Iceland used to be a place where, in our minds, wealthy anglers went to catch great big salmon. It was also an area where there was disputation about other nations fishing the seas around her. And one more thing, a friend remembers there was an Irish connection somehow. Did Irish monks land there and make some mark way, way back? Anyway, Seamus Delargy, that great genius and innovator in the study of folklore the world around, had made connections with scholars there and once invited a colleague around to his house to meet one of their folklorists or scholars of the sagas.
He produced - Delargy, that is - a present he had been given by his friend and offered some to the colleague. His only memory is that it was called hardfiskur - he wouldn't be entirely sure of the spelling, but it was a dried fish which was much used as a titbit to be chewed between meals. Having great trust in Delargy, our friend persisted to the end with his delightful, unusual gift.
According to a young Italian journalist, Allesandro Gori, Iceland is now at a crossroads between sagas and a global future. For things are changing. One scholar is quoted as saying that while traditions and language are still there, identity is switching to the environment more and more - "something pure, wild, untouched and to be preserved; it means a link with the past."
Iceland has the highest number of mobile phones in the world per head of population (67 per cent). Moreover, 45 per cent of the population have Internet access. Children start to learn English in school at 12 years of age, but by then they are already using it, watching TV and surfing the Internet. One scholar says of his daughter: "I try to push her in Icelandic and she says: `But it's easier in English!'"
A country of great traditions, for its parliament was established in 930 and Icelanders claim that it is the oldest working national assembly in the world. And was not Leif Eriksson the first European to discover the North American continent a millennium ago? New technology is moving in, but sagas still have a hold on the people, "giving us faith in ourselves and telling us we are a culture and have something to say to the rest of the world".
A young friend went there some years ago for a short holiday and was much impressed. Fish is still, of course, the heart of the economy, but just reading about it would make you want to go. Amazing though, in this world of an oil shortage threat, to find that in Reykjavik 86 per cent of the houses receive all the hot water they need and many power plants exploit geothermal energy. Volcanic power, if you like. From Europ, magazine of Journalistes en Europe.