{"id":4368,"date":"2015-08-27T20:04:46","date_gmt":"2015-08-27T20:04:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/icelandic\/?p=4368"},"modified":"2015-08-27T20:04:46","modified_gmt":"2015-08-27T20:04:46","slug":"reciting-icelandic-poetry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/icelandic\/2015\/08\/27\/reciting-icelandic-poetry\/","title":{"rendered":"Reciting Icelandic poetry."},"content":{"rendered":"
\"3222312648_ef596015f9_b\"<\/a>

Poetic graffiti by B\u00f6rkur Sigurbj\u00f6rnsson at Flickr.com<\/p><\/div>\n

If I had to describe Icelandic as a language, one word would come to mind immediately: poetic. For most of their existence Icelanders have always valued poets highly, so highly in fact that an important person was practically assumed to be a skilled poet and even the poorest farmer could (and often would) show off if they had even a little bit of talent to rhyming. All thanks to the surprisingly high literacy rates we have plenty of proof of that!<\/p>\n

Still, when a language learner looks at Icelandic poetry and tries to read it out loud the end result sounds awkward at best. It’s like the syllable count doesn’t work or the stress doesn’t seem to fall on the right parts of words. Good news and bad news – it really does work, except not if you simply read the text as it is. Let’s look at\u00a0Kyssti mig s\u00f3l<\/em> by Gu\u00f0mundur B\u00f6\u00f0varsson as an example:<\/p>\n

Kyssti mig s\u00f3l og sag\u00f0i: <\/em>
\nS\u00e9r\u00f0u ekki hva\u00f0 \u00e9g sk\u00edn? <\/em>
\nGleymdu n\u00fa vetrargaddinum s\u00e1ra, <\/em>
\ngleymdu honum, \u00e1stin m\u00edn. <\/em>
\nN\u00fa er \u00e9g \u00e1tj\u00e1n \u00e1ra. <\/em><\/p>\n

(“The sun kissed me and said:\/Don’t you see how I shine?\/Forget now your sad winter frost,\/forget that, my love. \/Now I’m eighteen years old.”)<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/a>

Photo by Axel Kristinsson at Flickr.com<\/p><\/div>\n

The second and fourth lines in particular don’t seem to work at a first glance, but here’s where the trick happens.\u00a0Icelandic has a strong tendency to drop vowels that end a word and also the letter H that beings a word<\/strong>, especially so if they’re present as a combo: one word ends with a vowel, the next begins with an H \/ one word ends with a vowel and the next one begins with one. Another important point: if a word ends with a single vowel + G, the G often gets unvoiced<\/strong>, such as in words \u00e9g<\/strong><\/em> and og<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

S\u00e9r\u00f0u<\/strong> + ekki = s\u00e9r\u00f0ekki<\/em>: these two words run into one, dropping that extra syllable. The E<\/strong> at beginning of ekki<\/em> cannot be dropped, because that would create a very difficult to pronounce triple consonant.<\/p>\n

Gleymdu<\/strong> + h<\/strong>onum = gleymdonum<\/em>: here, however, both the vowel and the H have to go.<\/p>\n

So let’s try to read it again but with the corrections in place:<\/p>\n

Kyssti mig s\u00f3l og sag\u00f0i: <\/em>
\nS\u00e9r\u00f0’ ekki hva\u00f0 \u00e9g sk\u00edn? <\/em>
\nGleymdu n\u00fa vetrargaddinum s\u00e1ra, <\/em>
\ngleymd’\u00a0‘onum, \u00e1stin m\u00edn. <\/em>
\nN\u00fa er \u00e9g \u00e1tj\u00e1n \u00e1ra.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Let’s have another example of how vowels and H get dropped, two stanzas from a popular folk song T\u00edminn l\u00ed\u00f0ur<\/em> (= time passes by):<\/p>\n

\"104\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00dea\u00f0 \u00e1 a\u00f0 str\u00fdkja str\u00e1kaling,<\/em>
\nstinga honum ofan \u00ed kolabing,<\/em>
\nloka hann \u00fati \u00ed landsynning,<\/em>
\nl\u00e1ta hann hlaupa allt um kring.<\/em><\/p>\n

(“The boy must be strengthened \/ he should be stuck into a pile of coal \/ locked outside to south-east wind \/ let him run around the place.”)<\/p>\n

The first line has eight syllables, the second ten, third nine and the last one eight again. Something has to be dropped.<\/p>\n

Stinga<\/strong> + h<\/strong>onum = stingonum.<\/em><\/p>\n

O(fa)n<\/em>: sometimes the middle part gets unvoiced, but this may depend on how the song is sung. I’ve definitely heard it voiced as well.<\/p>\n

Loka<\/strong> + h<\/strong>ann = lokann, \u00fati<\/strong> + \u00ed = \u00fat\u00ed.<\/em><\/p>\n

L\u00e1ta<\/strong> + h<\/strong>ann = l\u00e1tann.<\/em><\/p>\n

Aw, poor lad. Sounds like he’s in for some bad times, all for his own good of course so that he’ll grow up strong… but what will happen to the girls?<\/p>\n

\"084\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00dea\u00f0 \u00e1 a\u00f0 str\u00fdkja stelpuna,<\/em>
\nstinga henni ofan \u00ed mykjuna,<\/em>
\nloka hana \u00fati og lemja hana<\/em>
\nog l\u00e1ta hann bola \u00e9ta hana.<\/em><\/p>\n

(“The girl must be strengthened \/ she should be stuck in manure \/ locked outside and beaten \/ and let a bull bite her.”)<\/p>\n

Ouch. Seems like traditional life\u00a0was not easy on anyone… but to\u00a0make this part work poetry-wise it needs cropping as well.<\/p>\n

Stinga<\/strong> + h<\/strong>enni = stingenni.<\/em><\/p>\n

Loka<\/strong> + h<\/strong>ana<\/strong> + \u00fati = lokan\u00fati.<\/em> Yup, three words can be strung together just as easily as two. \ud83d\ude00<\/p>\n

L\u00e1ta<\/strong> + h<\/strong>ann = l\u00e1tann<\/em>, just like above, \u00e9ta<\/strong> + h<\/strong>ana = \u00e9tana<\/em>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Lastly, remember Winnipeg Icelander<\/a> by Guttormur Guttormsson? A brilliant, hilarious poem that shows what happens when Icelandic and English get on a crash course and neither agrees to budge!<\/p>\n

Vi\u00f0 t\u00f3kum til Winnipeg traini\u00f0-a fly,<\/em>
\nNick treata\u00f0i always so kindly.<\/em>
\nHann lof\u00f0i m\u00e9r rj\u00fapuna’ a\u00f0 bera’ upp \u00ed b\u00e6<\/em>
\n\u00c9g borga\u00f0i fyrir \u00fea\u00f0, mind ye.<\/em>
\nSvo dressa\u00f0i Nick hana’ \u00ed dinnerin sinni<\/em>
\nOg duglega upp ‘ana stoppti,<\/em>
\nBau\u00f0 Dana McMillan \u00ed dinnerinn sinn,<\/em>
\n\u201e\u00c9g drepti ‘ana,\u201c \u201esag\u00f0i’ ann, \u201e\u00e1 lofti.\u201c<\/em><\/p>\n

Alas, this poem is untranslatable; it works only as long as you understand enough of both languages. There are plenty of unvoicing examples in this stanza alone so I picked only two of them to use as examples.<\/p>\n

Here we see that the H<\/strong>s have already been helpfully removed, and even better, each unvoicing is written into the text with apostrophes.<\/p>\n

Hann lof\u00f0i m\u00e9r rj\u00fapuna’<\/strong> a\u00f0 bera’<\/strong> upp \u00ed b\u00e6 – Hann lof\u00f0i m\u00e9r rj\u00fapun-a\u00f0 ber-upp \u00ed b\u00e6<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201e\u00c9g drepti<\/strong> ‘ana,\u201c \u201esag\u00f0i<\/strong>‘ ann, \u201e\u00e1 lofti.\u201c – “\u00c9g drept-ana,” sagd-ann, “\u00e1 lofti.”<\/em><\/p>\n