- Malan Marnersdóttir og Turið Sigurðardóttir

Malan Marnersdóttir and Turið Sigurðardóttir, who are literary scholars at the Faculty of Faroese Language and Literature, lead and execute this project. Other members of the Faculty, as well as external researchers, also participate in the project and write about specific chosen topics. Jógvan í Lon Jacobsen, who is a philologist at the Faculty, has, for example, written about the scholarly and enlightenment culture of the 17th and 18th centuries.

The objective is to produce a research-based history of Faroese literature, which affords a global overview of artistic and historical literary development.
Project information

The objective is to produce a research-based history of Faroese literature, which affords a global overview of artistic and historical literary development.

Work currently centres on a period starting in the 17th century, when significant works about the Faroes were produced, and ending around 1900, when Faroese contemporary literature had emerged.

We aim to start the publication with this period and follow up with a tome on the 20th century.

What will be the main difference between the forthcoming history of literature and existing ones, such as Føroysk bókmentasøga (Faroese literary histore) by Christian Matras from 1935, Føroyskar bókmentir I-III (Faroese Literature I-III) and Færøsk litteratur ( Faroese Literature) by Jógvan Isaksen? This new publication will draw on both existing resources and new research. It is based on textual analysis and will therefore be more extensive and thorough.

The project strives to explain the history of Faroese literature by placing the development of genres and general aesthetic characteristics in the context of universal literary history and scholarship. It will explore the interplay between Faroese, Nordic and European developments. We will analyse currents, periods and authors based on the texts themselves; however, we will also take previous analyses into account, discuss them and draw on them.

New research shifts the focus. Authors not previously included or just mentioned are discussed, analysed and their importance in literary history is assessed. These may be men or women, who wrote certain genres or used styles or languages, which there was no room for in the first works on Faroese literature, when the concept was first established. 

As regards the 20th century, which will be the topic of the following volume or volumes, there is a significantly larger body of work than in previous centuries, there are many more texts and genres to discuss. The last three decades in Faroese literature have never been discussed as a whole in literary history before. The project will break new ground in selection, summary, classification and analysis.

The results will speak for themselves. The new history of literature is likely to be part new departure, part synthesis and continuation of previous works on literary history.

The first volume of the History of Faroese Literature was published in June 2011.

[Translate to English:] Í løtuni er arbeiðið miðsavnað um tíðarskeiðið frá 17. øld, tá ið týdningarmikil rit um Føroyar komu út, til umleið 1900, tá ið føroyskar nútíðarbókmentir vóru vorðnar veruleiki.