is between Olav and his conscience, there is a corresponding drop in action — but I still enjoyed this very much and am looking forward to the next in the series; I’m rounding down to three stars only in comparison to Vows. (Note: I read an ARC through NetGalley and passages quoted may not be in their final forms. Spoilers from here on.)
  
  

  By now he’d given so much thought to every aspect of the matter that he could hardly remember anymore what he was thinking when he chose to remain silent and erase all trace of the deed, but he’d fooled himself into believing that the shame could be concealed. No one must know that he had gotten rid of Teit Hallssøn; then no one would find out that Ingunn had been disgraced by Teit. It seemed to Olav incomprehensible that he could have imagined anything so utterly foolhardy.

  
  Providence picks up where Vows ended: After killing the man, in self defense, who raped Ingunn (his betrothed since childhood), Olav Audunssøn returns to his “allodial estate” of Hestviken to become its new Master. When Olav goes to retrieve Ingunn from where she had been staying with kinfolk, he learns that she had given birth to a son by her rapist and had sent the boy off to live with a foster family. Although these events had brought Ingunn much shame up in the north, Olav was able to offer her a fresh start as the Mistress of Hestviken, where no one knew of the unwed pregnancy or the “wayside bastard” that resulted. The pair is young, beautiful, finally living together as they had expected to their entire lives, and although their future seems assured of happiness, the past insists on holding them back. Anxious to continue the family line (of which Olav himself is the last living member), Ingunn suffers a series of stillbirths and miscarriages, and when Olav realises that Ingunn is pining for her missing son, he retrieves the boy and claims him as his own. Olav eventually believes that because he had killed the rapist Teit without making a confession to the priest (and risking the priest forcing him to make a public confession as well and opening himself up to legal repercussions), God was punishing him. But when Olav suggests to Ingunn that he should finally clear his conscience, the weak and wasted woman fears what consequences would befall her and her son Eirik if her husband were jailed or exiled; Ingunn makes Olav promise to never make that confession and he agrees to live with a burdened soul, watching his beloved wife slowly fade away.
  
  

  It felt like he was swimming with a drowning companion clinging to his neck, and to be deemed worthy of calling himself a man, he would either have to save the other person or drown as well. Yet it was possible to feel a certain failure of courage at the thought that the end was inevitable; he would be dragged under, no matter how hard he strove to do his utmost, because a man could do no less.

  
  While most of the action in this book takes place at Hestviken — and most of that inside the smoke-filled, sparsely-furnished main hall that served as the living quarters for this rich family of landowners — there are a few scenes of Olav fulfilling his duty to join in a
  leiðangr against the Danes; much history and social custom was relayed in this way, but I wish there had been a bit more about the supernatural beliefs of the people: the
  nøkk, the
  hulder, Ættarfylgja (Olav’s axe that sang before a killing), the ghost story that Olav’s aged kinsman Olav Ingolfssøn told about how he ruined his leg and which had caused another relative, Dirt Beard, to go mad. For the most part, however, the characters are trying to forget their pagan pasts and follow the teachings of the Church; and it is the disconnect between Olav’s religious beliefs and the accepted code of honour of the community that causes him so much unhappiness (that and his beloved wife wasting away in her bed with frequent bouts of diarrhea and suppurating bedsores). I am very much looking forward to the third volume (Crossroads) and hope that poor Olav finds some happiness there.
• 
  Elizabeth

  This book is gorgeous- much deeper, richer, and more complex than Book one. So much to ponder. I can't begin to do this book or any book by Sigrid Undset justice in a "book review."
  
  Oh! And I really enjoyed the meeting of Olav and Lavrans & Ragnfrid from "Kristin Lavransdatter."
  
  A favorite quote: "The sin of all sins is to despair of God's Mercy. "
  
  One caveat: I am reading the Kindle version of these books and I did not notice it as much with book one but with this book, I did notice a few flub ups with spelling and word confusion-- it must have happened in the transfer to the e-form but it does not in any way take away from the beauty of the book.
• 
  Dax

  Book two of this tetralogy grapples with faith and humanity’s tendency to grapple with our conscience. While the plot does move along somewhat, most of the book centers around Olav and Ingunn’s internal torment from past mistakes. Undset’s terse prose style fits the tone of the novel. The three star rating really stems from the fact that this portion of Olav’s tale didn’t need to be this long. It’s only a 260 page book, but it does seem to be an excessive amount of pages given the content. I liked it, it’s a solid three stars, but I’m expecting a little more out of the remaining two books.
• 
  Sookie

  Providence picks up right after
  Vows. Providence is a study in virtues and morals of 14th century Norway. The titular character Olav struggles with the happenings of Vows where he killed his wife's rapist and ends up confessing his sins to a priest. Undset here toys with the idea of morality, religiosity, and law of the land by letting Olav stew in panic about consequences of his confession. In the meantime, his wife, Ingunn falls into depressive state unable to get out of room or her bed, severely ailing physically and undergoing the pregnancy and childbirth - the child of her rapist who she had to give away to a foster family. Olav adopts the son of his wife's rapist and brings into his home to reunite the child with his mother - Ingunn.
  
  Olav slowly takes over his legacy, being the last in the line, as he and Ingunn start their lives together as married couple like they were intended to. But the doom of Olav's sin looms close and Ingunn's declining health, miscarriages hold their happiness back.
  
  Thank you University of Minnesota Press and Net Galley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
• 
  Ashley

  Oh man, this story is heavy. There is not a happy moment in it. But I am still struck by how powerful both the characters and situations are. The family in this book has some big problems, but their struggles and attempts at love are moving. And I still love the Christian themes throughout--although these people have a warped relationship with penance and honor. But that's medieval Norway for you. I definitely want to read the next two volumes, but maybe when winter is over . . .
• 
  Elizabeth

  "The Snake Pit" probably deserves 5 stars, but I found it so excruciating to read...I'd forgotten how Undset can really skewer a mother's heart, especially. I can't think of another book I've read in which despair is so tangible -- and has affected me so much. That said, the darkness only makes the theme of redemption all the more powerful. As I told a friend who'd read "The Axe" with me but couldn't finish this second book -- I'll press on, but the payoff had better be good!
• 
  Audrey

  Olav and Inguun continue to battle with their feelings. Undset shows a beautiful picture of a couple who are bound to each other but have such difficulty expressing themselves. The background of religion and paganism in 13th century Norway becomes more apparent in this book. This series feels like a travel book in a way (a genre which I love). It's both a beautiful portrait of a couple and a portrait of Norway at the time.
• 
  Alli Shoemaker

  For an Undset, this is a 3.5. For a book in the context of every other author, it’s a 5. She is SO good about connecting a person’s inner world to their actions, and despite the plot being slow… I can’t deny that that’s the kind of book I absolutely adore.
• 
  Catherine

  So heart wrenching; I’m not sure I could continue with the series if I didn’t know with Sigrid Undset there has to be a beautiful redemption at the end.
• 
  Elsie

  This is the 2nd of the Master of Hestviken books. Olav and Ingunn move to Hestviken and start their married life together. This story like Kristen Lavransdatter is set in medieval Norway. Hestviken is on the Oslo fjord. They farm, hunt, fish, harvest seal. They plant corn using fish offal to fertilize them. This is about the day to day life of this estate but the story through it is that Olav and Ingunn love each other so deeply. Yet that love is absolutely destroyed by the shame and guilt their actions, culture and beliefs impose on them. There is so much passion and pain in this story.
  Undset is amazing writing about the natural setting, I'm going to say better than Tolkein, ya I went there. Her detail of life at that time is fully and accurately immersive of 13th century Scandinavia.
  
  The Snake Pit refers to a scene in the Volsunga Saga where the hero Gunnar is thrown into a snake pit. He's almost saved by a harp which charms the snakes except one that bites him in his heart. That's the metaphor for Olav's love for Ingunn. And ya now I have to read the Volsunga Saga...
  There are beautiful passages like this:
  Ingunn could see that a change had come over him and he was not as she had seen him for a long, long time -- his face was still as a rock, his lips pale, his eyes veiled, unseeing. He spoke as though in his sleep:
  "Will you promise me one thing? Should it go with you as -- as you said -- should it cost your life this time -- will you give me your promise that you will come back to me?" He looked at her, bending slightly toward her. "You must promise me, Ingunn -- if it is so that the dead may come back to the living --- then you must come to me!"
  "Yes."
  The man bent down hastily, touching her breast with his forehead an instant.
  "You are the only friend I have had," he whispered quickly and shyly.
  
  Love, tragedy, passion, medieval Norway.
• 
  Alan

  Got the book because of the title is the same as a 1948 Olivia de Haviland movie that my wife and I enjoyed (and related to). My wife came across it while packing things out of the house her mother no longer occupies. The book was originally owned by her grandfather, a Smith College professor, and then her father, so it's something of a family heirloom.
  
  As for the book itself, I didn't realize till I started reading it that it has no connection to the movie, and it is part 2 of a 4 part series. I feel much more knowledgeable now about 13th century Norway, but I can't imagine reading books 1, 3 or 4. The writing is drudgery to work through, perhaps on purpose because it matches the lives lived by the main characters. The pace is mostly very slow and the story tends to be dark and murky, with spradic embers briefly glowing into dim light before fading again into cold darkness.
  
  A man rapes a betrothed woman. She is too shamed to admit she has been raped and instead pretends the sex was consensual. Due to her family's shame, the boy conceived is sent to a foster family. The rapist is then travelling with her fiance and while alone attacks him. The fiance kills the rapist while defending himself, but because he gains revenge in the process he considers himself a murderer. He covers up the killing and carries guilt thereafter. Marries his betrothed and takes her to his inherited estate far away where no one knows either of them or their history. He eventually brings the boy home and publicly claiams to be the father. For some reason he cannot adopt the boy as his own, so must lie to make him his heir. The man is distinctly aware that Christ bore his sin in His scourging and redeemed him in His death, but due to Catholic policies of the time he cannot confess his sin to a priest without accepting some form of public pennance which will bring shame on his wife and cost her son the inheritance. He would have to buy absolution for his sin, as though the payment by Christ was insufficient. This theme cycles over and over through 300 pages like a cow chewing its cud.
  
  I am curious what my father-in-law thought while he was reading this, and what his father thought. Neither was involved in raising their children.
• 
  Michael

  The Snake Pit is not so eventful as The Axe, the series' first installment, but it is in a way more emotional and tragic, dealing with Olav's and Ingunn's life together at Hestviken, trying to live the peaceful, happy life they have always dreamed of but constantly encountering disappointment. Ingunn's son from the previous book, Eirik, becomes a character in his own right, a strange and unique boy who gives a slightly skewed but still valuable and moving view of his parents and their lives together. Another major plot element is Olav's lingering guilt over his crime at the end of the previous book, and his desire to atone for it, as well as struggle to allow himself to. I would prefer to read this book translated by someone like Tiina Nunnally, rather than Arthur Chater, whose translations I usually enjoy. The intentional medieval-esque phrasings start to get a little old, especially after one has had a taste of Sigrid Undset's actual writing style (see Nunnally's clear, refreshing translation of Kristin Lavransdatter), but as always Undset is a good enough writer to overcome such limitations as bad translation.
• 
  Joy

  4.5 stars
  It is difficult to comment on this second of the four Olav Audunsson novels without giving spoilers, and the work is so eventful and emotional that spoiling a clean read would be criminal. While equally engaging, Providence is quite different from book 1: There is less chaos created by external conflict and the consequential changes in locations, but much more domestic drama.
  A couple points of criticism: some of the physical descriptions of the women are fairly harsh. I’m not sure if this is from the culture, the time period, or both. Also, the ending drags out a bit. Still, I am absolutely lost in Olav’s world and look forward to Book 3.
  Thank you to the estate of Sigrid Undset, University of Minnesota Press, and NetGalley for an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review.
• 
  Tom Johnson

  Sigrid Undset is a writer for the ages - her themes cover the most basic of human needs - I finished the first 2 books of KL but could only start the third - MoH I find far more interesting - one gets a sense as to why SU converted to Catholicism - the Lutheran Church (as I remember from my youth) has no Latin liturgy and no Mary worship - from this tetralogy I sense SU found both to add much to her religious experience and she made me feel the same - I'm not religious in the sense of church going and am somewhat surprised how fascinating I find the books - of course her detailed knowledge of Norwegian medieval history does much to enrich the books.
• 
  Joanne

  This is a fascinating series. Sights, sounds, smells...the setting becomes immediate. The people become known. I'm going to read the next two books.
• 
  Seth

  This story--detailing the way sin slowly works its poison through the lives of the characters--is difficult to read.
• 
  Isabella Leake

  This book -- Book 2 of the Master of Hestviken tetralogy or (as it was originally published) the concluding half of the first of two volumes -- was quite different from what I expected. I had thought it would pick up loose ends from the first book and deal largely in the vengeance and blood feuds that threatened the promise of equanimity at its conclusion. I braced myself for a wild ride.
  
  But actually, this book is concerned with more internal themes like the nature of guilt and forgiveness, divine judgment and human responsibility, marital fidelity and chronic illness. Although it isn't exactly a cakewalk, it is most definitely a good read.
  
  A special little bright spot is that Kristin Lavransdatter's parents (and possibly Kristin herself) make a cameo appearance toward the end of the book.
  
  The way this volume played out has given me an inkling as to Undset's strategy in crafting her serial novels. She has a way of drawing the reader closer and closer to the characters as the book progresses and excitement builds, until by the end we fully share their perspective and sentiments. And then another volume begins, and we're back to feeling alienated from the characters until, by degrees, we come to know them better. It seems like a clever solution when you need to continue a story but want to give each volume an internal consistency, its own heartbeat if you will. For the reader being strung along in this fashion, it's only *slightly* maddening to feel so close to characters at the end of one volume but so distant from the same characters as the next begins, and it certainly keeps one turning the pages!
• 
  April

  It pulled me along into the pit.
• 
  Kevin Adams

  Why isn’t this tetralogy more widely read? Incredible so far.
• 
  Paul

  Absolutely gutting depiction of pride as the worst of all sins.
• 
  Nicki Markus

  For me, Providence did not quite have the magic of Vows (the first book in the series). I think this was partly because a lot happened in Vows, whereas this second volume was more about the aftermath of those earlier actions, without a huge amount of new action taking place. It therefore felt a little plodding at times and I found myself flicking the pages, waiting for something interesting to happen. It didn't help either that, while I remembered the general events of book one, it had been a while since I read that first volume, and it therefore took me a few chapters of book two to really get back on track with what was going on, as the story launched us straight in without much in the way of a recap. This was not a bad book; it simply lacked the excitement of its predecessor. Therefore, I am giving it 3 stars. Providence didn't leave me super excited for book three in the series; however, if given the opportunity, I would read on, in the hope that things will pick up again in the next volume.
  
  I received this book as a free eBook ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
• 
  Mark Werderitsch

  The Snake Pit is essentially a sudser describing the trials and tribulations of a couple fostered together who, while they love each other, have a joyless marriage during which each has an adulterous liason and an out of wedlock child in late thirteenth and early fourteenth century Norway. The details of everyday life are more interesting than the story. The Norwegian version was published in the late twenties and this translation dates from 1930. It badly needs to be redone. The English used is very archaic and is in some places unreadable, and in others so confusing as to make no sense. A rendering into modern English is badly needed.
• 
  Morena

  The poor, weak Ingunn became somewhat reasonable on her deathbed, Olav, however, drove me crazy. I don't understand why he mops and flagellates himself over the killing (IN SELF DEFENSE) of that disgusting scum, Teit. In hands of hacks who get published today, this would make for a frustrating plot, but Undset pulls off this madness, and I am going to suffer this to its bitter end. I am guessing right now that Olav will end up just like his mad great uncle. There were plenty hints, so we'll see.
• 
  John O'Brien

  The second in the 4-volume saga of "The Master of Hestviken" continues here, bringing Ingunn and Olav out of exile and into a new life together. But the hidden sins of the past remain with them, and they do not seek to purge them, either through civil or church means. An already dark saga gets darker, the already tragic ends more tragically here in volume two, but the final word is mercy, pointing to new beginnings (I hope) in the third and fourth.
• 
  A.K. Frailey

  Sigrid Undset is a fantastic writer, but I must admit that I got weary of the emotional drama. Sin and brokenness is a part of our human condition, so I felt worn thin when guilt led to self-destruction. There is a lot to be said for showing the downside of human weakness, but—deep sigh—I need some hope as well. Perhaps the next book will be both insightful and uplifting. I sure hope so.
• 
  Ruth D

  This book is not as compelling as Vows. It's more of a psychological thriller and not a lot happens. The ending doesn't provide a real resolution either and it's honestly fairly depressing to read as Olav wrestles with, but does nothing to repair, his misdeeds of the past. Ingunn is a deeply troubling character but I can't put my finger on why.
• 
  Connie

  Loved it - the earlier volumes go slowly, and my favorite is the last volume. The book I had combined all the volumes into one book.