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Pslarvottar n hfileika
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Wikipedia article
'Pslarvottar n hfileika: Saga af hnattvddri kynsl' ('Martyrs without talent: A history of a globalised generation') is the first novel by Kri Tulinius, published in 2010 by JPV.
Form
The novel is in prose, with several quotations of free verse by one of the characters, Lilja, and passages where the prose style itself could be seen to drift into free verse. Chapters are short, and chapter titles prosaic and sometimes detailed, evoking eighteenth-century novels (for example, ' leiinni annan fund terroristaklbbsins' [on the way to the second meeting of the terrorist club'] and 'Frsgn Geira af fer sinni til Palestnu' [Geiri's account of his journey to Palestine]). The novel is divided into two parts, the first part ('fyrri hluti') set in September 2008 and the second ('seinni hluti') set in November 2008. The narrative of the novel's present is presented linearly and in the present tense. However, chapters set in the novel's present are interspersed with chapters, whose titles state the year in which they are set, narrating flashbacks, mostly concerning the principal character, Sli. These passages in particular are characterised by an absence of punctuation, and at times depart from conventional typographical layouts, using layout to artistic effect in the style of concrete poetry. The language throughout the novel tends to be colloquial, and dominated by realistic direct speech.
Summary
The principal characters are Sli, Marks, Geiri, Lilja and Dra, well educated twenty-to-thirty-something would-be radicals living in 101 Reykjavk. At the opening of the story, they form a terroristaklbb ('terrorist club'), whose name points firmly to their integration into US-driven discourses of the war on terror, and naively unreflective attitude to what living up to their name might really entail. They are mostly depicted meeting and chatting in bars in the town, where they discuss left-wing revolutionaries and plot a terrorist attack. They struggle, however, to agree on a name for the group, much less on the deed itself, and the relationships between them are complicated by sexual attractions and liaisons. Their main achievement is to gain the opportunity to send two of their number to travel to Palestine as aid workers. Eventually Geiri and Dra are chosen, but Dra is killed by being run over by a tank (evoking the death in 2003 of Rachel Corrie). Her death comes just as the 2009 kitchenware revolution is gathering pace, so that what should be the terroristaklbbs moment to shine is cast into shadow, putting the characters inability to act meaningfully within their own societylet alone elsewherein a particularly stark light.Cf. Bergrn Andradttir, '[http://hrunid.hi.is/skaldskapur/pislarvottar-an-haefileika/ Pslarvottar n hfileika]', 'HRUNI, i muni: Gagnabanki um samtmasgu'.
The flashbacks of the novel mostly concern formative moments in Sli's life, not least an early life in which his mentally unstable mother prevents him discovering a world outside their house.
Reviews and related interviews
* Bergrn Andradttir, '[http://hrunid.hi.is/skaldskapur/pislarvottar-an-haefileika/ Pslarvottar n hfileika]', 'HRUNI, i muni: Gagnabanki um samtmasgu'.
* Einar Falur Inglfsson, '[http://timarit.is/view_page_init.jsp?pageId=5298457 Af byltingarsinnum og kattarvinum]', 'SunnudagsMogginn' (6 June 2010), p. 54.
* sgerur Jlusdttir, '[http://timarit.is/view_page_init.jsp?pageId=5322942 Misleitar manneskjur]', 'Morgunblai', 21 May 2010, p. 43.
* '[http://timarit.is/view_page_init.jsp?issId=382889&pageId=6374057&lang=is&q=P%EDslarvottar%20%E1n%20h%E6fileika Nennti ekki a vera kvin]', 'DV' (19 May 2010), p. 21.
References
Category:2010 novels
Category:Icelandic novels
Category:Novels set in Iceland
Category:Icelandic-language novels
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