Icelandic Literature

For centuries Iceland was one of Europe's poorest countries. Its people lived a harsh and isolated life on their chilly island, especially in the later middle ages and early modern times. Urban development was all but non-existent, and cultural life was limited – with the notable exception of literature. Iceland experienced a golden age of writing in the 13th and 14th centuries, when the renowned Icelandic sagas were written, and ever since that time literature has been closely identified with the self-image of the Icelandic nation.

Icelandic literature was unique in Europe in terms of linguistic continuity: the Icelandic language underwent little change over the centuries, which means that even today Icelanders can read their medieval literature with ease.

In the 19th and 20th centuries Icelandic literature flourished once more. When Halldór Laxness was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1955, the Swedish academy praised his “colourful fiction writing which has revived the great Icelandic narrative tradition.”

Icelandic literature will be in the limelight at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2011.

This website will provide information on Icelandic literature, old and new. We will tell you about writers and their books, translations, translators and translation grants; and the youngest generation of writers will have the opportunity to present themselves.

For further information on contemporary Icelandic writers, novelists, poets, children's writers and playwrights, go to the Reykjavík City Library's literature website www.literature.is. It is in database form, enabling searches for information on individual authors and their works. The information provided is extensive, including essays by literary scholars about the writers, personal articles written by the authors for the website, biographical information, bibliographies and samples of their writings. The website is in Icelandic and English.