So I liked this book but it's definitely a weird one. I get why the intro says that it's not for everyone. The characters can be a bit infuriating. At first glance, it literally goes nowhere. The writing style itself is a bit strange, like it is the transcript of someone telling a story, rather than the story itself being told (which I came to really like). I'm not going to try to avoid spoilers or anything, so adding in a jump break. Beware
So yeah, one of the major criticisms this book gets is that Steinar abandoning his family seems too unbelievable. At face value I get it. However, I think it does make sense. The reason he goes to Denmark is for his family, to improve their lives. He didn't know what was going to happen. Plus he's been caught up in religious zeal. It's an experience that if you've felt it, you get why he did. No it's not rational but it certainly happens.
The idea of finding, no building, Zion really resonates with me. It's one of my big drives. I want to find and create as close to a paradise on Earth as I can (see the eventual "On Zion"). I like how this pic depicts Zion both as the literal gathering of saints, working together to make the desert bloom but also a state mind and something that can be built anywhere. That's what I really got from the end. When Steinar starts rebuilding the walls on his farm, this isn't a rejection of Zion. He says as much himself. Rather, he's realizing (or long since realized) that building Zion is a continual process. Just because you've reached paradise doesn't mean you're done. You need to keep building where you are, lest paradise fall into ruins. So that's what he did.
On the topic of a physical paradise, man reading the Utah sections made me miss Utah, in a weird way. I miss the mountains. My haunts may have been further up the valley than Spanish Fork, in Timpanogos's shadow but I still relate deeply. I miss the quail too. This line, meant to be silly, really got me
what great pleasure I take in these dear little quails which visit me here sometimes in the brickyard; see how agile they are at running obliquely, just like knights on a chess-board, heeheehee.
This really does feel like the most pro-polygamy book ever written, which is kinda weird. I do get the contrast Laxness was trying to make though. You have two groups, the mormons and the elites. Both have many sexual partners, but the Mormons are vilified for taking care of their wives while the elites are praised (or at least never punished) for conquering and leaving, with only small tokens of "appreciation".
I doubt this is what Laxness meant and I do think it is more relevant now than in the 60s, but I find Steinar's disappointment about not being beaten an interesting commentary on the assimilation vs polarization (or whatever it is) debate. I really sympathize with Steinar there. It is, in a way, better to be reviled than for people to treat you indifferently. It's not that I (or Steinar) want to be beaten up, it's that a world where no one cares is a world where no one is striving for Zion.
I've seen this novel compared to the story of the fall and I sort of get it. It is a book about losing innocence, suffering from that loss of innocence and then through sacrifice and hard work regaining (reclaiming?) the glory you once had, but even more. That being said, it seems to be a stretch at best. Now Xenoblade 3, that did it's Adam and Eve themes well (also, someone give Takahashi a copy of D&C, the Pearl of Great Price and the Journal of Discourses. I want to see what he comes up with). I've written essays on that before, but since the fall is presented so positively in that game it can be hard to explain and connect with it without a Mormon (or gnostic) background.
Really minor note, but the Bishop is a great character. The (kinda badass) wandering pastor archetype is such a good one.
Anyway, good if strange book. Laxness certainly can write beautifully. Glad I read it and I did speed through it overall.
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