Learning Icelandic

I hesitate to title this post “Learning Icelandic” because it might leave you with the impression that I have, actually, learned Icelandic. As in mastering it. Which I have not.

 

But in another sense “Learning Icelandic” is a perfect phrase to describe my experience, because it implies a continuous present, as if I were always in the process of trying to learn Icelandic. Which I am.

 

Personally, I find Icelandic grammar insanely, mind-bogglingly complicated. It’s highly inflected, so any one word will appear in various forms depending on the syntax of the sentence. (I once figured out there are 148 ways to say the word “the” in Icelandic.) As Freya explains it in my novel, “Icelandic words are tricksters. Acrobats. Masters of disguise. Shape-shifters.”

 

There are no Icelandic language classes in California, or almost anywhere else in the U.S. So my quest to learn Icelandic here has been a varied one, from memorizing lines from the Viking film Hrafninn flýgur (“I’ll cut you into pieces for Odin’s crows!”) to driving an hour and a half every Sunday for lessons with an elderly Icelandic woman who spoke in a whisper. I own Stefán Einarsson’s exhaustive 500- page tome of Icelandic grammar, written for American soldiers stationed in Iceland during World War II, along with a collection of contemporary instruction books. I even enrolled in a month-long intensive language program at the University of Iceland in Reykjavik.

 

And I’m still not remotely fluent.

 

Unless I can find a way to live in Iceland for a couple of years, my chances of mastering  Icelandic are remote. Yet I love this beautiful language way too much to give up. These days I’m avoiding the pesky grammar altogether. I read novels that are far above my head and listen to radio live from Reykjavik. I can’t understand most of it, but I try not let that interfere with my enjoyment.

Comments

[Colette]

Christina,

Might you include an 'Icelandic word for the day' in your blog? Maybe it could be an mp3 file, so we can learn how to pronounce the word? This would be a great gift, and good preparation for the novel....

CG

[Jefe]

yes but inquiring minds want to know...what does rotten shark meat REALLY taste like?