The Icelandic Canadian - 01.06.2004, Page 43

Vol. 58 #4
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
189
J 0 « A f T M 0ft
Icelanders in North America:
The First Settlers
By Jonas Thor
University of Manitoba Press, 2002
088755612 - $24.95
Reviewed by Ryan Eyford
Over the past number of years, the
Icelandic reading public has taken a
renewed interest in the history of the
Icelanders in North America. This has been
apparent in many literary genres, from
writer Bodvar Gudmundsson’s best-selling
historical fiction to journalist Gudjon
Arngrfmsson’s popular histories Nyja
Island and Annad Island. Icelandic acade-
mics have also got in on the act; literary
scholar Vidar Hreinsson’s two-volume
biography of poet Stephan G. Stephansson,
and anthropologist GIsli Palsson’s bold
new investigation of the controversial
career of arctic explorer Vilhjalmur
Stefansson, are two recent examples. Jonas
Thor’s Icelanders in North America: The
First Settlers is clearly part of this new
wave, although it is unique in that it is the
first of the new histories coming out of
Iceland to be aimed at an English language
audience, and is by an author who has
spent significant time living and working in
Canada.
In Iceland, Jonas Thor has taught class-
es on Icelandic migration and settlement in
North America, and guided many of his
students on tours of Icelandic communities
in Canada and the US during the summer
months. Thor became acquainted with
many of these places over the course of an
extended sojourn in Winnipeg as a graduate
student and journalist. He completed his
Master’s degree in history at the University
of Manitoba in 1980, and served as editor
of Logberg-Heimskringla before returning
to Iceland. In recognition of his knowledge
and expertise, the Government of Iceland
commissioned him to produce a new histo-
ry of Icelanders in North America as part
of its millennium initiatives. The end result
of Thor’s work must be evaluated from
two different perspectives: general readers
with little or no background in the subject,
and specialized readers familiar with the
events described and the sources used. For
a general audience, Thor’s book may pro-
vide an engaging introduction to the histo-
ry of the Icelanders in North America.
However, readers who know what has
been written before can hardly help but
find it to be a profound disappointment.
The book’s subtitle—The First
Settlers—is somewhat misleading. It seems
to indicate that the book will be about the
1870s—the decade in which the first large
groups of emigrants left Iceland and found-
ed key settlements in Wisconsin, the
Canadian North-west, Minnesota, and
Dakota. While the bulk of the book is ded-
icated to this period (roughly ten of four-
teen chapters), Thor attempts to cover all
the settlements founded across the conti-
nent up to the First World War. This is an
ambitious task, especially considering the
fact that the book runs just over 260 pages.
Thor begins with a very brief back-
ground section on Iceland before moving
on to describe the first small migrations to