Modern Icelandic Fiction

A pair of books reviewed today:

The Creator
A novel by
Guðrún Mínervudóttir
Tanslated by Sarah Bowen
Portobello Books, 2008


The first title, The Creator, is the lighter of the two. A situational comedy, its humor is leavened with serious themes of isolation, friendship and even a little salvation, with all of it revolving around a sex doll. The protagonist, Sveinn, is an artist in silicone, making life-sized and anatomically correct dolls for lonely men. Lóa is a divorced mother of two who gets a flat tire and pulls into Svienn’s driveway to change the tire, an action which sets the plot into motion. Sveinn invites Loá in, sharing his supper (and a couple of bottles of wine) with her leading Lóa to drink herself into a stupor. She nods off in an armchair while Sveinn fixes her tire. Sveinn gallantly covers her and retires to his bed. When Lóa awakes in the morning Sveinn is still sound asleep so she explores his workshop where she discovers Sveinn’s sex-doll masterpiece: Raven-Black. Lóa thinks that her anorexic daughter could use some company (as well as a curvaceous role-model) so she steals the doll and the parade of errors begins. At the same time, Sveinn is plagued by crank calls and letters that accuse him of ruining lonely men’s lives with his sex-dolls. Sveinn thinks that Lóa is to blame.

Both of the main characters have misgivings and spells of self-examination which, in true Icelandic fashion, don’t really resolve much but there is sort of a happy ending.

Recommended.

Swanfolk
A novel by
Kristín Omarsdóttir
Translated by Vala Thorodds
Harpervia, 2022

Looking for weird modern Icelandic fiction? Swanfolk is the weirdest, full stop.

From the sleeve:

In the not-too-distant future, a young Special Unit spy named Elísabet Eva finds herself mentally unraveling following an assignment in Paris. To regain her mental balance, Elisabet takes long solitary walks near the lake.

One day, she sees two strange beasts emerging from the water—seemingly mythical creatures, human above the waist, swans below. Curious, she follows them through a tangle of thickets to a clearing...and into a strange new reality.

The story never lets up from there—hallucinatory, impressionistic, with some dystopia and a bit of very odd poetry thrown into the mix. The translator, Vala Thorodds, is an Icelandic literary figure of note herself and, in a brief afterword hints at some of the difficulty translating this work. It is strange and beautiful in translation, but I can’t help but feel that the book’s true measure is to be found in the original tongue.

Not recommended for the timid, and braver souls should still be wary.