Author: Eli Petzold - The Reykjavik Grapevine

Author: Eli Petzold

Björk’s ‘Cornucopia’: A Utopian Reverie For A World In Peril

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“Imagine a future and be in it,” Björk sings in “Tabula Rasa,” the final song before the encore of ‘Cornucopia,’…

This is Ós: Ós Pressan Challenges What Counts As ‘Icelandic literature’

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Since the days of sagas and skalds, the abundance and international distinction of Icelandic literature has always seemed an anomaly,…

Town Guide: Giant Eggs, Bones, Cake, And The Future In Djúpivogur

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Just off Route 1 in the East Fjords, the buildings of Djúpivogur fill the interstices between a network of crumbling…

Brewing Community: Beljandi’s Recipe For A Hoppier Breiðdalsvík

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If you want to know how a hip microbrewery like Beljandi ended up in Breiðdalsvík, a tiny town in Iceland’s…

Town Guide: Local Beer, Swimming & The Freedom To Explore In Breiðdalsvík

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Unlike its nearest neighbours to the north, which nestle within the steep embrace of narrow fjords, the small fishing village…

Antediluvian Architecture And Vegetarian Sausage: A Day In Berufjörður

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The more miles I log on Iceland’s country roads, absorbing each landscape as it melts into the next, the more…

Writing Across the Chasm: Pondering Distance And Travel In Iceview Magazine

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Situated halfway up the western coast of Skagi peninsula, the humble fishing village of Skagaströnd seems an unlikely headquarters for…

Partus Gives Birth Abroad: The Icelandic Publisher Goes International

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Since its inception in 2015, Partus Press has kept a finger on the pulse of the Icelandic literary scene, providing…

Saga Spots: Searching for Egill in Borgarnes

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Every time I drive by the gas stations and supermarkets along Route 1 as it passes through Borgarnes, I’m reminded…

Miss Vanjie Of The North: A Borgarnes Monument To An Insignificant Saga Character

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You would be forgiven for assuming, upon visiting Borgarnes, that the elegant modern monument atop a hill in the town’s…

Travel Tips From W.H. Auden: Letters From Iceland, Seventy Years Later

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With fascism and nationalism beginning to take hold in a handful of western nations, two idealistic Oxonian poets realise their…

Saga Spots: Glaumbær

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In Glaumbær, just north of the truck-stop town Varmahlíð in Northern Iceland, a modest memorial commemorates a paradigm-shifting moment in…

Saga Spots: Krosshólar

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With not so much as a gas station along the road, the peninsula that juts out into Breiðafjörður between Snæfellsnes…

New Old Reykjanes: Looking And Seeing On A Lazy Day Trip

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“Sleepy” is an adjective so frequently and tiresomely appended to the noun “town” that together the phrase “sleepy town” seems…

Saga Spots: Gunnarshólmi – I’ll Ride Home and I Won’t Depart

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“Lovely are the slopes—never have they seemed lovelier—the pale cornfields and mown meadows.” So proclaims Gunnar, gazing upon his hillside…

Saga Spots: Berserkjahraun—Where To Bury Your Daughter’s Suitors

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Perhaps it’s a familiar problem: your brother acquires two ferocious fighters as a gift from a foreign potentate, then palms…

Saga Spots: Island of Outlaws

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The island of Drangey stands like a naval fortress in the waters of Skagajförður in northern Iceland. Once a maritime…

Adventures Close To Home: A Trip To Borgarnes

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It’s an hour’s drive from the capital to Borgarnes, and, on this Good Friday morning, old-time Southern gospel seems a…

Saga Spots: Helgafell, The Holy Mountain

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Just off the road linking Stykkishólmur to the rest of Snæfellsnes, Helgafell (“Holy Mountain”) rises 73 metres above the flat,…

Pull Up Your Socks! Tanja & Loji’s Nu-Sportswear

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As last month’s DesignMarch put the freshest ideas in Icelandic design on display, artists Tanja Levý and Loji Höskuldsson presented…

Kalifornía Dreaming: Icelandic Music Goes To LA

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“Welcome to Iceland. Don’t like the weather? Wait fifteen minutes.” So goes the clichéd joke about Iceland’s capricious meteorological tendencies—windy…

Ramsplaining: The Icelandic Word of 2016

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Hey girl, let me tell you about the Icelandic word of 2016, hrútskýring. It’s a portmanteau of the words hrútur…

Grapevine’s Best Of 2016: An Antiquarian Book Lover’s Guide To Reykjavík

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Reykjavík is a relatively small city, but even so, sometimes you need a bit of local advice to find what…

An Icelandic Chef In The Big Apple: Chef Gunnar Karl Alights at Grand Central

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On a typical day, 750,000 people pass through Grand Central Terminal in Midtown Manhattan. That number—twice the population of Iceland—includes…

Last Words: “Schmuck?”

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Piss-warm Gull was beginning to dull my taste buds and whet my tongue. I was at a house party, debating…