My grandfather, Arni Kjartansson is born 1922, his father drowned at sea when he was 11, he quit school and started working to support his family. He married my grandmother 1956 and their honeymoon was a four week glacier expedition doing research on Vatnajökull Glacier. Grandfather just joined Facebook and has gathered the whole family in a group. He has been scanning and sharing some of his photographs but he took both photographs and 16mm films. Here is one, Hulda my grandmother and him on their honeymoon trip 1956.

“In economics, they talk about the invisible hand that regulates the market. In Iceland, the free market became so wild that it was not fixed by an invisible hand, but an invisible guillotine. So, in one weekend, the whole class of our newly rich masters of the universe lost their heads (reputation, power, and money), and all the power and debt of the newly privatized companies fell into the hands of the people again.”

Andri Snær Magnason

More here.

From Bonus Poetry – published by Bonus 1996 and 33% more 2003

Gathering 

Man’s primal instinct 

was not the hunting instinct  

in ancient times  

before man had spears and weapons  

he roamed the prairies  

and he was gathering!  

he was gathering roots  

and he was gathering fruits 

and eggs and nuts  

and selfdead animals 

I  

the modern man  

I can feel how the primal man breaks forth  

when I race with the cart  

and I gather and gather and gather… 

Andri Snær Magnason, Sjón and Auður Jónsdóttir are represented in Bokprogrammet, NRK1 Norway February 10th. Dreamland is not yet published in Norway but the Blue Planet was recently released as an audiobook by Karviland. 

NRK1 tirsdag 10. februar kl 22.30 Bokprogrammet: Litterær gulltid på Island

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The Blue Planet by Andri Snær Magnason will be premiered in Vaasa City Theater April 18 2009. This will be the second production in Finland – before it has been performed in Lahti. The Blue Planet was originally performed in the National Theater of Iceland. In Toronto the production was nominated for 5 Dora Awards. The book has been published in Finland and published by Pieni Karhu. Here is more information about the play in Finnish and here is lots of information in Finnish about Andri Snær Magnason and his book – The Story of The Blue Planet.