Obscure Reykjavík #2

Symmetry

“The other place”, a youth center, is now a food hall, Pósthússtræti:

Skólabrú guest house:

Hallgrímskirkja (rear):

Obscure Reykjavík #1

Reykjavíkur, 2012

This is the time of year that my thoughts usually stray to Iceland.

It’s the best time to plan a trip in the fall in order to secure the best lodging and to plan ahead for cultural activities. Not this year, however. Barring some unexpected twist of fate, I will sit this one out—the law of diminishing returns has started to make itself apparent. While last year’s trip was memorable, it was only an echo of the previous two trips.

For the rest of the month I’ll just have to make do by revisiting pictures from previous trips, with an emphasis on the odd and unusual. The display workers pictured above (in the Reykjavík city hall—2012) were creating an exhibit honoring the founding of Icelandair, 75 years ago. I shot it through an enormous picture window, definitely click to embiggen.

Return to Sheperd’s Harvest

An annual Minnesota festival of fibers, although this harvest is held in the spring. It has been five years since I was last there but things have, for the most part, remained the same.

An enthusiastic presenter:

StevenBe is the most flamboyant vendor:

There was no shortage of mysterious foodstuffs:

And, of course, SHEEP:

Photo Shoot

Another spring, another place, another era. A photo shoot of a doomed band.

A reformed band, trying to make a new start. No backers, no label, only possessing the chippy self-confidence of youth.

This configuration would barely last the summer but the next iteration did have some success.

Alas, it too, was doomed.

Ten Years Ago on FITK

Art-a-Whirl 2014

Another year, another Art-A-Whirl.

I’ve started to burn out on this event.

The good artists seem to be fewer and fewer while the growing attraction of this Northeast Minneapolis event is a proliferation of brew pubs. Not that there is anything wrong with a good microbrew, I’ve been known to indulge in one myself, but it turns the focus away from the artists. The same holds true, but worse, with the growth of music stages. Not only do they generally feature bad music, but the sound pervades throughout an entire building, effectively driving out any lofty thoughts about art one might entertain. It can become a bit too much for the younger attendees:


Solar Arts Building

But there were many nice visual moments; the artists’ galleries tend to be in re-purposed industrial buildings which have their own aesthetic:

Alexandra Bildsoe

At times the overall effect is astonishing:


Solar Arts Building, painting by Caitlin Karolsczak

And some patrons become truly overwhelmed:


Casket Arts Building

Salton Sea Redux

A look back at my 2017 California trip:

The Salton Sea is a body of water dying from salinity and pollution from agricultural run-off. It is a weird place, from a distance it appears inviting, but up close everything is dead.

There are still a few towns on its shores, one of which is Bombay Beach, which is half-deserted but still has a vibrant restaurant:

Inside, the money pasted on every flat surface gives the place a false sense of prosperity:

Since my trip, Bombay Beach has experienced a resurgence of interest from day-trippers and even some willing to try an Airbnb there.

Animal Life

A Novel

By Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir
Translated by Brian FitzGibbon

This is the fifth novel by Auður that I’ve read; she is one of the most-respected modern Icelandic authors. This book consists of vignettes and ruminations of a middle-aged midwife in Reykjavík.

In the days leading up to Christmas a terrible storm races towards Reykjavík. Midwife Dómhildur delivers her 1,922th (typo?) baby. She has inherited an apartment full of memories from her grandaunt, also a midwife, who had a reputation for her unconventional methods. Dómhildur’s paternal side was filled with undertakers causing her to have a deeper perspective on the coming and goings of life. Dómhildur discovers decades worth of letters and manuscripts hidden amongst her grandaunt’s clutter. Her anxious meteorologist sister and her curious new neighbor compound things as Dómhildur digs into her grandaunt’s archive and discovers strange and beautiful reflections on birth, death, and human nature. And, like the previous Icelandic book I just read, there is a playlist!

And, as far as plot is concerned, that’s it, but plot is not the point of this book. I’ll let you discover these subtle truths for yourself, it would be a literary crime to quote them out of context. I will say, however, that the text is firmly grounded in the City of Reykjavík; with a decent map you could exactly follow her on her trips throughout the city. This evoked strong memories in me; something that a casual reader might not share. Aside from the aforementioned typo, FitzGibbon’s translation is fine, even poetic at times.

Qualified recommendation, if you liked her other works, you’ll love this. If you like plot-driven novels you might pass this one by.

Ten Years Ago on FITK

Art in Bloom

The Minneapolis Institute of Arts annual "Art in Bloom" was held last week, an event where florists create arrangements which complement the art in the galleries:



We attended on the day before the opening, when the people watching is usually better:



There were several groups of teens in the galleries as well:

Although their commitment to art may have been less than wholehearted, it was good to see them make the museum as comfortable as home:

Your Absence is Darkness

A Novel
By Jón Kalman Stefánsson
Translated by Philip Roughton
Biblioasis International Translation Series

Whew!

This is a roller-coaster of a tale from one of the leading modern Icelandic authors.

On its surface it is the story of three generations of over-lapping Icelandic families and their successes and failures in love. It is told from the point of view of an anonymous narrator (who is also the author of the book) sprinkled with dialogs between him and a mysterious coach-driver (who happens to have a faint smell of sulfur about him.) As the tale unwinds, the coach driver interacts with the narrator—even suggesting rewrites!

It begins with the narrator finding himself in a church in a northern town in Iceland. He suffers from amnesia; people know him, but he only has glimmerings of who they are and why he is there. The narrator has fits of automatic writing from time to time, wherein he tells the story of a woman in Snæfellsness who, years ago, wrote a monograph about earthworms that caused her to look beyond her bleak existence and passionless marriage. There are about 20 other characters who interact with the story line, fortunately there is a dramatis personæ.

While it is set in modern, post-Covid, times there is a lot of rural Icelandic life and the narrative is quite earthy at times. There is also a playlist of mostly modern pop songs! 

What the book is really about is how passions and mortality shape our lives. Stefánsson also delivers numerous little digressions about various meanings of life throughout:

Each person has his own way in life. Some are open, other less so. Some people have a great need for companionship and a social life, others are inclined toward solitude. In whatever direction you lean, it doesn’t necessarily imply anything about your disposition towards your neighbour, those who matter to you. each has his own way, and no one should go against his nature. And naturally, everyone carries his own luggage. His wounds. His knots. Some struggle with them all their lives. And it appears that certain knots can only be undone by death…

There is a distinct presence of Halldór Laxness’ influence felt throughout, Under the Glacier in particular. It is, like all of Stefánsson’s work, well-written, but it becomes a bit much at times. Roughton’s translation is as invisible as one could hope for, given the novel’s peculiar nature.

Qualified recommendation.

Weird Tales - #1

Room 313

“We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far.” ~ H. P. Lovecraft

In the University District of Seattle, there is a peculiar little bookshop.

It is a haven for bookworms and comic enthusiasts alike, tucked away on a side street lined with charming stores. On a sunny afternoon a college student named Eliza decided to escape the monotony of her daily routine so she cut her sociology class to explore the more esoteric shelves of this shop. She thought of herself as being too ordinary—that she needed something off-beat to stimulate her imagination.

As she wandered through the aisles her eyes she looked with curiosity at the garish covers of comic books and graphic novels. Digging amongst the trashy pop, Eliza found an old leather-bound tome wedged in a top shelf. It seemed out of place among the colorful graphic novels; its spine was adorned with faded runes and symbols. Intrigued, she took it down and gently traced her fingers over the ancient markings. Upon opening it, Eliza felt a strange energy.

She had found want she was looking for in that mysterious tome.

There was no penciled-in price on the flyleaf, so she took it over to a bewhiskered clerk at the checkout desk.

“Excuse me, do you have a price for this book?”

“Huh,” said the clerk, “I don’t recall it, let me see if it is our computer.”

“Is there a problem?” Eliza said as she experienced a mini-panic attack while the clerk checked his files.

“No, sometimes we do get books that aren’t in the system. There is no ISBN, no date or publisher either. It was probably a vanity press, how about eight bucks?”

All she had was seven dollars. “I can’t do it. Maybe five?”

“Seven.”

Still too much. “Six?”

“Six and a quarter. My last offer,” said the clerk, with an off-putting grin.

“Okay…”

“With tax it comes to $6.66”

Eliza paid for the book and headed for the door. As she stepped out of the quaint little shop, clutching the ancient tome she had just purchased, she felt a strange tingling sensation crawl up her spine. The book seemed to vibrate faintly in her hands, as if whispering secrets no one could understand. With each step she took, the world around her began to warp and shift. Colors bled together, and the familiar sounds of the bustling city became a discordant racket. Panic gripped her heart as the familiar streets she knew so well looked strange. Shaken, Eliza headed to the campus quad where she thought things would be calmer. Before she could get there she was greeted by a ragged busker strumming his guitar. He began to sing:

In the city of emeralds strange faces collide
Little girl lost in the chaos of the neon lights
Every street corner is a symphony of LOUD
A concrete jungle from whence dreams erupt

Pulse of the city can't be contained
Fusing of cultures in a vibrant display
Chaotic energy alive with the beat
Strange and wild children lost in the madness

Chaos thrives, chaos rules

The book in Eliza’s hands was really humming now and the runes on the cover began to glow a deep red. Reaching the usually tranquil quad, typically a picturesque scene of students lounging on the grass or strolling between classes, she saw it transformed into something eerie and unsettling, trees seemed to be hunched over; twisted limbs reaching out in every direction;  air suffused with an inexplicable tension; leaves rustling ominously in what seemed to be sinister whispers.

Suddenly, the campus crows that perched in the branches of the trees lining the quad erupted into cacophonous caws. As they took flight their black forms swirled in the sky, their eyes gleaming with an unsettling intelligence, and their sharp beaks seemed to embody malice as they circled above and cast menacing shadows on the ground below.

The shrubbery lining the edges of the square appeared to come alive, gyrating and writhing as if possessed by some demonic force. Eliza set the book down and the scene immediately returned to normal—the busker gone, the crows returned to their branches, and the vegetation once again benign. When she touched the book with the tip of her boot nothing happened, but when she touched it with her fingers, the red glow returned to the letters. “Perhaps it is my skin that causes the reaction,” she mused as she dug a pair of gloves out of her bag, “This should do the trick.”

It seemed to work.

She put the strange book into her bag and left the Quad, walking over to Hansee Hall. It was the oldest dorm on campus; a “quiet” dorm. She thought that it would be just the place to explore the odd little book. Legend had it that room 313, her dorm room, was haunted—cursed by a tragic event long ago. Eliza had heard the stories but dismissed them as mere campus folklore, although she had noticed peculiar occurrences—doors slamming shut on their own, whispers echoing in the dead of night, and, at times, an unshakable chill that seemed to linger in the air. Eliza had discovered that years ago a student named Sarah had lived in that room. Sarah was an introverted girl with a passion for the occult. One fateful night, after being spurned by a lover, Sarah attempted to seek revenge by summoning demonic spirits using an ancient ritual she had found in an old book.

The ritual went horribly wrong. Something malevolent answered her call, unleashing a dark force that consumed Sarah and left the room tainted with its presence. From that day on, Room 313 became a place of fear and dread. Eliza was undeterred. Armed with her curiosity and a desire to uncover the truth, she thought the book could be a portal to communicate with whatever spirits lingered there.

Eliza began to conduct her own séance, laying her bare hands on the book with mysterious symbols, closing her eyes, she began to concentrate. At first, there was only silence. But when a cold breeze swept through the room the atmosphere grew heavy with anticipation.

Suddenly, a figure materialized before Eliza—a spectral apparition with hollow eyes and a haunting aura. She sensed that it was Sarah, the girl who had once inhabited her room. Through whispered voices and eerie gestures, Sarah conveyed her anguish and her longing for peace.

Emily listened intently, her heart filled with empathy for the tormented spirit. She promised to help Sarah find solace and release her from the shackles of the curse that bound her to Room 313. The book opened to a page of an incantation in glowing letters that Eliza read and spoke these words out loud:

Spirits bound by chains unseen,
In the realms where shadows glean,
I call upon the ancient light,
To grant you freedom from the night.

Through the veil that separates,
Where spirits linger, bound by fates,
I break the bonds that hold you fast,
And set you free to roam at last.

Release the ties that bind your soul,
Let the energies now make you whole,
From this realm, you shall depart,
To find peace in the endless heart.

As the final words of the incantation echoed through the room, a blinding light filled the space, and Eliza felt as if a wave of peace had washed over her. The curse had been lifted and Sarah’s spirit had finally been freed. When Eliza opened her eyes, she found herself alone in room 313.

The book had vanished.



Friday Fiction , YA edition.