36 pages • 1 hour read
Hannah KentBurial Rites
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2013A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 4-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 4 Summary
As Chapter 4 begins, Blondal writes to the Deputy Governor of Northeast Iceland to discuss the execution act that will be used to behead the three murderers. He asks who should be charged with the task and what should be done with the axe after the beheadings. Meanwhile, Toti is planning to go back on his promise to serve as Agnes’s advisor as their second encounter went no smoother than the first. However, it’s been two weeks and he has yet to write the letter. His father encourages him to not disgrace himself and to fulfill his obligation, and Toti knows his guilt and shame will drive him back to Kornsa. On his way back to the farm, Toti stops in Undirfill to talk to the Reverend Petur Bjarnason. While he waits, he talks to a woman who tells him that Natan once cured her sick child. It seems Natan was an herbalist who some revered as a healer, but others considered a devil-worshipping sorcerer. There were old rumors that he was named after Satan, but the priest changed his name to Natan. He tells the women in the church that he is Agnes’s spiritual advisor, and an old woman named Gudrun who knew Agnes has harsh words to say about her, claiming she’s a ruthless social climber. Toti meets with the Reverend, and they discuss how the family is adjusting to having a murderer living among them, as well as Agnes’s past. Toti notices a discrepancy in the date Agnes was confirmed—it says she was fourteen at the time, but her birthday indicates she was thirteen. The Reverend dismisses this as unimportant.
Toti returns to the farm, where Margret is glad to see him. He asks Agnes to join him at the table for coffee, and Agnes says she is being treated well, although Jon and the daughters avoid her. He asks her to give him another chance as her spiritual advisor, and reminds her that although he’s young, he spent three years studying for this. He tries to ask her more questions about her past, but she is hesitant and they are interrupted by Steina, who says Agnes is needed for work. Although Toti protests, Agnes asks him to come back the next day. Agnes is frustrated that no one has allowed her to speak for herself, either at her trial or with her previous spiritual advisor. They twisted her words, or used them to threaten her. She is intrigued by the fact that Toti is the first person to care about her story and thinks of what to say to him. Agnes spends the day cutting hay with the farmhands, Kristin, Gudmundur, and Bjarni. Although Gudmundur is hesitant to give Agnes a scythe, Margret orders him to. It is difficult for Agnes to get the hang of the scythe at first but she soon gets into the rhythm and is pleased to be useful. However, she is disturbed by Gudmundur’s stares and thinks that men have been looking at her like that since she was fourteen.
The next day, Toti returns to the farm and meets with Jon outside. They discuss the plans for Agnes’s execution. Although a man named Jon Thordarson had volunteered to be executioner, Blondal has other plans, naming Gudmundar Ketilson, Natan’s brother, to the job. When Agnes and Toti meet again, Agnes tells him that she was abandoned as a child by her mother, and that her mother was like her—the victim of rumors and distrust by the village at large. She didn’t know who her father was. One man, Magnus Magnusson, was listed as her father, but her mother told her it was another man named Jon Bjarnason—who was married at the time. She never asked Bjarnason whether or not he was her father, and states that she doesn’t believe the truth holds any meaning. Toti replies that there is truth in God, but Agnes is skeptical. She speculates that her mother wanted to keep her, but no one would hire a servant with a newborn. She is confused by the mix of memories she holds in her head.
Chapter 5 Summary
As Chapter 5 opens, Agnes is exchanging poems with a woman named Poet-Rosa, and expresses her desire that the Lord will give her grace. Margret’s neighbors continue to worry about her safety; however, Margret becomes more and more confident that Agnes is no threat to them. Agnes has proven herself to be a hard, quiet worker, and Toti’s frequent visits seem to have a positive effect on her. Margret knew Agnes’s mother, Ingveldur, as a loose woman and worries about Agnes’s influence on Steina, who seems to be fascinated by the convict. Agnes supposedly had a lot of influence on Sigga, and Margret worries that Agnes will have the same effect on Steina. Lauga, on the other hand, has not warmed up to Agnes as well. Agnes is haunted by dreams of her execution, and she throws herself into hard work. She still finds herself isolated by most of the family and wonders exactly what to tell Toti. Her childhood memories are hazy, and she doesn’t know her half-siblings too well. Although she was fostered alongside her half-brother, Jonas, for a year, he was eventually taken back by their mother and she was left behind.
Steina comes to talk to Agnes, and Agnes warns Steina that her parents will not be happy that they’re talking. Steina tells Agnes that she believes Agnes is innocent, and Lauga is only scared of Agnes because of gossip. Steina says that Blondal has petitioned for an appeal for Sigga and volunteers to start one for Agnes as well. Agnes, upset by the news, tries to talk away. Steina follows her and says Agnes deserves a chance to tell her side of what happened at Illugastadir. Agnes suddenly collapses, and Steina apologizes for upsetting her before running back to the house. When Steina tells her parents what happened, her father angrily tells her to stay away from Agnes, and Lauga warns Steina to be careful or she’ll wind up corrupted, like Agnes. Agnes overhears this conversation and begins to lose hope. Young, beautiful Sigga might be freed, but she knows she is doomed to take the blame for the entire affair. Toti receives a message from Jon telling him to come quickly, and learns from Gudmundur that Agnes is out of control, having fought Jon off when he tried to bring her back to the house. When Toti arrives, he finds Agnes in irons, and she explains to him what she has learned about the appeal. Agnes says that if she was considered stupid like Sigga, they would have blamed the whole thing on Fridrik. Toti asks for her to be freed from the irons, and they pray together. Agnes tells Toti that her only visitor at her previous prison was a woman named Rosa Gudmundsdottir, who was in love with Natan and blamed Agnes for making her life meaningless. She asks Toti if it is possible to organize an appeal, like Steina says, and Toti says he’ll talk to Blondal. They talk about Agnes’s early life, when she was a foster child in the valley. Her foster mother died in childbirth when Agnes was eight, which deeply traumatized her.
Chapter 6 Summary
Chapter 6 begins with clerks itemizing the possessions of the prisoners Agnes and Sigga. Meanwhile, Agnes continues to tell Toti about her past. She considered her foster mother, Inga, her mother, but her foster father, Bjorn, would never allow her to call him father. He discouraged Inga’s efforts to teach Agnes, but Inga persisted. She remembers being taken to see the Northern Lights, but that journey made Inga ill and she later died giving birth to a stillborn child. Bjorn blamed Agnes for the death of his wife and child while a devastated Agnes tried to find comfort next to her dead foster mother that night. Agnes wonders if she is being punished by God for wishing to die, or if she had any hand in the baby’s death. Her memories are foggy except for Inga’s death. She remembers the funeral, which had to be delayed until spring because the ground was frozen, and the way Agnes’s foster brother Kjartan didn’t understand where his mother had gone. One day, Agnes was told Bjorn no longer wanted her, and she was taken into the custody of the parish. That night, Agnes has a nightmare in which Fridrik kills Natan, and she wakes up with a scream. She tries to wake Toti to talk, but he is fast asleep. She returns to sleep and has a vivid dream of Inga’s body lying in the storeroom after her death.
Chapter 4-Chapter 6 Analysis
The opening of the fourth chapter focuses on the cold, bureaucratic manner of the local government towards the condemned. The matter of the execution axe is treated as one of money and property rights, rather than one of human life. This is in stark contrast to the way Toti approaches his work with Agnes. Toti’s spiritual struggle and his decision to continue working with Agnes is the emotional core of this chapter and, with his father’s encouragement, Toti comes to understand what Agnes truly needs. Her previous advisor, like most people in her life, had ignored her needs and treated her with contempt. What she is actually looking for is someone who will try to understand her as a person, and this chapter starts to peel back the layers of her past and reveal how she came to be where she is now.
Chapter 5 focuses on the dynamic Agnes has with her host family, and particularly the relationship between Agnes and Steina. Steina is oddly fascinated by Agnes, and although Margret discourages this and keeps Agnes busy with work, Steina is persistent. Steina’s belief in Agnes’s innocence is what leads her to reveal the details of Sigga’s appeal to Agnes, which deeply upsets Agnes and sends her into a hysterical state. Realizing that no one in authority has any plans to help her, Agnes points out to Toti the hypocrisy of the government officials, condemning her for murder but violating the commandment of “Thou shalt not kill”. Sensing underlying issues of abandonment, Toti encourages Agnes to talk more about her childhood, and they come to the topic of Agnes’s relationship with her mother and her time with her foster mother.
Chapter 6 focuses primarily on Agnes’s close relationship with her foster mother Inga. Although treated harshly by her foster father Bjorn, Agnes found comfort in Inga’s love and education. However, this was cut short when Inga died in childbirth. Bjorn’s cruelty in placing the soon-to-die baby in Agnes’s arms left her with a lifelong fear that she had caused the child’s death. Memories of Inga’s death, including Inga’s body lying in the storehouse till spring and the way Agnes found comfort by lying next to Inga’s dead body, traumatized her and have haunted her all her life. This trauma was exacerbated when Agnes was rejected by Bjorn and sent out as a ward of the parish. This series of abandonments offers some explanation for Agnes’s disillusionment and mistrust.
