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REVIEWS:THERE ARE MANY connections between Iceland and Ireland. Irish monks lived in Iceland before the Vikings arrived. The Norse chiefs took female slaves from Ireland and Scotland to Iceland so that, during the Age of Settlement, 76% of women in Iceland were Celtic. These factors contribute to the fact that Icelandic DNA is currently more Celtic than Scandinavian, with Ireland and Iceland sharing similar bone structure, skin colouring and type O as our most common blood type, as opposed to type A in other Scandinavian countries.

However, the similarity with which we are perhaps most familiar is captured by the joke “What is the difference between Iceland and Ireland? One letter and about six months.” Both countries experienced a period of sudden and unprecedented economic growth in the 1990s (called the “Nordic Tiger” in Iceland) followed by a similarly sudden collapse over the past year. Perhaps because Iceland is outside the Eurozone (it has recently applied for membership of the EU) its economic crisis is worse than ours, with Icelands national currency plummeting in value and the country facing the threat of national bankruptcy last October. During that month, Icelanders descended on Austurvöllur Square, banging pots and pans outside the Parliament of Iceland building (Althingi) until they successfully replaced the previous government with the current coalition of the Social Democratic Alliance and Left-Green Movement.