The Icelandic connection - 01.03.2018, Page 46

44
ICELANDIC CONNECTION
Vol. 70 #1
question, who was considerably older than
he was.
The likeliest explanation is probably
that his older brother, Jon Julius, had
moved west two years earlier. None of
this is verifiable, but perhaps we can ask
ourselves: did Jon Julius write to his brother
and urged him to slip out of his home-ties?
Or was it the dream of something better
that called him? To become more than just
some hired hand out on a farm?
Many years later, Kristjan Niels, (who
was by then, well known both east and
west of the Atlantic as K. N. or Kainn)
pondered on this question, in verse form.
He didn’t want to live in poverty back
home in Iceland and in North America
was the golden dream of prosperity:
Svo Audi eg fe3ra grundu,
mer fannst jrar allt of Jiurrt;
a5 leita fjar og frama
eg fullur sigldi burt.
So I left my fatherland
I thought it much too dry
To look for riches and try my hand
I sailed off and cut the tie
(transl. Elva Simundsson)
1 Kristinn GuSlaugsson: „Bernskuminningar Kristins a Nupi“, Menn og minjar. IX,
(Reykjavik 1960), 16.
O ERGESEN'S
Original. Always.
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