Stephen Mitchell’s homepage

Stephen A. Mitchell

Professor of Scandinavian and Folklore

Barker Center 353

Harvard University

12 Quincy Street

Cambridge, MA 02138 USA


Tel. +1 617 495-3513

Biographical notes


I grew up in northern Northern California (Shasta County), and attended the University of California, Berkeley, where I took an A.B. in Anthropology and Scandinavian Languages and Literatures. I also studied at the University of Lund, Sweden and the University of Minnesota, where I received the Ph.D. in 1980. I have taught at Harvard since then.


My research addresses a wide variety of genres and periods of Nordic culture and literature, centering on popular traditions, mythology, and legends in the late medieval and early modern periods, but I have also written on such diverse topics as Scandinavian drama and women's autobiographical literature in the 17th century. Among other works, I am the author of Heroic Sagas and Ballads, a study of the medieval Icelandic mythical-heroic sagas and their heritage in more recent Scandinavian ballads and other oral traditions, and of the medieval section of A History of Swedish Literature. My writing in recent years, including as a Fellow of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies, has focused on witchcraft and magic throughout Scandinavia in the period 1200 to 1525.


In addition to being Professor of Scandinavian and Folklore at Harvard University, I am also Curator of the Milman Parry Collection of Oral Literature and an active member (and former chairman) of The Committee on Degrees in Folklore and Mythology. I have been very involved in student life at Harvard, and am the former Master of Eliot House (1991-2000). Together with colleagues from the University of Aarhus, Denmark, and the University of Aberdeen, Scotland-- Pernille Hermann and Neil Price-- I annually teach Harvard's Viking Studies Program in Denmark and Sweden.

Skógarfoss, Iceland

Bunge, Gotland

Sweden

 

Selected Publications


2009. "The Supernatural and Ketils saga hængs." In Fornaldarsagaerne: Myter og virkelighed. Studier i de oldislandske fornaldarsögur Norðurlanda. Ed. Agneta Ney, Ármann Jakobsson and Annette Lassen. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Forlag . Københavns Universitet. Pp. 281-98.

2008a. "The n-Rune and Nordic Charms." In “Vi ska alla vara välkomna!” Nordiska studier tillägnade Kristinn Jóhannesson. Ed. Auður G. Magnúsdóttir et al. Meijbergs Arkiv för svensk ordforskning, 35. Series Ed. Bo Ralph. Göteborg: Meijbergs Arkiv för svensk ordforskning. Pp. 219-29.

2008b. "Spirituality and Alchemy in Den vises sten (1379)." In Lärdomber oc skämptan: Medieval Swedish Literature Reconsidered. Ed. Massimiliano Bampi and Fulvio Ferrari. Svenska Fornskrift-Sällskapets Samlingar. Serie 3. Smärre texter och undersökningar, 5. Uppsala: Svenska Fornskrift-Sällskapet. Pp. 97-108.

2008c. "Pactum cum diabolo og galdur á Norðurlöndum." In Galdramenn. Galdrar og samfélag á miðöldum. Ed. Torfi H. Tulinius. Reykjavík: Hugvísindastofnun Háskóla Íslands. Pp. 121-45.

2008d. "Forord." In Kaj Munk. Opgørets dramatiker. Ed. Henrik Nygaard Andersen and Torleiv Austad. Frederiksberg: Anis. Pp. 7-9.

2008e.     "The heroic and legendary sagas." In The Viking World. Ed. Stefan Brink and Neil Price. London: Routledge. Pp. 319-22.

2007a. "Transl. of Virgilessrímur." In The Virgilian Tradition: The First Fifteen Hundred Years. Ed. Jan M. Ziolkowski and Michael C. J. Putnam. New Haven: Yale University Press. Pp. 881-88. [with Gísli Sigurðsson]

2007b. "Interrogating Genre in the Fornaldarsögur: A Round-Table Discussion." Viking and Medieval Studies 2: 275-96. [with others]

2007c. "The Academic Calendar and 'Primal Scream' at Harvard." In The Ritual Year and Ritual Diversity. Ed. Lina Midholm, Annika Nordström and Maria Teresa Agozzino. Proceedings of the Second International Conference of the SIEF Working Group on the Ritual Year, Gothenburg, Sweden, June 7-11, 2006. Gothenburg: Institutet för språk och folkminnen. Dialekt, ortnamns- och folkminnesarkivet i Göteborg. Pp. 169-75.

2007d. "Skírnismál and Nordic Charm Magic." In Reflections on Old Norse Myths. Ed. Pernille Hermann, Jens Peter Schjødt and Rasmus Tranum Kristensen. Viking and Medieval Scandinavia, Studies, 1. Series Ed. Judy Quinn, Stefan Brink and John Hines. Turnhout: Brepols. Pp. 75-94.

2007e. "DgF 526 'Lokket med runer', Memory, and Magic." In Emily Lyle: The Persistent Scholar. Ed. Francis J. Fischer and Sigrid Rieuwerts. Ballads and Songs International Studies, 5. Trier: Wissenschaftlicher Verlag. Pp. 206-11.

2007f.  Transl. of  "Yuletide Beasts at Lejre (from the Bjarkarímur)" and  "The Battle on the Ice (from the Bjarkarímur)." ANQ (American Notes and Queries): A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes and Reviews 20(3): 43-46, 70-74. [with Marijane Osborne]

2005. "'An Evil Woman is the Devil's Door Nail': Probing the Proverbial and Pictorial Patriarchate in medieval Scandinavia." In Neue Wege in der Mittelalterphilologie. Ed. Astrid van Nahl and Susanne Kramarz-Bein. Beiträge zur Germanistik und Skandinavistik, 55. Series Ed. Heiko Uecker. Frankfurt am Main/Basel: Peter Lang. Pp. 11-34.

2004."A Case of Witchcraft Assault in early nineteenth-century England as Ostensive Action." In Witchcraft Continued: Popular Magic in Modern Europe. Ed. Willem de Blécourt and Owen Davies. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Pp. 14-28.

2003a. "The fornaldarsögur and Nordic Balladry:  The Sámsey Episode across Genres." In Fornaldarsagornas struktur och ideologi. Ed. Ármann Jakobsson, Annette Lassen and Agneta Ney. Nordiska texter och undersökningar, 28. Series Ed. Lennart Elmevik and Mats Thelander. Uppsala: Uppsala Universitet, Institutionen för nordiska språk. Pp. 245-56.

2003b. "Magic as Acquired Art and the Ethnographic Value of the Sagas." In Old Norse Myths, Literature and Society. Ed. Margaret Clunies-Ross. The Viking Collection. Studies in Northern Civilization, 14. Series Ed. Margaret Clunies Ross, Mathew Driscoll and Mats Malm. Viborg: University Press of Southern Denmark. Pp. 132-52.

2003c. "gandr-Göndul än en gång." In Grammatik i fokus. Ed. Lars-Olof Delsing et al. I. Lund: Lunds universitet, Institutionen för nordiska språk. Pp. 117-23.

2003d. "Reconstructing Old Norse Oral Tradition." Oral Tradition 18 (2): 203-06.

2002a. "Women's Autobiographical Literature in the Swedish Baroque." In Skandinavische Literaturen in der frühen Neuzeit. Ed. Jürg Glauser and Barbara Sabel. Beiträge zur Nordischen Philologie, 32. Tübingen & Basel: A. Francke Verlag. Pp. 269-90.

2002b. "Performance and Norse Poetry: The Hydromel of Praise and the Effluvia of Scorn." Oral Tradition 16 (1): 168-202.

2001a. "Forging Traditions: Oral and Literary Multiforms of Kämpen Grimborg (ST 7)." Arv: The Yearbook of Scandinavian Folklore 57: 55-69.

2001b. "Warlocks, Valkyries and Varlets: A Prolegomenon to the Study of North Sea Witchcraft Terminology." Cosmos 17 (1): 59-81.

2000a. "Introduction to the Second Edition." In The Singer of Tales. By Albert B. Lord. 2nd ed.  Ed. Stephen A. Mitchell and Gregory Nagy. Harvard Studies in Comparative Literature, 24. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Pp. vii-xxix. [with Gregory Nagy]

2000b. "Witchcraft Persecutions in the Post-Craze Era: The Case of Ann Izzard of Great Paxton, 1808." Western Folklore 59: 304-28.

2000c.  Entry on "The Scandinavian Tradition." In Medieval Folklore: An Encyclopedia of Myths, Legends, Tales, Beliefs, and Customs. Ed. Carl Lindahl, John McNamara and John Lindow. Santa Barbara, Denver, & Oxford: ABC-CLIO. Pp. 876-83.

2000d. "Special Section: Witchcraft in Local and Global Perspectives (Introduction)." Western Folklore 59 (3-4): 246-328. [with Derek Collins and Timothy R. Tangherlini]

2000e.  "Skírnir's Other Journey: The Riddle of Gleipnir." In Gudar på jorden. Festskrift till Lars Lönnroth. Ed. Matts Malm and Stina Hanson. Stockholm: Brutus Östlings Bokförlag Symposion. Pp. 67-75.

2000f.  "HarvardLore: Tradition and Belonging at America's Oldest College." Norveg 43: 47-65.

2000g. "Gender and Nordic Witchcraft in the Later Middle Ages." Arv: The Yearbook of Scandinavian Folklore 56: 7-24.

2000h.  Entry on "Fornaldarsögur." In Medieval Folklore: An Encyclopedia of Myths, Legends, Tales, Beliefs, and Customs. Ed. Carl Lindahl, John McNamara and John Lindow. Santa Barbara, Denver, & Oxford: ABC-CLIO. Pp. 372-75.

2000i. "Folklore and Philology Revisited: Medieval Scandinavian Folklore?" In Norden og Europa. Fagtradisjoner i nordisk etnologi og folkloristikk. Ed. Bjarne Rogge and Bente Gullveig Alver. Occasional Papers from the Department of Cultural Studies, Univ. of Oslo, 2. Olso: Novus forlag. Pp. 286-94.

Herjolfsness, Greenland




1998. "Anaphrodisiac Charms in the Nordic Middle Ages: Impotence, Infertility, and Magic." Norveg 38: 19-42.

1997a. "Nordic Witchcraft in Transition: Impotence, Heresy, and Diabolism in 14th-century Bergen." Scandia 63 (1): 17-33.

1997b. "Courts, Consorts, and the Transformation of Medieval Scandinavian Literature." In Germanic Studies in Honor of Anatoly Liberman. Ed. Marvin Taylor. North-Western European Language Evolution, 31/32. Odense: Odense Univerity Press. Pp. 229-41.

1997c. "Blåkulla and its Antecedents: Transvection and Conventicles in Nordic Witchcraft." Alvíssmál 7: 81-100.

1996. "Literature in Medieval Sweden." In A History of Swedish Literature. Ed. Lars Warme. A History of Scandinavian Literature, 3. Series Ed. Sven Rossel. Lincoln, etc.: University of Nebraska Press in co-operation with the American-Scandinavian Foundation. Pp. 1-57.

Visby. Gotland, Sweden

Fyrkat, Jutland, Denmark