Seven Icelandic Short Stories Part 1

Seven Icelandic Short Stories.

by Various.

INTRODUCTION

I

Of the seven Icelandic short stories which appear here, the first was probably written early in the thirteenth century, while the rest all date from the early twentieth century. It might therefore be supposed that the earliest of these stories was written in a language more or less unintelligible to modern Icelanders, and that there was a gap of many centuries in the literary production of the nation. This, however, is not the case.

The Nors.e.m.e.n who colonized Iceland in the last quarter of the ninth century brought with than the language then spoken throughout the whole of Scandinavia. This ancestor of the modern Scandinavian tongues has been preserved in Iceland so little changed that every Icelander still understands, without the aid of explanatory commentaries, the oldest preserved prose written in their country 850 years ago. The princ.i.p.al reasons for this were probably limited communications between Iceland and other countries, frequent migrations inside the island, and, not least important, a long and uninterrupted literary tradition. As a consequence, Icelandic has not developed any dialects in the ordinary sense.

It is to their language and literature, as well as to the island separateness of their country, that the 175 thousand inhabitants of this North-Atlantic state of a little more than a hundred thousand square kilometres owe their existence as an independent and separate nation.

The Icelanders established a democratic legislative a.s.sembly, the Althingi (Alingi) in 930 A.D., and in the year 1000 embraced Christianity. Hence there soon arose the necessity of writing down the law and translations of sacred works. Such matter, along with historical knowledge, may well have const.i.tuted the earliest writings in Icelandic, probably dating as far back as the eleventh century, while the oldest preserved texts were composed early in the twelfth century. This was the beginning of the so-called saga- writing. The important thing was that most of what was written down was in the vernacular, Latin being used but sparingly. Thus a literary style was evolved which soon reached a high standard. This style, so forceful in its perspicuity, was effectively simple, yet rich in the variety of its cla.s.sical structure.

There were different categories of sagas. Among the most important were the sagas of the Norwegian kings and the family sagas. The latter tell us about the first generations of native Icelanders.

They are all anonymous and the majority of them were written in the thirteenth century. Most of them contain a more or less historical core. Above all, however, they are fine literature, at times realistic, whose excellence is clearly seen in their descriptions of events and character, their dialogue and structure. Most of them are in fact in the nature of historical novels. The Viking view of life pervading them is characteristically heroic, but with frequent traces of the influence of Christian writing.

Besides these there were short stories (aettir) about Icelanders, of which THE STORY OF AUDUNN AND THE BEAR (Auunar attr vestfirzka) is one of the best known. [Footnote: In this edition, the specially- Icelandic consonants and are printed as th and d respectively, and the superstressed vowels a,i,o, and u, are given without the acute accent, when they occur in proper names in the stories, e. g.

Porur: Thordur.]

These may be regarded as a preliminary stage in the development of the longer family saga, simpler, yet having essentially the same characteristics. Both types then continued to be written side by side. Although the geographical isolation of the country was stated above as one of the reasons for the preservation of the language, too great a stress should not be laid on this factor, especially not during the early centuries of the settlement. The Icelanders were great and active navigators who discovered Greenland (shortly after 980) and North America (Leifr Eiriksson, about 1000). Thus THE STORY OF AUDUNN AND THE BEAR recounts travels to Greenland, Norway, Denmark and Italy. It was then fas.h.i.+onable for young Icelanders to go abroad and spend some time at the courts of the Norwegian kings, where the skalds recited poems of praise dedicated to the king. In this story the occasion of the voyage is a less common one, the bringing of a polar bear as a gift to the Danish king. In several other Icelandic stories, and in some of other countries, we read of such gifts, and of how European potentates prized these rare creatures from Greenland.

In Scandinavia, Germany, and elsewhere, there have been legends similar to the story of Audunn, where a man, after having been to the Norwegian king with a tame bear, decides to present it to the king of Denmark. However, we know of no earlier source for this motif than the story of Audunn. Whatever its value as historical fact, it could well be the model to which the other versions might be traced. This story is preserved in the Morkinskinna, an Icelandic ma.n.u.script written in the second half of the thirteenth century, as well as in several later ma.n.u.scripts. [Footnote: The most valuable edition of THE STORY OF ADUNN AND THE BEAR is that of Guni Jonsson in the series islenzk fornrit (vol. VI. Reykjavik 1943). The text of this edition is followed in the present translation, except in a few cases where reference has been made to the texts of Fornmannasogur VI, Copenhagen 1831, and Flateyjarbok III, Oslo 1868.] The story had probably been written down by 1220, if not earlier. It is given a historical background in so far as it is set in the time of Haraldr the Hard-ruler, King of Norway (1046-66), and Sveinn ulfsson, King of Denmark (1047-76), when the two countries were at war (c. 1062- 64). Both monarchs are depicted as generous, magnanimous men, but Audunn was shrewd enough to see which would give the greater reward for his precious bear. For all his generosity, King Haraldr was known to be ruthless and grasping. What the writer had in mind may have been a character-comparison of the two kings and the description of "one of the luckiest of men", about whom the translator, G. Turville-Petre says: "Audunn himself, in spite of his shrewd and purposeful character, is shown as a pious man, thoughtful of salvation, and richly endowed with human qualities, affection for his patron and especially for his mother. The story is an optimistic one, suggesting that good luck may attend those who have good morals."

II

The Icelanders have never waged war against any nation. But in the thirteenth century they were engaged in a civil war which ended in their submitting to the authority of the Norwegian king in the sixties (this authority was transferred to the King of the Danes in 1380). It is interesting that, during the next few decades after this capitulation, saga-writing seems to reach a climax as an art, in family sagas like Njals saga, "one of the great prose works of the world" (W. P. Ker). It is as if the dangers of civil war and the experiences gained in times of surrender had created in the authors a kind of inner tension--as if their maturity had found full expression in the security of peace. However, with the first generation born in Iceland in subjection, the decline of saga- writing seems to begin. This can hardly be a mere coincidence. On the contrary it was brought about by a number of different factors.

Subsequently, in the fourteenth century, saga-writing becomes for the most part extinct. From c. 1400-1800 there is hardly any prose fiction at all. Hence the fact that several centuries remain unrepresented in this work (though the gap might have been reduced to four or five centuries had literary-historical considerations alone been allowed to influence the present selection).

But the sagas continued to be copied and read. After the setting up of the first printing press (c. 1530), and after the Reformation (c.

1550), religious literature grew much in bulk, both translations (that of the Bible was printed in 1584) and original works, and a new kind of historical writing came into being. Side by side with scholars, we have self-educated commoners who wrote both prose and, especially, poetry.

In Iceland, being a "poet" has never been considered out of the ordinary. On the contrary, a person unable to make up a verse or two would almost be considered exceptional. Yet, this requires considerable skill as the Icelanders are the only nation that has preserved the ancient common Germanic alliteration (found in all Germanic poetry till late medieval times). We frequently find this device accompanied by highly complicated rhyme schemes. Despite this rather rigid form, restrictive perhaps, yet disciplinary in its effect, exquisite poetry has nevertheless been produced. This poetry, however, is not within the scope of this introduction.

Suffice it to say that from what exists of their verse it is clear that poets have been active at all times since the colonization of the country. It is this uninterrupted flow of poetry that above all has helped to preserve the language and the continuity of the literary tradition.

During the centuries we have been discussing--especially, however, the seventeenth--the Icelanders probably wrote more verse than any other nation has ever done--ranging in quality, to be sure, from the lowest to the highest. When, in the sixteenth century, they had got paper to take the place of the more expensive parchment, they could universally indulge in copying old literature and writing new, an opportunity which they certainly made use of. It was their only luxury--and, at the same time, a vital need.

We have said that the Icelanders had never waged war against any other people. But they have had to struggle against foreign rulers, and against hards.h.i.+ps caused by the nature of their country. After the Reformation, the intervention of the Crown greatly increased, and, at the same time, its revenues from the country. A Crown monopoly of all trade was imposed (in 1602). Nature joined forces with mismanagement by the authorities; on the seas surrounding the island pack-ice frequently became a menace to s.h.i.+pping, and there also occurred unusually long and vicious series of volcanic eruptions. These culminated in the late eighteenth century (1783), when the world's most extensive lava fields of historical times were formed, and the mist from the eruption was carried all over Europe and far into the continent of Asia. Directly or indirectly as a consequence of this eruption, the greater part of the live-stock, and a fifth of the human population of the country perished.

Still the people continued to tell stories and to compose poems. No doubt the Icelanders have thus wasted on poetical fantasies and visionary daydreams much of the energy that they might otherwise have used in life's real battle. But the greyness of commonplace existence became more bearable when they listened to tales of the heroic deeds of the past. In the evening, the living-room (bastofa), built of turf and stone, became a little more cheerful, and hunger was forgotten, while a member of the household read, or sang, about far-away knights and heroes, and the banquets they gave in splendid halls. In their imagination people thus tended to make their environment seem larger, and better, than life, as did Hrolfur with his fis.h.i.+ng-boat in the story When I was on the Frigate.

III

About 1800, things began to improve. The monopoly of trade, which had been relaxed in 1787, was finally abolished in 1854. In the year 1874 Iceland got self-government in its internal affairs, and in 1904 its first minister of state with residence in the country. It became a sovereign kingdom in union with Denmark in 1918, and an independent republic in 1944.

The climate of the country has improved during the last hundred and fifty years, though there were a number of severe years in the eighteen eighties. It was at this time that emigration to the North- American Continent reached a peak, especially to Canada, where one of the settlements came to be called New Iceland--the t.i.tle given to the last story in this book. Many of these emigrants suffered great hards.h.i.+ps, and, as the story tells, several of them became disillusioned with the land of promise. Their descendants, however, have on the whole done well in the New World.

Until recently, the Icelanders were almost entirely a nation of farmers, and the majority of the stories in this collection contain sketches of country life. A certain amount of perseverance and even obstinacy was needed for a farmer's life on an island skirting the Arctic Circle (The Old Hay). Only about a quarter of the country is fit for human habitation, mainly the districts along the coast. The uplands, for the most part made up of mountains, glaciers, sand- deserts, and lava, are often awe-inspiring in their grandeur.

Nevertheless it would be wrong to exaggerate the severity of the land. In many places the soil is fertile, as is often the case in volcanic countries, and--thanks to the Gulf Stream, which flows up to the sh.o.r.es of the island--the climate is a good deal more temperate than one might suppose (the average annual temperatures in Reykjavik are 4-5 Centigrade).

Besides, the surrounding sea makes up for the barrenness of the country by having some of the richest fis.h.i.+ng banks in the world.

Hence, in addition to being farmers, the Icelanders have always been fishermen who brought means of sustenance from the sea--usually in primitive open boats like those described in When I was on the Frigate and Father and Son. In the late nineteenth century decked vessels came into use besides the open boats, succeeded by steam trawlers at the beginning of the present century. For the last few decades, the Icelanders have been employing a modern fis.h.i.+ng fleet, and, at the time of writing, fishery products const.i.tute more than ninety per cent of the country's exports.

With the growth of the fisheries and commerce there began to spring up towards the end of the nineteenth century a number of trading villages in different parts of the country. Reykjavik, the only munic.i.p.ality of fairly long standing and by far the biggest one, had at the turn of the present century a population of only between six and seven thousand--now about eleven times that number. We catch glimpses of these small trading stations at the beginning of the twentieth century in A Dry Spell and Father and Son.

Nowadays, four fifths of the population live in villages and towns.h.i.+ps--where some light industry has sprung up--and, in Reykjavik alone, more than two fifths of the population are concentrated.

In the last fifty years, the occupations of the people and their culture have changed from being in many respects medieval, and have a.s.sumed modern forms. The earlier turfbuilt farmhouses have now been replaced by comfortable concrete buildings which get their electricity from a source of water power virtually inexhaustible.

Many of these,--e. g. the majority of houses in Reykjavik--are heated by water from hot springs, so that the purity of the northern air is seldom spoilt by smoke from coal-fires. The reliable Icelandic pony--so dear to the farmer in New Iceland, and for long known as "a man's best friend"--has now for the most part come to serve the well-to-do who can afford to use it for their joy-rides, its place in farmwork being taken by modern agricultural machinery.

As a means of travel it has been replaced by a host of motorcars, and by aeroplanes, which in Iceland are as commonly used in going from one part of the country to another as railway trains in other countries. In fact, it has not been found feasible to build railways in Iceland. Besides this, a large number of airliners make daily use of Icelandic airfields on transatlantic flights. What with most other nations has been a slow and gradual process lasting several centuries, has in Iceland come about in more or less a revolutionary way. It is therefore not to be wondered at that there should have been a certain instability in the development of the urban and economic life of the country. In this field, however, there appear to be signs of consolidation.

Foreigners who come to this country in search of the old saga-island are sometimes a little disappointed at finding here, in place of saga-tellers and bards, a modern community, with its own university, a national theatre, and a symphony orchestra. Be this as it may, literature still holds first place among the arts and cultures. A collection of books is indeed considered as essential a part of a home as the furniture itself. For such visitors, there may be some consolation in the fact that in some places they may have quite a job in spotting the grocer's among the bookshops.

IV

In literature there had, especially in poetry, been a continuity from the very beginnings. Yet, in the field also, the early nineteenth century saw the dawn of a new age. The Romantic Movement was here, as elsewhere, accompanied by a national awakening, so that literature became the herald and the princ.i.p.al motive force of social improvement. There was at the same time a new drive for an increased beauty of language and refinement of style, where the cla.s.sical, cultivated, literary language and the living speech of the time merged. With Romanticism there also emerged poets of so great merit that only a few such had come forward since the end of the saga period. But henceforward--let's take as our point of departure the second quarter of the nineteenth century--each generation in the country has indeed produced some outstanding literary works, comparable in quality with the accomplishments of the ancient cla.s.sical Edda and saga periods.

During this new golden age, several literary tendencies and genres may be observed. But Romanticism remained the most lasting and potent literary force for about a century. However, one of the characteristics of the Icelandic literature of later ages is the infrequent manifestation of literary trends in their purest and most extreme forms. Here the stabilizing and moderating influence of the ancient sagas has, without doubt, been at work. In most cases this middle course may be said to have been beneficial to the literature.

But the saga-literature may also well have had a restraining influence on later authors in so far as it set a difficult standard to be emulated. It is probably here that the princ.i.p.al explanation of the late re-emergence of prose fiction is to be sought. It was not until about the middle of the nineteenth century that modern short stories, novels and plays began to be written on anything like a scale worthy of note. The earliest of these were romantic in spirit, though most of them had a realistic tinge. With Realism, the short story came into its own in the eighties and nineties of the last century. This trend came like a fresh current to take its place side by side with Romanticism, without, however, ousting it from the literary scene. But owing to the realistic technique and the tragic endings of much in the ancient literature--Eddaic poetry and sagas alike--Realism was never the novel force it generally was felt to be elsewhere. Still, it brought social criticism into our literature.

This was introduced through the activity of young literary-minded students who, while studying at the University of Copenhagen, had become full of enthusiasm for Georg Brandes and his school.

One of these young men was Einar H. Kvaran (1859-1938), a clergyman's son from the North, who, after beginning as a student of politics, soon turned his attention to literature and journalism. He became editor of Icelandic newspapers in Canada (1885-95), and, later, in Iceland, mainly in Reykjavik. His chief preoccupation, however, became the composition of short stories and novels, and besides these he also wrote some plays and poetry. The delicacy and the religious bent of his nature could not for long remain the soil for the satirical asperity and materialism of the realist school, though his art was always marked by its technique. As he advanced in years, brotherhood and forgiveness became an evergrowing element in his idealism, and he became the first bearer of the spiritualist message in this country. With his stories he had a humanizing influence on his times, especially in the education of children, and in the field of culture he remained actively interested right up to a ripe old age. If somewhat lacking in creative fervour and colourful raciness of style, he made up for it by the abundance of his intelligence, his humanity and culture.

He wrote A Dry Spell (urrkur) at the beginning of the present century, when he had disengaged himself from the strongest influence of Realism, but before moral preaching and the belief in the life hereafter had become the leading elements in his stories. He had then, for a few years, been living in the north-country town of Akureyri, which obviously provides the model for the setting of the story. It was first printed in the 1905 issue of the periodical Skirnir.

In addition to the travelled, academic realists, there appeared a group of self-educated popular writers, some of whom had come into direct contact with this foreign school. They were farmers, even in the more remote country districts, who had read the latest Scandinavian literature in the original, and who wrote stories containing radical social satire. Gumundur Frijonsson, for instance, had begun his career in this way. In many of these authors, however, we find rather a sort of native realism, where there is not necessarily a question of the influence of any particular literary tendency. Their works sprang out of the native environment of the authors, whose vision, despite a limited horizon, was often vivid. They convey true impressions of real life.

Of this kind are most of the works of Gumundur Frijonsson (1869-1944), a radical who later turned to conservatism--and the best works of Jon Trausti (1873-1918). These, who had their debut as writers about the turn of the century, are the authors of the next two stories in our collection. Both were North-countrymen. The former, a farmer's son from a district enjoying a high standard of culture, himself settled down as a farmer in his native locality in order to earn a living for his large family. In his youth he had attended a secondary school in the neighbourhood for a couple of winters, but he never had his experiences enriched by foreign travel and was during the whole of his life anch.o.r.ed to his native region.

Jon Trausti, the son of a farm labourer and his wife, who had been born on one of the northernmost farms in Iceland in a barren and outlying district, was brought up in dire poverty. From an early age he had had to fend for himself as a farmhand and fisherman, finally settling in Reykjavik as a printer. Apart from his apprentices.h.i.+p with the printers, he never went to any sort of school (school education was first made compulsory by law in Iceland in 1907); but on two occasions he had travelled abroad.

These energetic persons became widely read, especially in Icelandic literature, and wrote extensively under difficult circ.u.mstances:--in fact all the modern authors represented in the present book may be said to have been prolific as writers. Gumundur Frijonsson was equally versatile as a writer of short stories and poems. He has a rich command of imagery and diction, and his style, at times a little pompous, is often powerful though slightly archaic in flavour. The ancient heroic literature doubtless fostered his manly ideas, which, however, sprang from his own experience in life. One must, he felt, be hard on oneself, and on one's guard against the vanity of newfangled ideas and against the enervating effect of civilization. It is in the nature of things that with this farmer and father of a family of twelve, a.s.siduity, prudence, and self- discipline should be among the highest virtues. This is notably apparent in The Old Hay (Gamla heyi), which he wrote in 1909, and which was published in Tolf sogur (Twelve stories) in 1915.