Ritmennt - 01.01.2002, Page 194

ABSTRACTS
RITMENNT
country to another. It is worth noticing how
they show the spirit of the age and how they are
indicative of a different approach of different
peoples to the subject matter of the books.
Jökull Sævarsson: Skrá um rit Halldórs Laxness
á íslensku og erlendum málum - viðauki. Rit-
mennt 7 (2002), pp. 116-32.
The present bibliography is a supplement to
the bibliography of the works of Halldór Laxness
by Haraldur Sigurðsson and Sigríður Helgadóttir
published in Landsbókasafn íslands. Árbók. Nýr
flokkur 19 (1993), pp. 49-140, and covers the
period 1993-2001.
Helga Kress: Ilmanskógar betri landa. Um Hall-
dór Laxness í Nýja heiminum og vesturfara-
minnið í verkum hans. Ritmennt 7 (2002), pp.
133-76.
The Icelandic emigration to America in the
19th century occupied Halldór Laxness's mind
right from his early days. Time and again in his
books he returns to this motif and for him the
emigration becomes symbolic of the dilemma of
the Icelander: whether to remain at home or go
away in search of the promised land. He de-
velops this motif when he writes about poets
and poetry, language and nationality, and also
the separation from the wife, the mother, and
one's origins. Halldór Laxness himself lived in
America from 1927 to 1929, first for a few
months in Manitoba and then in California
where he tried his luck at scriptwriting.
Helena Kadecková: Játning þýðanda til Halldórs
Laxness. Ritmennt 7 (2002), pp. 177-81.
The author, a scholar and translator of Hall-
dór Laxness's works, recalls how she became fas-
cinated by Laxness's works in the fifties, her
enthusiasm for Iceland, her friendship with Lax-
ness and his wife while she was studying in
Iceland, and, in particular, what it meant to her
in the darlc days following the invasion of 1968
to be able to immerse herself in Laxness's world
while working on the translation of Brekku-
kotsannáll into Czech.
Gagnfræðingurinn. Ritmennt 7 (2002), pp. 182-
87.
Halldór Laxness took the general certificate of
education examination at the Reykjavík
Grammar School in 1918. An essay written by
him as a part of this examination has been pres-
erved and is printed here for the first time. Hall-
dór Kolbeins, a theology student, was given the
responsibility of tutoring Halldór Laxness for the
examination, and his son, Gísli H. Kolbeins,
recalls here some amusing details of their co-
operation as told by his father and Halldór Lax-
ness several decades later.
190