Moreover, the author's imagination was bound to be attracted by the difficult task of conjuring out of the darkness of a little known past the external life of former generations in all its diversity. Sigrid Undset has done so to an extent that has aroused general admiration. In so far as the inner life is concerned, her work can hardly be criticized. Intimately combined with the consciousness of the nation, in her depiction, honour retains all the rigour and all the weight that it had for the chevaliers and great landowners of the fourteenth century. The demands of honour are clearly stated, and the conflicts it creates are worked out regardless of their brutal consequences.
Religious life is described with startling truth.
Profoundly conscious of the hold of faith on these inexperienced and unpolished souls, the author has given it, in the grave hours of existence, an overwhelming power. The erotic life, the problem common to the two sexes, which constitutes the centre of Sigrid Undset's psychological interest, is found again, almost without modifications, in her historical novels. In this respect, objections naturally come to mind. The historian, demanding proofs, has the right to note this discrepancy. The archaeologist must admit that there existed in the past instruments of a nature other than those which have come down to us, not to mention the often fortuitous ways in which the memories of the past have reached us.