Crawford’s knowledge of and passion for the topic is clear throughout, and he strikes an excellent balance between approachability and authenticity.

“n excellent and entertaining work that succeeds in achieving its intended purpose: to create an accessible and readable English translation of the Poetic Edda. Dick Ringler, Professor Emeritus of English and Scandinavian Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison With their individual headnotes and complementary general introduction, they supply today’s readers with most of what they need to know in order to understand and appreciate the beliefs, motivations, and values of the Vikings.” Jackson Crawford’s modern versions of these poems are authoritative and fluent and often very gripping. These amazing texts from a 13th-century Icelandic manuscript are of huge historical, mythological and literary importance, containing the lion’s share of information that survives today about the gods and heroes of pre-Christian Scandinavians, their unique vision of the beginning and end of the world, etc. Here it is at last (Odin be praised!) and well worth the wait.

It is a fascinating collection of poems that has stirred the imagination of artists such as Richard Wagner and Thomas Gray, and it will continue to inspire as it stands as a valuable and informative historical document and an entertaining set of stories of Norse mythology.“The poems of the Poetic Edda have waited a long time for a Modern English translation that would do them justice. Rediscovered in the seventeenth century and immediately celebrated for its broad portrait of northern pagan beliefs, 'The Poetic Edda' is the most important source of Norse mythology and Germanic heroic legends in existence today. This body of poetry contains narratives on creation, the Doom of the Gods, the adventures of Thor and hostile giants, and many tales of love, family, heroes, and tragedy. It was preserved for hundreds of years in the medieval Codex Regius of Iceland. First passed down orally through innumerable generations of minstrels before the presence of Christianity in Scandinavia, and written down eventually by unknown poets, 'The Poetic Edda' is a collection of mythological and heroic Old Norse poems.

The Poetic Edda by Anonymous