Laughing Shall I Die

Tom Shippey is Professor Emeritus of Saint Louis University, Missouri. His books include J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century (2001), The Road to Middle Earth (4th revd edn, 2004), and Hard Reading: Learning from Science Fiction (2016).

• Tom Shippey is Professor Emeritus of Saint Louis University, Missouri, and concurrently Senior Research Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin. His books include J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century (2010), The Road to Middle Earth (4th revd edn, 2004), and Hard Reading: Learning from Science Fiction (2017).

Tom Shippey’s magnificent Laughing Shall I Die: Lives and Deaths of the Great Vikings explores the adventures and mind-set of these heroes and heroines, many of whom were actual historical figures who flourished during the Viking heyday of roughly 750 to 1100 AD. Their exploits were passed down orally and given literary form only as prose narratives in the 13th and 14th centuries . . . Writing for a popular audience has clearly punched up Shippey’s prose, which is lively, friendly and occasionally barbed (mostly when alluding to academic stodginess) . . . Shippey’s magnum opus provides not only an exhilarating, mind-expanding appraisal and retelling of Viking history but also an invitation to discover the cold-iron poetry and prose of the medieval North. Take up that invitation.