History Literature / KristinLavransdatter

* {{Fainting}}: Kristin faints at a party when she sees Erlend for the first time after many weeks of longing--in front of her fiance and his entire family.

* IllGirl: Ulvhild Lavransdatter becomes crippled after an accident, and is always pale and sick.

** The first is between Simon, Kristin, and Erlend; Simon is engaged to and in love with Kristin, who finds him nice but boring and is passionately in love with Erlend. When she decides to break her engagement with Simon, it humiliates him because they've already set the wedding date, utterly crushes her father when he realizes [[BastardBoyfriend what man she picked for herself]], destroys her reputation, and lands her in an unhappy marriage.

* BastardBoyfriend: Erlend exhibits this behavior to Kristin. Played straight in the first book, where Kristin falls in love with Erlend, breaks her engagement with her fiance, and defies the will of her father to be with him, all despite his shady past and his none-too-kind treatment of her. Deconstructed in the two later books, set after Erlend and Kristin's marriage, where she has to live with the painful consequences of her decision.

%%* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters

''Kristin Lavransdatter'' is a trilogy of historical novels written by Nobel laureate Sigrid Undset. The individual novels are ''Kransen'' (The Wreath), first published in 1920, ''Husfrue'' (The Wife), published in 1921, and ''Korset'' (The Cross), published in 1922. The cycle follows the life of Kristin Lavransdatter, a fictitious Norwegian woman living in the 14th century.

* BastardBoyfriend: Erlend exhibits this behavior to Kristin. Played straight in the first book, where Kristin falls in love with Erlend, breaks her engagement with her fiance, and defies the will of her father to be with him, all despite his shady past and his none-too-kind treatment of her. Deconstructed in the two later books, set after Erlend and Kristin's marriage, where she has to live with the painful consequences of her decision, all in a highly patriarchial world that offers little support for women.

%%* CharacterTitle

* TheHeroDies: The books follow Kristin's whole life, so naturally end when it does. Specifically, [[spoiler:she catches the Black Plague after caring for victims of it.]]

* HeroicSacrifice: [[spoiler:The nuns at Kristin's convent, Kristin included, at the end of ''The Cross''. They tend to victims of the Black Plague, catch it, and die themselves.]]

** [[spoiler:Comes up again at the end of ''The Cross'', when a group of terrified men try to sacrifice a child to appease Hel and end the Black Plague. Kristin stops them.]]

* RedemptionEqualsDeath: [[spoiler:While a pious woman, Kristin spends most of her life struggling with or outright rejecting God's will ([[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor with poor results]]). Near the end of it, she decides to join a convent. Two years later, she catches the Black Plague from her patients and dies, but at peace with her faith.]]

* TheFairFolk Kristin meets the ''huldra'' as a child.

* TheHeroDies: It follow Kristin's whole life, which naturally includes its end. Specifically, [[spoiler:she catches the Black Plague after caring for victims of it.]]

* DestructiveRomance: Kristin and Erlend. Their romance is full of passion and thrives when they can't be together, such as when they start their secret affair or [[spoiler:when Erlend is arrested for treason]]--at the cost of [[CorruptTheCutie bringing ruin onto Kristin's character]] and her relationships. Furthermore, her and Erlend's relationship withers and becomes strained whenever they ''can'' be together, such as ''during the rest of their marriage'', as they have clashing beliefs and values, passion alone isn't enough to sustain a marriage, and they have nothing to really talk about.

* CourtlyLove: [[spoiler:Ulf reveals at the very end, after her death, that he secretly carried a torch for her. She never knew and he never acted on it; he just supported her as best he could. The priet he's speaking to praises him for this.]]

* HeroicSacrifice: [[spoiler:The nuns at Kristin's convent, Kristin included, who tend to victims of the Black Plague, catch it, and die themselves.]]

* BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor: A thematic undercurrent in the book. Kristin dishonors her parents, cheats on her fiance, betrays her religion, ruins her reputation beyond repair, [[spoiler:helps murder a woman]], and causes several people extreme emotional agony, all so she can be with Erland...which leads her into an unhappy marriage because all the qualities that made her affair with him so exciting make him unsuited to be a husband and father. [[CharacterDevelopment She herself grows to acknowledge this]], admitting that she threw away every blessing she had to get what she wanted and thus has no right to complain about how it turned out.

* AManIsAlwaysEager Averted with Lavrans Bjorgulfsson.

* CharacterTitle

* Defictionalization: The Kristin Days are held every year on the first weekend of July at Jorundgard Middelaldersenter in Norway where the main attraction is a theater production of the book(s) in addition to lectures, fairs and other Kristin-themed activities.

* DoggedNiceGuy Simon is very kind, but Kristin chooses Erlend over him.

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters

* MurderTheHypotenuse: Erlend has promised himself to both Eline and Kristin. Eline tries to poison Kristin when she finds out about this. Kristin forces Erlend to choose between them and does nothing to prevent Eline's death.
* TheOldGods Kristin sacrifices to them when Simon's son is ill.

* SettleForSibling: Kristin leaves her bethrothed Simon for Erlend. Simon ends up marrying her little sister, but never really gets over Kristin.

* StayWithMeUntilIDie: [[spoiler: Simon begs Kristin to sit with him while he's dying so he can confess his undying love to her]]

* GrandmaWhatMassiveHotnessYouHave: Erlend continues to turn heads even after his daughter Margaret has married and borne a child.

Won Sigrid Undset the NobelPrizeInLiterature in 1928.

* ThrownDownAWell: During the Black Death, some desperate townspeople attempt a sacrifice to the pagan goddess Hel by throwing the child of a local prostitute down a well

* AttemptedRape

* DaddysGirl

* DoggedNiceGuy Simon is the epitome of this.

* TheHighMiddleAges
* HistoricalFiction
* HookerWithAHeartOfGold: Brynhild Fluga
* IllGirl: Ulvhild Lavransdatter
* LadykillerInLove: Erlend

* LoveMartyr
* MassiveNumberedSiblings

* PoisonedChaliceSwitcheroo

* Fainting: Kristin faints at a party when she sees Erlend for the first time after many weeks of longing--in front of her fiance and his entire family.

* TheBlackDeath
* TheFairFolk Kristin meets the ''huldra'' as a child.
* TheHighMiddleAges
* TheOldGods Kristin sacrifizes to them when Simon's son is ill.

* YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe: The Archer Translation from the 1920's for English-speaking audiences. It is similar to the way the King James Version of the Bible is written, but even more so. A new translation by Tiina Nunnally was released in 2005 which is closer to English spoken today.

Sigrid Undset won the NobelPrizeInLiterature in 1928 for this book.

* HotDad Lavrans and Erlend.

* HairOfGold: Kristin starts out like this. People remark on her blond hair, and she is sweet, innocent, and beloved in her neighborhood. Until she meets Erlend...