For Icelanders, Poetry Is King

For all of its beautiful vistas and geothermal pools, it seems like folks in Iceland just can't stop reading poetry. In the New York Times's "What in the World" section, journalist Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura observes, from scientists to English professors, the majority of the population enjoys writing poetry about topics as diverse as genetics and nuclear holocaust.

When they’re not at their day jobs, a great many of the island’s 330,000 inhabitants dabble in verse, including politicians, businessmen, horse breeders and scientists who study the genetic isolation of the island in pursuit of medical breakthroughs. Even David Oddsson, who was prime minister in 2002 (when Iceland’s banks were privatized) and central bank governor in 2008 (when they collapsed), is a poet by training.

Birgitta Jonsdottir, the leader of the anarchist-leaning Pirate Party, which did well in a recent general election, describes herself rather loftily as a “poetician.” Her first published poem, “Black Roses,” written when she was 14, is about a nuclear holocaust.

Kari Stefansson, one of the world’s leading geneticists and the founder of Decode Genetics, recalled a poem he wrote in 1996, a few months after the birth of Dolly, the cloned sheep.

More via New York Times.