Heðin Brú's "Father and Son on the Road" is a masterpiece of Nordic literature. It is one of the first novels in which the Faroese language, previously reserved for everyday rural life and traditional folk songs, became literature. Heðin Brú tells of life on the windswept, treeless Faroe Islands, lapped by the foamy sea, with subtle, affectionate humour, recounting the hardships of everyday life between whaling, peat cutting and collecting driftwood.
Ketil, an oddball Faroese fisherman, buys a piece of whale meat that is too big and too expensive for him at an auction after a profitable whaling trip. When he learns that he has to pay it off by the end of the year, he leaves no stone unturned to raise the necessary money. His sense of honour does not allow him to live in debt. The youngest of his eleven children and the last one still living in his house, his son Kalvur, accompanies him on his endeavours.
Heðin Brú tells the story of an ageing fisherman whose everyday life is characterised by his work and the weather, but whose fate extends far beyond the remote Faroe Islands. Ketil has to recognise that, with the advent of modern technology and working methods, his sons' and daughters' generation is no longer dependent on the experience and knowledge of their elders and is forging its own path. Progress is unstoppable, but literature can record the past and preserve it for future generations. Aferradetes, Paula.
Conflictes generacionals?.
ReplyDeleteInteressant.
Bona nit, Sean.
Heðin Brú's "Father and Son on the Road" is a masterpiece of Nordic literature. It is one of the first novels in which the Faroese language, previously reserved for everyday rural life and traditional folk songs, became literature. Heðin Brú tells of life on the windswept, treeless Faroe Islands, lapped by the foamy sea, with subtle, affectionate humour, recounting the hardships of everyday life between whaling, peat cutting and collecting driftwood.
DeleteKetil, an oddball Faroese fisherman, buys a piece of whale meat that is too big and too expensive for him at an auction after a profitable whaling trip. When he learns that he has to pay it off by the end of the year, he leaves no stone unturned to raise the necessary money. His sense of honour does not allow him to live in debt. The youngest of his eleven children and the last one still living in his house, his son Kalvur, accompanies him on his endeavours.
Heðin Brú tells the story of an ageing fisherman whose everyday life is characterised by his work and the weather, but whose fate extends far beyond the remote Faroe Islands. Ketil has to recognise that, with the advent of modern technology and working methods, his sons' and daughters' generation is no longer dependent on the experience and knowledge of their elders and is forging its own path. Progress is unstoppable, but literature can record the past and preserve it for future generations.
Aferradetes, Paula.
Gràcies per l'explicació!.😉
DeleteAnother author I don't know. So many books, so little time is so very true.
ReplyDeleteThe more important is to choose carefully what you read.
DeleteFather and Sons, a relationship often fraught with peril.
ReplyDeleteIt is, dear Mimi, it is.
Delete