Giants in the Earth (Critical Overview)

Critical Overview

Early reviews of Giants in the Earth were highly favorable. Writing in the Chicago Daily News, Carl Sandburg called the story "so terrible and panoramic, piling up its facts with incessantly subtle intimations, that it belongs among the books to be kept and cherished." Walter Vogdes wrote in The Nation that "We may wish desperately that Rölvaag could have ended his tale in triumph and satisfaction. But no, Rölvaag had to stand close to the facts and the truth." In his introduction to the novel, Lincoln Colcord, Rölvaag's co-translator, called the work unique for being "so palpably European in its art and atmosphere, so distinctly American in everything it deals with."

Other contemporary evaluations were equally positive. Historian Henry Commager called the novel "a milestone on American literature" and "the most penetrating and mature depictment of the westward movement in our literature." Scandinavian studies scholar Julius E. Olson was impressed that the book (which was first published in Norwegian) had "passed muster with Norwegian critics and Norwegian readers in the homeland." Clifton P. Fadiman had praise for Rölvaag's ethnic sensitivity, "as delicate as a seismograph."

Giants in the Earth has maintained its value over time. Critics often note the influence of Lutheranism and the writings of Henrik Ibsen and Kierkegaard on Rölvaag's characterization. According to Harold P. Simonson, "In spite of Beret's indomitable effort to preserve her Norwegian ways, her greater strivings concern a transcendent faith." Theodore Jorgenson and Nora O. Solum pointed out that "the robust conscience [such as Per Hansa's] is an element of character that Ibsen used time and again. The Vikings are said to be blessed with it. They never seemed to regret their deeds, were never inclined to be morbid."

Other frequently cited literary influences are Old Norse sagas, Norwegian fairy tales, and Nordland dialect and folk memories. Particularly the Askeladd — a Norse tale in which the hero triumphs over adversity and wins the hand of a princess — is invoked in discussing the novel. Joseph E. Baker compared Rölvaag's respect for man to Homer's, and he calls the novel "a modern epic of Western man." Einer Haugen agreed. "By themselves, the events are simple and everyday, such as might have occurred to anyone. But the framework into which he has placed them deserves to be called epic." George Leroy White, Jr., praised Rölvaag's description of nature and his "Scandinavian" ability to evoke atmosphere. "It becomes oppressive; you feel that you must put the book down, you are so tired." Baker considered the passage where the minister brings Beret out of "utter darkness" to be "the greatest yet written in American fiction."

A universally acknowledged strength is Rölvaag's psychological realism, that is, his unromantic portrayal of the internal state of his characters. Though other writers such as Hamlin Garland, Edward W. Howe, and Willa Cather also dealt with psychological aspects of the westward movement, none had done it on the same scale as Rölvaag. "For the first time," wrote Commager, "a novelist has measured the westward movement with a psychological yardstick and found it wanting."

There is little disagreement that the work is tragic on several levels. According to Commager, "The westward movement becomes the tragedy of earth's humbling of man." But this would not have been news to Rölvaag. He knew that "immigration is always tragic," wrote Julius E. Olson. "It is the price the pioneer pays for the future welfare of his children." Kristoffer Paulson recognized a tragic pattern typical of Rölvaag's novels, "inevitably ending in catastrophe," and he ranked the book among other great American tragedies such as A Farewell to Arms, The Sound and the Fury, and The Red Badge of Courage.

Critics dispute whether Per or Beret is the true hero of the story. Harold P. Simonson saw Per Hansa as "heroic in his choosing fallen in his choice. This is the paradox informing great tragedy. Choice and the dreadful possibility of damnation are inseparable." But for Paul A. Olson, it is Beret's heroism that "is the tragic heroism of Lear, or Kierkegaard's Abraham or Job."

Critics do not stress the work's weaknesses. Charles Boewe found Giants in the Earth the most "aesthetically satisfying" of the books in Rölvaag's trilogy, "but at the same time the poorest history," because it is based on secondhand knowledge.