Steinarnir tala

Suðursveitarkróníkan #1

by Þórbergur Þórðarson

Steinarnir tala er fyrsta bókin af fjórum í Suðursveitarkróníku Þórbergs Þórðarsonar. Í þessu magnaða verki segir Þórbergur frá bernsku sinni á Hala í Suðursveit á síðustu áratugum nítjándu aldar og setur sig í spor barns sem er að uppgötva umhverfi sitt og náttúruna. Allt er lifandi í hugarheimi þess og ímyndunaraflinu eru engar skorður settar. Þórbergur lýsir af nákvæmni lifnaðar- og búskaparháttum þessa tíma, híbýlum, innanstokksmunum og tengslum fólks við náttúruna, dýrin og þá yfirnáttúrulegu krafta sem það trúði á.

Steinarnir tala er lifandi vitnisburður um horfinn heim, færður upp í veldi skáldskaparins á þann frumlega og listræna hátt sem Þórbergur Þórðarson hafði meistaratök á. Verkið hefur alla þá eiginleika sem hann sjálfur vildi að góðar bækur hefðu, það er „fræðandi, göfgandi og örvandi“.

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1956

Reviews

[Mark]

Since no one else has made a review on this book, I might as well be the first. The Stones Speak is basically an autobiography about the author in his youth. I decided to buy it during my stay in Iceland for a Geology Field Trip, as Iceland is known for its storytelling. There's not really a plot, but rather the meanderings of his past. It can get a bit disturbing and sad at points, but in all honestly its what makes the book enjoyable. It has a very intimate feel to it, like your best friend telling you secrets that they'd dare not tell anyone else. You feel like you're there experiencing his life with him, no matter it be an up or down. In other words, I enjoyed it. You may too.

[Hrafnkell Úlfur]

Virkilega skondin bók um æsku Þórbergs á suð-austurlandi, þar sem hans helsta ósk er að eignast úr með sekúnduvísi og hans helsta áhyggjuefni er hvernig hann getur mælt vegalengdir á milli staða án þess að líta út eins og flón.

[Laura]

Very odd book, almost nothing happens and yet you keep reading. Very Romantic but in an unusual way, almost surreal at certain points (where he's like, talking to stones).

[Anzi]

I bought this book in the museum dedicated to the author and the area where he grew up and that the book is about. The museum is really nice and the nature surrounding it is fantastic and plays a major part of the author's life when he was a little boy. The book starts before he is born and up till he is a boy and it is a combination of retelling exactly how everything looks and anecdotes about things happening around the farms that lays between the mountains and the sea. The boy's thoughts about the world, people, history and science are really interesting. He, as many children, has a way of magical thinking I like and he believes everything is filled with life. Hence that the stones can speak, or rather, he wishes they could tell of things past that haven't been written down.

[Petra Smetana]

Kameny a stíny a koně a ovce a dobrá knížka do cizí země na severu.

[Ásta Steinsen]

Ég las þessa hægt því hún er meira eins og hugleiðing en saga. Ýmislegt sem fékk mig til að hugsa og áhugavert að sjá svona skýrt inn í huga barns.

[Numshah]

I bought this book while visiting the Thorbergur Museum in Hali, Iceland. I was instantly brought back to the Sudursveit countryside upon reading this book years after that trip, albeit many decades in the future. Thordarson's writing reflects a charming Icelandic straightforwardness of thought and expression. However, he has also suffused his account of growing up in the Icelandic countryside with his own peculiarities. Thordarson was indeed an odd man, but I was still sympathetic to his synaesthetic descriptions of objects and people in Hali. The one account in the book that demonstrates his true weirdness is his account of determining the time at which a particular stone in a field stood out to him. Reading that drove me to tears of laughter at this strange, strange man.

[Tanja Špes]

»But I was always totally convinced, from as far back as I could remember, that every object was alive and had some form of consciousness. I know of no reason for my belief, I’d never read about it or heard anyone else reading about it. It was as if it was an innate knowledge, as irrefutable as drawing breath.«

Ta knjiga je okno v preteklost, prepojena z domišljijo pripovedovalca. Govori o vplivu preteklih dogodkov na objekte in kraje ter kako ti vplivajo na tiste, ki jih poseljujejo v nekem obdobju - tako ljudi kot živali. Všeč mi je bila ta nenavadnost, "duše" objektov, dostikrat kamnov, in kakšni nemi opazovalci kratkih človeških življenj so. Pripovedovalca bi dandanes označili za čuječega opazovalca, iz besed pa se čuti njegovo spoštovanje narave in rodnega kraja.
Na čase se mi je zdelo preveč podrobnega opisovanja, v določene dele pa sem kar zdrsela in z zanimanjem tičala v pripovedovalčevi (nenavadni) perspektivi. Nekaj delov besedila, ki so me še posebej nagovorili, sem si izpisala.

"These memories are not connected to any other events in my life. They stand out alone like mountain peaks above an ocean of mist. It was as if I’d not really existed before they happened, and had ceased to live as soon as they were over."
“Though there might be many things to complain about with cows, they had considerable meaning for the mental life of the dwelling room. It was as being aware of this living creatures near you gave life a greater dimension. They kicked the stall partitions when they were hungry, this reminded folk of the needs of starving. They sometimes made melancholy moans with a long, deep breath. This expanded life and led your mind to sense there were other, larger breaths in existence.”
“There was always something on the move, and the barking made you pay attention to the great immensity of the evening calm. It was most exciting in pitch darkness, for then the imagination had more opportunities for guessing at things than in moonlight. You looked out into the darkness and saw nothing, listened to the darkness and heard nothing. But there was something out there all the same.”
“The darkness gave the imagination a depth and life on its own.”
“But that’s often the way; people say “it’s quite impassable”, but then it really isn’t when someone actually makes an effort and tries.”
“And that means it knows more than I thought, because rocks which stand out on their own can see everything that happens all around them. But rocks which are fixed in crag belts can only see straight ahead. It can still be a million years old, the first millions of years being captive in a rock face before enjoying hundreds or thousands of years’ independence on a ledge of a crag or cliff edge. Isn’t all life like that, first being part of a whole and then being all alone? Then back to being a part of one whole?”
“But if events exist in time not yet arrived, before they happen on earth, isn’t it just as likely that events continue to exist in olden times after they have happened on this earth? I see no reason why not.”

[Lindsey G]

In love. I scored this book from my local community library box and it is one of the most perfect finds. I love Icelandic culture, and old things, so reading a book about farm life in the south of Iceland around 1900 from an eccentric child could not go wrong for me. I loved this - the language and writing really took me there and I genuinely do feel as if the translator did a wonderful job capturing the author's voice and traditional Icelandic terms, etc. There was a helpful guide at the beginning about how the farmstead was laid out, how some measurements were taken, and a very understandable guide to how certain Icelandic letters in their alphabet are pronounced, which helped me read the names of places easily. I really feel like I learned something and gained a useful skill in linguistics!

[Marketa]

(Čteno v českém překladu Heleny Kadečkové s názvem Kameny mluví (SNKLU, 1965).)

Život na islandském pobřeží v podání vypravěče vzpomínajícího na dětství. Tyto vzpomínky jako by mu navodily i nevinné a poťouchle zvědavé pozorování okolního prostředí. Všední momenty, například několika stránkové pozorování krav s obdivným zaujetím, jsou v dětských konstatováních bezděčně vtipné, zároveň ale přináší pohled na velice pokorný a vyrovnaný život chlapce, jenž měl "od nejútlejšího věku sklony k zeměměřičství" (s. 62-63), ve kterém lze stále objevovat a zachovávat tajemství (ať už jde o tulení žaludek visící od stropu domu nebo o měsícem ozářenou kadibudku).

[Guðmundur Gunnarsson]

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