Prologue
Just as Geoffrey of Monmouth asserted, Sturluson's Edda begins with the battle of Troy, arguing that several soldiers from that war traveled north to Iceland and the Nordic states. He reframes the telling of the Lanfeogatal. His list of characters and gods leads to the character Skjöldr, a son of Odin, and his rise to kingdom in Denmark.
Gylfaginning
Sturluson retells the story of the creation of the world, the gods, and the heroes of ancient days. This story involves an ancient primordial king among the humans named Gylfi who is seduced by a goddess who tricks him out of his property, seizing permanent control of the island of Zealand. We learn about Norse gods.
Skáldskaparmál
Ægir is the god of storms and the sea, like Greek Poseidon. This section is the story of Ægir's conversation with Bragi, a neighboring god. The two discuss the cyclical, poetic order of reality, explaining synchronous parallels in their people's poetry. They discuss poetic devices by name, and they end by discussing the strange phenomena of homonyms.
Háttatal
This portion is poetry composed by Sturluson. He recaptures important poems from ages past, and he catalogs the common references of poetry from his part of the world. He gives the rules that poetry generally follows, but he elaborates that because of the game of poetry to give the reader what they do not expect, the reader should always understand that real poets break rules as well as following them.
