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kareinaI have now listened to 01:08:26 on the audio book of Gösta Berlings saga while reading along in the book to the bottom of page 34.
Chapter two was an odd chapter--it turns out that the two people who met along the road were our hero, Gösta Berling, who is the priest from chapter 1, who has become a beggar, and a 12-year old daughter of some other priest, who was dragging home a sack of flour on a sled. They converse and the beggar correctly guesses whose daughter she is based on either what she says or how she says it. They hear someone else coming along the road, and the girl expresses fear that she will get into trouble with her father if it is him returning home, and that the beggar should take the sled so that dad thinks it is his and she won't get into trouble (but I am so not clear as to why she thinks there would be a problem).
Then a woman comes along, there are tears on the part of the girl, some confusing things happen, and then Gösta and the woman, who is the local mayoress, and the most powerful woman in the region, are at her home and having an odd conversation, wherein he expresses the thought that he is dead (or perhaps should be), and she explains that she is also dead, or at least the girl she once was is dead. That when she was young she was courted by a wonderful, but poor man, who went off for five years to try to earn a fortune so that her parents would let her marry him. But when he had been gone for three years a local powerful man, whom her parents thought rich, came along and wanted her, and her parents insisted (with beatings) that she marry him. But he turned out not to be rich, and her life was hard, and then the first man returned, and now he was truly rich, and she became convinced that not only had she died the day she wed, but that the people she used to think of as her parents were also dead, and she doesn't know the ones who stayed behind in her place.
Then she asks Gösta if he is willing to live, and somehow he winds up settling down as a kavalijer in this community. The next chapter is a lovely description of the landscape of the area--the water, the mountains, the plain and what a beautiful landscape it all is. The following chapter introduces a new character, Sintram, whose name is mentioned five separate times on the first page of that chapter (p 31 in this printing) along with lots of description as to who he is, and the fact that one day he comes to Ekeby (Oak village). Then it is Yule night, and a feast table is ready at the smithy. Then we are introduced to the 12 kavalijer here, two of whom I recognize as drinking buddies of the Priest in chapter 1, and the last of them is Gösta Berling himself. At this point I was getting sleepy, so I put the book down just before the 12 kavalijer are about to have a conversation.
Chapter two was an odd chapter--it turns out that the two people who met along the road were our hero, Gösta Berling, who is the priest from chapter 1, who has become a beggar, and a 12-year old daughter of some other priest, who was dragging home a sack of flour on a sled. They converse and the beggar correctly guesses whose daughter she is based on either what she says or how she says it. They hear someone else coming along the road, and the girl expresses fear that she will get into trouble with her father if it is him returning home, and that the beggar should take the sled so that dad thinks it is his and she won't get into trouble (but I am so not clear as to why she thinks there would be a problem).
Then a woman comes along, there are tears on the part of the girl, some confusing things happen, and then Gösta and the woman, who is the local mayoress, and the most powerful woman in the region, are at her home and having an odd conversation, wherein he expresses the thought that he is dead (or perhaps should be), and she explains that she is also dead, or at least the girl she once was is dead. That when she was young she was courted by a wonderful, but poor man, who went off for five years to try to earn a fortune so that her parents would let her marry him. But when he had been gone for three years a local powerful man, whom her parents thought rich, came along and wanted her, and her parents insisted (with beatings) that she marry him. But he turned out not to be rich, and her life was hard, and then the first man returned, and now he was truly rich, and she became convinced that not only had she died the day she wed, but that the people she used to think of as her parents were also dead, and she doesn't know the ones who stayed behind in her place.
Then she asks Gösta if he is willing to live, and somehow he winds up settling down as a kavalijer in this community. The next chapter is a lovely description of the landscape of the area--the water, the mountains, the plain and what a beautiful landscape it all is. The following chapter introduces a new character, Sintram, whose name is mentioned five separate times on the first page of that chapter (p 31 in this printing) along with lots of description as to who he is, and the fact that one day he comes to Ekeby (Oak village). Then it is Yule night, and a feast table is ready at the smithy. Then we are introduced to the 12 kavalijer here, two of whom I recognize as drinking buddies of the Priest in chapter 1, and the last of them is Gösta Berling himself. At this point I was getting sleepy, so I put the book down just before the 12 kavalijer are about to have a conversation.