Hmmm.... The Black Death as a plot device... Interesting...

The concluding volume of The Master of Hestviken, this book follows Olav and his children through the last years of his life, and the denouement of his estrangement from both his family and God. This book is perhaps one of the better volumes of the series, on par with the first; in many ways it is really Eirik's (his son) story as much as Olav's; the irresponsible, untruthful and overly fanciful young man really comes into his own, an honorable, respectable and very noble young man. After the woman he wishes to marry dies, Eirik decides to become a monk, and joins a monastery. Within a year, he realizes that the calling is not for him, and returns home a new man, tempered by the discipline he has undergone. He takes the farm in hand, becomes active in his community, and even settles down to marry — in an extremely unforeseen yet ultimately very pleasing way. Olav himself finally has his moment of catharsis when he, driven by tragedy at home, is finally able to confess his sin; yet it comes in a way in which he is not ultimately able to enjoy the benefit of it. At the end of the book, all the character arcs are resolved in a bittersweet yet extremely satisfying way. Undset here, as always, ably evokes the sense of time and place of her subject, and the reader feels as if he not only walks in medieval Norway, but breathes its air. Undset has very quickly become one of my favorite authors of all time, and though I liked Kristin Lavransdatter slightly better, The Master of Hestviken was a memorable experience, a must-have for lovers of medieval or Scandinavian fiction, or even of just a plain good, character-driven story.

A beautiful, engaging, and satisfying ending to the tetralogy. I’m sad it’s over and am more than a little jealous of people who still get to discover Olav Audunsson. Nunnally’s translation was worth waiting for!

Olav Audunsson has been my favorite read of the year so far. It is a work you inhabit rather than simply observe. Undset's deceptively simple tale of a man's life, marriage, deeds, offspring, and death becomes a four volume meditation on love, sin, guilt, mercy, and forgiveness - in their presence and their absence in both human expressions and divine. Read it, inhabit it, and you will be the richer for it.

I loved reading this story and did not have problems understanding it as I did not read the previous books in the series. Winter is beautifully written, and the characters - flawed or not - are irresistible as they question their purpose in life, their actions, and what their ending will be. At the same time they pray for God they still believe in magic and earthly powers. A powerful story about medieval times in Norway.

© 1930. Last book in the Master of Hestviken series. Olav ages and declines, and the younger people take over his responsibilities. This book contains love, marriage, murder and revenge in unexpected ways as each character's story unwinds and concludes.

n  God, my God, have You chased me up to the skies and down to the bottom of the sea? Olav had once ended up alone before God’s countenance beneath the ink-blue vault of a winter’s night. That was the time when he lost half of his life. Now that he had lost everything he had tried to put in Ingunn’s place, he was forced to feel God’s eyes on him again, as if peering from the forests of kelp in the darkness of the sea floor.n

I have found the Olav Audunssøn tetralogy to be delightfully entertaining and immersive (telling, as it does, the tale of one nobleman’s dramatic life story in Medieval Norway), and Winter ties it all up nicely. As the fourth and final volume in this series, the entire thing had the feeling of a denouement or epilogue — everything truly exciting happens in the earlier volumes; this would probably not much satisfy as a standalone read — and I had to keep reminding myself to put it in the larger context; and when I did, I had to admit that author Sigrid Undset ended her epic exquisitely. I am so delighted to have taken a chance on this new English translation (by Tiina Nunnally) of the 1926 classic and can only hope it’s discovered by more modern day readers. (Note: I read an ARC through NetGalley and passages quoted may not be in their final forms.)

n  He no longer gave any thought to himself or his own concerns. He considered himself an old man now, and he’d made his choice as to what would become of him. Yet for that very reason it seemed there was only one purpose behind everything he might still achieve and accomplish until night came to claim him — and that was to protect these two young maidens. How their future might take shape was not something that worried him greatly — he was certain it would turn out in the best possible way. When the time came, he would undoubtedly marry them off, and it would be a most peculiar man who wouldn’t want to bear such treasures through the world on outstretched arms if he ever had the good fortune to acquire them. But there was plenty of time for Olav to consider this matter; both maidens were still so young.n

The last volume in the series culminated in fearsome battle scenes as the Norwegian king called upon his noblemen to resist an incursion by a Swedish duke. Now an “old man” approaching fifty (“he was now gray-haired and the right side of his face had sunk inward, his cheek crisscrossed with furrows from the fearsome scar“ received in that battle), Olav Audunssøn — the Master of the Hestviken estate on the Oslo Fjord — has settled into a calm domestic routine with his daughter, Cecilia, and his foster daughter, Bothild; his son and heir the illegitimate issue of the rape of his young wife, Olav had murdered the baby’s father without confessing the deed at his wife’s pleading; this taint on Olav’s soul dogging him his entire life having left the estate years earlier for parts unknown. Olav assumes that settling his daughters into appropriate marriages would be the last official duty of his life, but when his son Eirich does return home (in the company of his handsome but feckless best friend, Jørund), Olav allows the boy to have his say in matters — to everyone’s detriment. This shift to an Austenian focus on courting and marriage might seem like it belongs in a different series, but as Olav is in his twilight years and his lifelong concern was about keeping faith with his ancestors and continuing a respectable family line, seeing how the generations carry on does make for an appropriate finish to his story.

n  After Olav died, folks did not consider his reputation to be as glowing as Brother Eirik would have wanted — and all the grandchildren were fully aware of this. Olav had been a brave soldier, a capable and honest landowner. But he was odd and unapproachable and a gloomy companion in the company of more cheerful men.n

In the end, Olav’s was a respectable but not a happy life: by keeping a promise to his wife (who suffered and wasted away so young), Olav was forced to live outside the community and fellowship of the Church; punishing himself and those around him with coldness and distance. Undset masterfully demonstrates the consequences of Olav’s early conflict between duty and love, and it warrants the epic length of these four volumes to follow all the ripples through time. And then she ends the whole thing with an ironic, stinging paragraph n  The Great Death arrived and decimated the lineage, although there were still many descendants alive after the plague had passed.n In God’s time, the suffering of any one man doesn’t add up to much, so what was the point of all this pain?

The best book of the series, a wonderful ending. A really incredible piece of literature, Sigrid Undset was truly a master.

Library drama! Bibliomation treachery! Someone recalled my Master of Hestviken library book when I expected I'd get to renew it!

In consequence, I ended up purchasing the fourth volume and taking a hiatus from the tetralogy until it arrived. I'm very glad to have finished the whole book now: at over 1000 pages, it was a big undertaking, and sometimes (like most big undertakings) required a lot of effort to continue.

The last installment closes out Olav's life, but the middle portion of the volume is told from his son's perspective. This seemed at first glance like either a copout or a red herring, but it does mirror the switch of perspective from Olav to Ingunn in the first volume. It's true, I was fascinated to see things from the point of view of someone so different in temperament from Olav, and it was a real pleasure to see his son become such a stable adult, good farmer, and devoted Christian -- and even, for a brief time, to experience monastic life with him.

The story wraps up in a way that may be sensational or may be profound -- I can't decide -- or maybe both together.

Taken as a whole, I think The Master of Hesviken (or Olav Audunsson in the more recent translation) is a splendid book. Looked at separately, the latter two volumes aren't as fine as the first two.

I'm sure Tiina Nunnally's new translation is superb, but I have to say I really enjoyed the old-timey translation by Arthur G. Chater.

I think the cover illustrations for these paperback volumes are pretty lovely, with a sort of pre-Raphaelite style that suits the novels well. I was delighted to find that they were done by an artist I know, Kinuko Craft, who has produced some lavishly illustrated fairytale picture books.

I will be measuring other works of fiction against this final book of Sigrid Undset's tetralogy for a long time - profoundly written with bold strokes in the style of the saga - if you are of a sentimental nature keep tissue handy as the ending does justice to Sigrid's intricate storytelling - oddly enough today my copy of INSIDE THE GATE Sigrid Undset's Life at Bjerkebaek arrived from Norway (difficult book to find and expensive but there appears to be dearth of biographical information on Sigrid's life written in English. I felt a need to know more about this amazing woman. For those interested the book can be ordered through http://www.aschehoug.no/fakta/histori... ... be forewarned, I went to CONTROL PANEL, disabled the POPUP BLOCKER, set SECURITY to non-existent - only then was I able to complete the transaction)

Sigrid Undset is said to have considered this work finer than her Nobel prize winning Kristin Lavransdatter. I agree. The 2nd book (The Snake Pit) was extremely tormented and I wasn't sure if I could continue the series, but I was rewarded for my perseverance. I don't want to spoil the plot, but I found the ending to be really beautiful.

Undset (and Nunnally!) knocks this one out of the park. What a powerfully beautiful telling of the serpentine and contradictory path of sin and repentance that makes up the drama of every human life. Undset deeply understands human relationships and unflinchingly depicts the unpredictable and predictably depressing ways the human desire for intimacy and love gets frustrated, but she never neglects the backdrop of grace ever piercing through.