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Continue reading →: Codex 1962 by Sjón
translated from the Icelandic by Victoria Cribb and published in 2016 This is my last of Sjón‘s English translations and I’ve greatly enjoyed every one of them. Sjón is my favourite Icelandic writer. I’d saved this until I was in Iceland, and it went down particularly well. Though at 530…
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Continue reading →: Heimaey – Vestmann IslandsThere’s two ways to look at my decision to travel around Iceland at this time of year; adventurous and exiting or foolhardy and ignorant. Older now, I tend towards the latter of those views. Though the Dylan words (‘older then, younger than that now’) reverberate in my head it’s seems…
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Continue reading →: Questions of Travel: William Morris in Iceland edited by Lavinia Greenlaw
published in 2011 – a collection of journals William Morris (1834 – 1896) was an English textile designer, poet, artist, socialist activist, and, of course, writer. He was greatly influenced in his love for Iceland by his University languages tutor Eiríkur Magnússon, who became a close friend. He is recognised…
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Continue reading →: In The CityI wrote in the last post that I thought 95% of the campervans on the Iceland roads at the moment were rentals, but it’s more than that. I’m at the Reykjavik campsite at the moment and there’s about a hundred vans here each night. They all roll in between about…
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Continue reading →: Fall, Bomb, Fall by Gerrit Kouwenaar
translated from the Dutch by Michele Hutchison & published September 2025 Kraus’s ambitious novel is based around her own childhood in 1960s Connecticut, and then later in her life in the north of Minnesota. It’s in three distinct parts. In the first, Jasper and Emma Greene and their daughters, Catt…
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Continue reading →: The Four Spent The Day Together by Chris Kraus
Contemporary American Literature published October 2025 Kraus’s ambitious novel is based around her own childhood in 1960s Connecticut, and then later in her life in the north of Minnesota. It’s in three distinct parts. In the first, Jasper and Emma Greene and their daughters, Catt and Carla, move from the…
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Continue reading →: Snæfellsnes PeninsulaThe Snæfellsnes peninsula in Western Iceland known for its dramatic landscapes. I’m currently reading the travel journals of William Morris, an English writer, poet and artist who travelled here in 1871 and 1873. He describes the landscape as ‘Most Unimaginably Strange’. At the age of 40 his marriage was struggling,…
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Continue reading →: Akureyri to SnæfellnesI stayed two nights at Húsavík. The campsite, next to the sports fields, was closed, but it was still possible to stay there; better really, no cost, and no facilities, which I wouldn’t have needed anyway. At this time of year the town looked very welcoming. Tourists still arrive, off…
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Continue reading →: Way Far Away by Evelio Rosero
translated from the Spanish (Colombia) by Victor Meadowcroft An elderly man is searching for something, though we are not aware of what until almost half way through. His travels take him to a bizarre town shrouded in mist, where mice carcasses lie rotting in the street, boys play football with…
To live more widely
supera superiora sequi
SafeReturnDoubtful is my alias.
Where is Andy?
I was so much older then…
Quote of the Week
Alice asked the Cheshire Cat, who was sitting in a tree, ‘What road do I take?’ The cat asked, ‘Where do you want to go?’ ‘I don’t know,’ Alice answered. ‘Then,’ said the cat, ‘it really doesn’t matter, does it?’
Lewis Carroll
Safe Return Doubtful 