larissa kyzer
Most read
Latest
-
A Winning Heart: Larissa Kyzer Wins Award For Her Translation Of Kristín Eiríksdóttir’s ‘A Fist Or A Heart’
“It was a real honour to work on ‘A Fist or a Heart,’” beams Larissa Kyzer, English-language translator of Kristín Eiríksdóttir’s novel. For Larissa’s translation, she won an American-Scandinavian Foundation Award announced last month. “It was exciting for me personally because it’s…
-
One Night Only: In Reykjavík, Pop-Up Restaurants Keep… Popping Up
Walking into the open, dining room at ‘slow-food’ favourite Bergsson’s harbourside satellite location in late September, we knew we were in for a treat. With the sun slowly setting in the background, two long, communal-style tables were laid before us. As they…
-
Misbehaving Nuns, Ancient Ice: Five Seasonal South Iceland Sights
Ideally, all of your travels in Iceland would be accompanied by mild weather and cloudless skies, but waiting for perfect weather in this country is much like waiting for Godot. This shouldn’t faze you, though, because the shoulder seasons (September and October,…
-
Feeling Parsley, Hearing Voices At The Iceland Writers Retreat
The second annual Iceland Writers Retreat took place this past weekend, bringing together acclaimed authors from Canada, Iceland, Norway, the UK, the US, to share their craft with both local and international participants. I had the chance to sit in on two…
-
Iceland Writers Retreat Redux
Going into its second year, the Iceland Writers Retreat—which, armchair copyeditors take note, is purposely “apostrophe free”—is riding high on the success of its inaugural event. Having already hosted such literary luminaries as Geraldine Brooks and Susan Orlean, organizers Eliza Reid and…
-
Kicking Off Iceland Noir 2014
Following the easygoing success of last year’s inaugural Iceland Noir crime lit festival, this year’s event is already off to a good start. The three day festival will involve two jam-packed days of author panels, talks, and readings at the Nordic House,…
-
Back To Basics
Although contemporary hip hop culture is undeniably global in its scope, most people wouldn’t think of Iceland as a hotbed for street dance, one of hip hop’s most recognizable and fundamental off-shoots. And honestly, it’s not. Today there are—at a generous estimate—maybe…
-
The Way We Live Now
Taking its inspiration from idiosyncratic headlines around the globe, ‘News Muse’ by Vala Hafstað combines two very Icelandic interests–the daily news and poetry–and uses them to paint a sometimes amusing, often ridiculous portrait of contemporary life. With a few notable exceptions, the…
-
Selling Like Hot (Crab) Cakes
Located further afield than most of Reykjavík’s new brigade of food trucks, Walk the Plank—specializing in crab cake sliders from locally caught Atlantic rock crab—seems right at home in its harbourside location, tucked comfortably between working trawlers and whale-watching boats. Started in…
-
Remembrance and Re-Remembrance
Following the astounding success of their last collaboration, “Dansaðu fyrir mig,” (‘Dance for Me’), collaborators (and fiances) Pétur Ármannsson and Brogan Davison have used their new show “Petra” to reapproach some of the former show’s more fertile topics—artistic creation and family—while also dipping into…
-
When Dreams Become Realities
In early 2012, 49-year-old Ármann Einarsson, a music school principal with a potbelly that he frequently, fondly, pats, sent a Facebook message to Brogan Davison, his son Pétur’s girlfriend, who is also a choreographer and dancer. “It said, ‘Hæ, Hæ: This is…
-
Have You Seen Hidden People?
During her childhood in Flói, a small rural area in Southwest Iceland, author Unnur Jökulsdóttir grew up with stories of the Hidden People. “My grandmother who was born and raised in the north had a great deal of affection for elves and…
-
Hiding in Plain Sight
In early 2014, we at Reykjavík Grapevine were forwarded a hand-drawn image entitled “Huldufolk [sic] of Iceland Remote Viewed.” The simple line drawing surrounded by redacted text was rather unlike any images of huldufólk that we had ever seen, a not at…
-
Hidden People: They’re Just Like Us (Kind Of)
When foreign media outlets report on Iceland and need to add a little local colour, they will invariably throw in a quick, ironical side note about the country’s pervasive belief in elves, or Hidden People. The tone is generally one of indulgence…
-
Hidden People Folktales
It is due to the efforts of two men, Jón Árnason (1819-1888) and Magnús Grímsson (1825-1860), that such a large body of 18th and 19th century Icelandic folktales exist today. Jón was a writer and also the first librarian of the National…
-
Reykjavík Pride Starts Today!
Reykjavík Pride (Hinsegin dagar), a six day celebration emphasizing LGBTQIA visibility, solidarity, and yes, pride, starts today. Reykjavík Pride began in 1993 simply with the parade, or ‘freedom walk’ (frelsisganga), and has since blossomed to include lectures and talks, Q&As, literary readings,…
-
Time’s Ticking For The Icelandic Goat
Goat farmer Jóhanna Bergmann Þorvaldsdóttir has launched a new IndieGoGo campaign to save her family farm, Háafell (also known as the Icelandic Goat Conservation Center), from auction next month, and all of its 400 goats from slaughter. “The family is facing foreclosure…
-
It’s Your Book And Your Voice
“Iceland is like a disease you can’t get rid of.” This from Andrew Evans, National Geographic’s ‘Digital Nomad,’ by way of introducing the locally set travel essay that he’s reading to kick off the first ever Iceland Writers Retreat. It’s clear that…
-
Great Grandma’s Recipe, With a Kick
Sceptics of Jungian psychology take note: the collective unconscious is most certainly A Thing here in Iceland. How’s that, you wonder? There are lots of good examples, such as the quickly passé, but briefly passionate fad for Tex-Mex-themed confirmation parties. But more…
-
Iceland In Miniature: Snæfellsnes
Having planned to spend much of this summer—my first summer in Iceland, in fact—gallivanting around the country, I’ve instead spent most of my time in the city, close to home. But today, I’m lucky. In the name of research, my partner and…
-
Butterflies In November
If it’s possible to claim a ‘trend’ based on what is as yet a rather small sample size, an interesting one seems to be developing in the domain of Icelandic literature in English translation. Until recently, these translations basically occupied either side…
-
Corpse Cats And Criminals
Summer visitors are spoiled for choice when it comes to guided introductions to our fair capital. There are walking tours, biking tours and Segway tours. History walks and sculpture walks and mythology walks. Culinary tours and beer tours and tours promising to…
-
Mayonnaise In Memoriam
For just a few weeks in July 2004, an enormous replica of a Gunnars Mayonnaise tub stood alongside Iceland’s national highway (Route 1). The rather sizeable advert was quickly nixed by local authorities, who determined that standing where it did, the tub…