Svanen

by Guðbergur Bergsson, Inge Knutsson (Translator)

Winner of the 1991 Icelandic Literary Prize, The Swan is a masterful work by one of Iceland's most accomplished novelists and one of its leading fictional innovators. A nine-year old girl is sent to live and work on a country farm to serve her probation for shiplifting, a common form of punishment in Iceland. There, in a powerful, unchanging landscape, she experiences a community torn between ancient tradition and new attitudes. She confronts new and painful feelings and has to face the unknown within herself and her alien surroundings. The contrasts that Bergsson carefully develops throughout the novel, between the grotesque and the beautiful, the comical and the dramatic, come to a powerful conclusion in an almost surreal confrontation by a lake between the girl, the swan, and a lamb.

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary, 20th Century

192 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

Guðbergur qualified as a teacher from the Iceland University of Education in 1955, went to Spain for further studies and graduated in Spanish, Literature and Art History from the University of Barcelona in 1958. Since then he has spent much of his time in Spain.
His first books, the novel Músin sem læðist (The Mouse That Creeps) and the poetry collection Endurtekin orð (Repeated Words), appeared in 1961. Since then he has published numerous books of various kinds: short stories, over 20 novels, children's books, autobiographical novels and more. He has also written articles about literature, art, and social issues for newspapers and magazines.
Guðbergur Bergsson is one of Iceland's most prolific translators from Spanish and has thus played an important part in introducing Spanish and Latin-American authors in Iceland. His own books have been translated into several languages and the novel Svanurinn (The Swan) has received critical acclaim in many countries. Guðbergur received the Nordic Prize from the Swedish Academy in 2004.