don't sweat her, son.

Perspective check yourself on that girl: For Gunnlaug Serpent-Tongue, Helga the Fair's his childhood intended, and his inability to let her go eventually costs him his life in a duel with her husband, which Gunnlaug wins but then dies from his wounds. Way before this tragedy, his father advises him:

"And don't set so much store by yearning for just one woman. Behave as though you haven't noticed, and you'll never be short of women."

Yet if he'd listened to his just-play-it-cool Dad, then we might not still be reading his saga 800 years later, and one can make a case for both acceptance of his own unavoidably fatal desire-bound Wyrd and that rival poet/husband Hrafn Önundarson certainly had his own death coming by opportunistically mis-bargaining his way into his marriage.



Or, to NorsePlay this, would Gunnlaug's poetically skilled tongue otherwise have gone on to weave its way into the hearts of even more becoming & worthy ladies, princesses, & queens in the courts outside of Iceland, and we would still be reading of his orally skilled verse victories instead? What say you?

[Gunnlaugur and Helga the Fair meeting (circa 1880-1885) by Charles Fairfax Murray.]

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Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires' Norse Gods and Giants at age seven. Since then he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the Map of Midgard project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay. If you have employment/opportunities in investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer, do contact him.