VCE Text review: Burial Rites by Hannah Kent

Burial Rites by Hannah Kent

KENT’s historical novel concerns the case of Agnes Magnusdottir who in 1829 was the last women to be executed in Iceland.

Despite the remote historical and geographical setting of the novel, it’s difficult to read without thinking about Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, who were executed by firing squad in Java, in April this year and indeed the fate of another woman Mary Jane Veloso who was given a last minute reprieve.

Kent’s tragic story can be read as an eloquent protest against the inhumanity of capital punishment.

Kent adopts a post- modernist structure. She includes official historical texts about the trial and execution that depict the inflexible administration of justice.

Official documents are juxtaposed against diverse texts, excerpts from Icelandic sagas, contemporary poems and the compelling first person narrative of Agnes, which seems to speak for the under privileged and homeless people of Iceland.

So like many postmodernist texts, there is a perspective from the point of view of the powerless that exposes the cruelty and hypocrisy of the powerful.

The setting of the novel is an immediate source of fascination, as we know so little about Iceland.

Kent economically creates a frozen world, with its harsh beauty and isolation from the rest of Europe.

Through Agnes’s eyes we feel the struggle to survive in 19th century Iceland, where fish skins substituted for glass windows.

Her language is rich and coveys a rural 19th century sensibility, while remaining accessible to modern readers.

Kent frequently uses earthy similes such as: “Even as the light flees this country like a whipped dog.’’ (247), which sound authentic to the modern ear and she gives a poetic voice to Agnes’s reflections:

“We’re all shipwrecked. All beached in a peat bag of poverty.’’ (248)

Besides her protagonist, Kent populates her novel with convincing characters.

Margret Jonsson, her reluctant (farm house) jailer is a three-dimensional character.

When we first meet her she has a strong sense of hostility to Agnes, but Margret is moved to deeply sympathise with the injustice of Agnes’s sentence.

The district commissioner, Bjorn Blondal, is also memorable for his cruel hypocrisy.

Agnes’s lover, Natan Ketilsson, is a fascinating and enigmatic character, who follows dreams and superstitions, but also takes an interest in scientific methods.

He has a charismatic attraction for women, but may have underestimated Agnes.

Less convincing, but serving a useful narrative purpose is the character of Thorvardur Jonsson, (Toti), assistant reverend, who has the role of being Agnes’s pastor and confessor.

His movement from weakness to quiet courage is too predictable.

However, it does serve the narrative structure as she reveals to Toti her history of suffering.

Burial Rites is also a rich psychological novel with a strong feminist sympathy.

The protagonist’s inner strength and intelligence is noted by several characters, but it is a strength which is hard won.

“I am determined to close myself to the world, to tighten my heart and hold onto what has been stolen from me.” (29).

Agnes articulates a determined struggle to hold onto a private sense of self despite cruel social labelling.

“They will not be able to keep my words for themselves. They will see whore, the madwoman, the murderess, the female dripping blood on the grass and laughing with her mouth choked with dirt … But they will not see me.” (30)

“Criminal, that word does not belong to me, I want to say. It doesn’t fit me or who I am.” (62)

“It’s not fair. People claim to know you through the things you’ve done, and not by sitting down and letting you speak for yourself.” (108)

The difficulty of really understanding others is one of Kent’s major themes.

Kent’s novel advises we should be cautious about making judgments. The conventional view, echoed in literature by Shakespeare and others, is judge not only on what characters say, but test what they say by actions. Agnes seems to trust more in words.

“To know what a person has done and to know who a person is, are very different things.”

“Actions lie, Agnes retorted quickly. Sometimes people never stood a chance in the beginning.” (107).

However, even lovers get it wrong. Agnes says of Natan: “The only person who would understand how I feel is Natan. He knew me as one knows the seasons, knows the tide.” (83). But later events show how she was manipulated by Natan too. Kent implies reading people; even the ones we love can be a complicated business.

Kent’s novel is also philosophical because the narrative explores the extent one’s actions can be free and genuinely chosen.

“God has had His chance to free me, and for reasons known to Himself alone, He has pinned me to ill fortune, and although I have struggled, I am run through and through with disaster, I am knifed to the hilt with fate.” (84).

Kent’s novel doesn’t take the easy way and blame a cruel God. Human agencies are at work, such as hypocritical treatment of children and single women, and a very flawed criminal justice system.

Hypocrisy is evident in Blondal’s self-serving rationalisation of his selection of Natan’s brother, Gumundur Ketilsson, as the executioner.

Indeed this historical novel shows the odds are stacked heavily against poor women. Readers may wonder if this is only a historical problem.

Mike Toomey teaches VCE English at St John’s Regional College, Dandenong

Mike Toomey recommends the following reading:

Burial Rites by Hannah Kent, Picador Pan Macmillan, 2013

http://www.picador.com/blog/august-2013/burial-rites-a-photo-essay-from-iceland