Snorri and the Strangers

by Nathaniel Benchley, Don Bolognese (Illustrator)

Norse settlers in the New World encounter hostile natives and finally decide to return to their home land. From inside book flap: Snorri was born in North America - more than a thousand years ago. His parents had come there from Greenland with other settlers. Snorri learned to fish, and to hunt. He also asked his parents questions: Where did you come from? Where is Greenland? He wondered what Greenland was like. One day, while Snorri was looking at the sea, strange men came paddling up. They traded with the Norsemen, and everyone was happy. Then something happened to frighten the strangers. They went away, and they came back ready to fight. But Snorri did not mind; because of this, he would have an answer to his questions about Greenland. In this exciting History I CAN READ book, Nathaniel Benchley recreates what it was like to be the youngest settler in a new land. Don Bolognese's exuberant pictures capture the humor and action of the story.

64 pages, Library Binding

First published January 1, 1976

About the author

Born in Newton, Massachusetts to a literary family, he was the son of Gertrude Darling and Robert Benchley (1889-1945), the noted American writer, humorist, critic, actor, and one of the founders of the Algonquin Round Table in New York City.

Nathaniel Benchley was the highly-respected author of many children's/juvenile books that provided learning for the youthful readers with stories of various animals or through the book's historical settings. Benchley dealt with diverse locales and topics such as "Bright Candles", which recounts the experiences of a 16-year-old Danish boy during the German occupation of his country in World War II; and "Small Wolf", a story about a Native American boy who meets white men on the island of Manhattan and learns that their ideas about land are different from those of his own peoples'.

Film director/producer, Norman Jewison made Benchley's 1961 novel The Off-Islanders into a motion picture titled The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming for which he received the nomination for an Academy Award for Writing Adapted Screenplay. He was a close friend of actor Humphrey Bogart and wrote his biography in 1975.

Benchley's novel Welcome to Xanadu was made into the 1975 motion picture Sweet Hostage.

His elder son, Peter Benchley (1940-2006), was a writer best known for writing the novel Jaws and the screenplay of the 1975 Steven Spielberg film made from it. His younger son, Nat Benchley, is a writer and actor who has portrayed his grandfather, Robert Benchley, in a one-man, semi-biographical stage show, "Benchley Despite Himself". The show was a compilation of Robert Benchley's best monologues, short films, radio rantings and pithy pieces as recalled, edited, and acted by his grandson Nat, and combined with family reminiscences and friends' perspectives."

Nathaniel Benchley died in 1981 in Boston, Massachusetts and was interred in the family plot at Prospect Hill Cemetery in Nantucket.

Reviews

[Richard Derus · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Publisher Says: Snorri was born in North America—more than a thousand years ago. His parents had come there from Greenland with other settlers. Snorri learned to fish, and to hunt. He also asked his parents questions: Where did you come from? Where is Greenland? He wondered what Greenland was like.

One day, while Snorri was looking at the sea, strange men came paddling up. They traded with the Norsemen, and everyone was happy. Then something happened to frighten the strangers. They went away, and they came back ready to fight.

But Snorri did not mind. Because of this, he would have an answer to hie questions about Greenland.

My Review: Very, very 1976, this book. Settlement by Vikings, okay; Native peoples, mean and threatening; instead of the older narrative of white people beating the savages, it's more or less a draw and the white folks run away back to Greenland.

People over a certain age will remember how the news of Norse settlements at L'Anse aux Meadows was very much in the news during the 1960s. Anyone just slightly younger will remember the American Bicentennial of independence from Britain was in 1976. So what could be more natural than to put this story out at that moment in history? And, since it's demonstrably true that there are no Norsemen among the Native Americans, we know only that the L'Anse aux Meadows colonists failed to gain more than a toe-hold here. Benchley imagines, in very 1970s style, that the mean ol' natives scared the wimpy non-English settlers into running away.

Ahhh, the Malaise Years. Even the colors of the so, so 1970s illustrations are Malaise Burnt Orange and black. Grim.



But the reason I got this little marvy was to research a plot point in a book I'm contemplating. Turns out it's perfect for my mooted plot point! Anyway, more on that in 15 or 20 years. But in the meantime, there's nothing that makes me think you need to get this book and read it now, or frankly ever. It's a kids' book that I'd probably never give to my kid due to simple-mindedness and cobweb-thin characters doing nothing worth discussing. I think kids deserve better than that.

There's a reason this is an obscure book I stumbled across while looking into Robert Benchley's son and Peter Benchley's father.

[Edwina Book Anaconda · Rating 4 out of 5]

This early reader book from the 1970s had me wiping laughter induced tears ... more than once!

When the Brunhilde-ish woman "suddenly, ripped off her blouse, beat her chest with the flat of the sword, and rushed at the strangers, screeching like a wildcat!", and earlier, when they first saw the "strangers", someone remarked "I hope they are friendly", she replied with, "If they are not, we will beat them on the head." I lost it!

I really needed this comic relief after reading so many *dark* books lately.
And, I wonder ... where was this book hiding when I was in grade school in the 1970s?
A banned book perhaps?

[Cheryl · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ordered because it's N. Benchley, but, really, it is just a leveled reader and could have been written (and, for that matter, illustrated) by just about anyone. An excerpt from a saga, with an author's note pointing out that we know very little about "ideas and impressions." However, we are quite sure the Norse had at least one failed settlement, so the 'facts' are likely true. My copy an ex-library book with lots of stamps over the span of more than a decade. Interesting in that it's of an historical period not so much covered in most children's HF.

[Nelson · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is an alright "I can read book" but quite outdated.