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 10-11Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 10 Summary
As Chapter 10 begins, a clerk writes up the deposition of Rosa Gudmundsdottir, regarding her relationship with Natan and what she knows of the people accused of killing him. She has a child, now three years old, with Natan, and she did not know Agnes or Sigga. She tells of how Natan sent Fridrik to her house to rob her, claiming she had money there. This was a lie, and Fridrik tore her storeroom apart looking for it, which only increased the rivalry between Natan and Fridrik. She states that Natan often buried money in the ground. Meanwhile, Toti has returned to his father’s house and taken ill due to exhaustion. Agnes wonders where he has been, and worries that he has abandoned her or grown tired of her. She also suspects that Blondal may be keeping Toti away, as an attempt to break her. She has not been told her execution date. She considers asking Margret if she could attend church with the family, as she feels in need of spiritual guidance, and regrets that Natan never allowed her to go to church. This brings her thoughts to Rosa, whom Natan grew tired of, despite having a daughter with her. He told Agnes that he loved her more deeply than Rosa. One day, Rosa brought her daughter to stay with Natan, but grew angry when she found that Agnes was there and refused to let her watch their daughter.
Meanwhile, Toti’s fever is getting worse and he starts hallucinating Agnes climbing on him to kill him. At the same time, and with Toti’s fate a mystery to the family, Margret’s health takes a turn for the worse and she starts coughing up blood. Agnes knows of a remedy made out of lichen that she makes for her. As winter settles in, Agnes waits for Toti’s next visit and wonders if she should tell him the full story of her time with Natan. They lived as man and wife for a while, but soon Natan began to travel more and more. When he returned, he was distant. He would accuse Agnes of being involved with Fridrik or Daniel, the new farmhand. Despite his increasingly bad moods and aloofness, there were still tender moments that made it impossible for Agnes to leave. One day, Daniel told Agnes that he was attracted to her, and that he had told everyone in town that they were engaged. She was angry that he was attempting to manipulate her. When Daniel and Natan went fishing one day, their boat nearly capsized and Natan believed this was an omen of his death. He became more paranoid, accusing her of meddling in his workshop. Their already tense relationship deteriorated, and he became convinced that Agnes was going to kill him. As he became physically abusive and she became more resentful of his relationship with Sigga, Agnes considered leaving but realized she had no place to go.
Chapter 11 Summary
Chapter 11 opens with the 1828 court records detailing a crime Fridrik’s younger brother Bjarni committed: mutilating three sheep. In the present, Margret hears Agnes crying in the night and goes to her. While covering Agnes up, Margret begins coughing up blood again, and the two women discuss their impending deaths. Agnes reveals that she’s been dreaming about Fridrik’s farm, where she took refuge after Natan threw her out. She was briefly taken in by Fridrik’s mother Thorbjorg, who had once served jail time for perjuring herself to protect her son. Margret asks if Fridrik burned the farm, and Agnes says she believes the fire was an accident. Agnes relates how the conflict between Fridrik and Natan grew out of control, until an argument over the meat of a beached whale led to Fridrik attacking Natan and other landowners beating Fridrik in retaliation. Life at the farm was tense after that, with Natan lashing out at both Agnes and Sigga. Sigga and Fridrik became engaged, but hid this from Natan, who threatened to throw Sigga out if her relationship with Fridrik continued. One night, while Natan was gone, Fridrik came over, got drunk, and stayed the night. Agnes woke up to find Fridrik attacking the sheep, having already killed two. Fridrik angrily stated that Natan had been raping Sigga, and vowed to kill him. As Agnes tried to defuse the situation, Daniel interrupted and kicked Fridrik off the farm. He expressed his disgust with Natan for sleeping with both women, and predicted that Natan would murder Fridrik for killing his sheep.
When Natan returned, he was enraged to find out about the engagement, and took Agnes back into his bed. He apologized for his neglect, and Agnes seemed to be Natan’s favorite again. Sigga was terrified to see Natan, but he gave her his blessing to marry Fridrik. Agnes revealed to Natan that she knew about his relationship with Sigga and forgave him, but he refused to say whether he loved her or not. They had an explosive argument, and Natan eventually dragged her outside, naked, and threw her in the snow. Sigga eventually brought her some clothes. Margret is horrified to hear this story, and Agnes says that she believes Natan went mad because he loved Sigga but realized she loved Fridrik. Agnes went to Fridrik’s farm, where she discovered Fridrik’s mother insisting that Natan was trying to keep Sigga for himself. She told her son that the only way he would have Sigga was if Natan was dead. Agnes tried to get him to speak to a priest, who could get Natan arrested, but instead, she tells Margret, while she slept they decided to kill him. Meanwhile, Toti’s fever breaks and he is determined to get back to his work with Agnes, but he is not strong enough yet.
Chapter 10-Chapter 11 Analysis
Toti is mostly absent from these chapters due to illness, and his absence is keenly felt. Agnes feels depression and confusion set in, due to both his absence and the ambiguity behind his disappearance. His vanishing triggers many long-standing issues she has with abandonment and the fear of feeling unworthy, stemming from both her childhood and her relationship with Natan. However, in this void, Margret winds up taking Toti’s place as Agnes’s confidant, and it becomes clear that Agnes has given spirituality a key place in her life thanks to Toti’s influence. In the ongoing flashbacks, it becomes clear that Natan is a jealous, manipulative man, obsessed with his own mortality. He begins behaving more and more erratically towards Agnes and she starts to realize that he is manipulating her. However, she is afraid to leave and holds out hope that his behavior will return to normal.
As Agnes continues to open up to Margret, she begins to talk about the events that led to the death of Natan and Petur. The complicated love affair involving Agnes, Sigga, Natan, and Fridrik reaches its conclusion, as Fridrik’s mother encourage her son to put an end to Natan’s manipulation once and for all. At the same time, Natan’s growing anger culminates in his violent rejection of Agnes. It is clear by the end of this chapter that Agnes was in a deeply abusive relationship, with Natan using her as he saw fit; only to throw her out like garbage when he was angry with her. Margret clearly sympathizes with Agnes over the turns her life took, as Agnes was forced to realize that the man she thought was the love of her life didn’t care if she lived or died.
