The Black Cliffs (1929) by Gunnar Gunnarsson re-issued in Germany

2. November, 2009

One of Gunnar's best-known novels  translated by Karl Ludwig Wetzig

Gunnar Gunnarsson, one of Iceland's leading authors, left his home country at a young age to study in Denmark.  Writing in Danish, he soon won renown as an author, with the bestselling Borgslægtens historie (Guest the One-Eyed).  Famous for his writing in both Europe and America, he was four times nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature. He was a prolific writer, whose oeuvre comprises dozens of novels, along with many short stories, as well as verse.

The Reclam publishing house in Germany has re-issued one of Gunnar's best-known novels, Svartfugl/The Black Cliffs/Schwarze Vögel (1929) in a new, revised edition by Karl Ludwig Wetzig. The book was written at the zenith of the author's career (1923-1933), when he produced his grandest works: Fjallkirkjan/Kirken på bjerget/Ships of the Sky/Schiffe am Himmel; Sælir eru einfaldir/Salige er de enfoldige/Seven Days' Darkness/Sieben Tage Finsternis; andVikivaki.Svartfugl is a historical novel which explores one of the most famous crimes in Icelandic history: a double murder committed on the farm of Sjöundá in the West Fjords in 1802.


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