1814

Today I was giving a tour of the museum to a group of journalists from Scandinavia (I felt a bit bad that I could not eke out more than three sentences in Norwegian before reverting to English). One of them was from Denmark, and after we'd done the tour, and were standing around having coffee, he asked about how people here in Iceland were handling the recession. I told him I thought it had been tough, but that maybe people's ideas about private companies and capitalism were changing a bit.

He then made the most wonderful point. He started talking about what had happened to Denmark in the early 19th century, about the loss of the fleet to the English in Copenhagen Harbor in 1809, and then the loss in the Napoleonic wars that forced Denmark to give Norway (and Iceland) to the Swedes. He said after these defeats, Denmark rallied, poured its energy into the arts and cultural fields, and from this sprang a new identity. He talked also about the events after WWII, when the Scandinavian countries worked to find cooperative projects after a difficult period. There was such warmth in what he was saying, so much compassion for what Iceland has endured, and it seemed to me marvelous, marvelous that he knew so much of his own history, that he interpreted it in such a sensitive and thoughtful way, instead of just dismissing the nationalism of the 19th century as silly.

I hope he says this to more people while he is here.

Comments

Morten Lange (Reykjavík) said…
Takk fyrir þessa frásögn. Gott að fá þannig hvatning, sem byggir á reynslu og jákvæðni og von sem ekki er innihaldslaus.

En reyndar þá fylgðu ekki Ísland og Grænland með þegar Danmörk "missti" Noreg til Sviþjóðar. Mér skilst reyndar að embættismaðurinn sem tók þátt í samninganna fyri hönd Svíþjóðar hafi ekki tekið eftir því að Danski samningarmaðurinn lagði ermið yfir þann hluta kortsins sem geymdi Ísland og Grænland. ( Sem fylgðu með þegar Danmörk tóku við stjórn Noregs um 1387, eftir að Svartidauði hefði farið illa með fjárhag og völd kongsættar og framamanna Noregs)

( I am not Icelandic, so there are probably some errors in there... )
September 5, 2009 at 1:00 AM
Lissy said…
Right, right, no I knew that. Exactly. Denmark managed to keep Iceland and Greenland but lost Norway. Bah! This is why I have never like quiz=trivia games, even when it is a fact I know very well, I can still overthink it. The thing that confused me was that Denmark got Iceland to begin with because Iceland was a province, basically, of Norway, as was the Faeroes and Greenland. Then Denmark and Norway agreed to become a joint kingdom, and then Norway lost its royal line. Anyhow, thanks for the correction.
September 6, 2009 at 11:40 PM
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