Jón Þorláksson (writer)
Jón Þorláksson , (born December 13, 1744 in Selárdalur on the farm of the same name in the area of Arnarfjörður , Iceland ; died October 21, 1819 in the rectory of Bægisá , Iceland) was an Icelandic writer and translator.
Family and childhood
Jón Þorláksson was born in 1744 as the son of the evangelical pastor Þorlákur Guðjónsson and his wife Guðrun Tómasdóttir at the Selárdalur rectory on Arnarfjörður in the southern West Fjords of Iceland. However, when the boy was five years old, his father lost the pastor's office. The charge was that he was drunk while holding the service. However, he subsequently received the position of Sýslumaður , first in Ísafjarðarsýsla , then on the Westman Islands and finally the family settled on the Teigur farm in Fljótshlíð , with the father now acting Sýslumadur for Árnessýsla and where the family lived longer while Jón grew up .
Life
As the young Jón soon proved to be quite talented, his parents sent him to secondary school in Skálholt , where he graduated from high school after three years.
He then worked for five years as a clerk for two different canons ( Magnús Gíslason (canon) and Ólafur Stefánsson (canon) ), at that time the highest administrative officials of the Danish crown in Iceland.
Then Jón completed his training as a pastor and got an office as such in Dalasýsla . There he also met the daughter of a rich farmer, Jórunn Brynjólfsdóttir. The father was against a marriage, but the two had a child. Jón therefore lost his parish in 1770. Two years later, however, he was again recognized as a pastor and received the parish of Stað in Grunnavík. Later, however, Jón was awarded another child to the woman and he lost his pastor again.
In Hrappsey , where he later worked, Jón Margrét married, the daughter of the printer owner Bogi Benediktsson , and lived with her for several years on the farm Galtardal am Fellsströnd (the southern part of the Klofningsnes peninsula , on Hvammsfjörður ).
From 1788 he was pastor again, this time in the parish of Bægisá on Tröllaskagi , known from the folk tale of the deacon of Myrká , where he also died in 1819. One of his assistant pastors there was Hallgrímur Þorsteinsson, the father of the poet Jónas Hallgrímsson .
plant
After he had lost his pastorate for the second time, he got work in the printing shop on the island of Hrappsey in Breiðafjörður , Hrappseyjarprentsmiðjan , which was founded in 1773. This turned out to be a stroke of luck for Jón and his work, who had started writing at an early age alongside work. He had u. a. translated a book of poems by the Norwegian poet Christian Braunmann Tullin , which has now been published and has proven to be a kind of bestseller.
Jón himself became known as a poet, but especially as a translator of world literature. For example, he translated works by Alexander Pope , Paradise Lost by John Milton , and the Messiah by Klopstock into Icelandic . When translating the famous work by John Milton, Jón Þorláksson used a meter made famous by the Edda of Songs . With this turn to medieval tradition in literature, he paved the way for the romantic literary trend in his country.
Shortly before the end of his life, he also received a number of prizes in recognition of his translation work.
literature
- Thorlaksson (Þorláksson), Jón . In: Johannes Brøndum-Nielsen, Palle Raunkjær (ed.): Salmonsens Konversationsleksikon . 2nd Edition. tape 23 : T – Tysk frisindede part . JH Schultz Forlag, Copenhagen 1927, p. 387 (Danish, runeberg.org ).
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i Jón R. Hjálmarsson: Með þjóðskjáldum við þjóðveginn. Reykjavík 2004, pp. 80-84.
- ↑ Kristján Eiríksson, Sigurborg Hilmarsdóttir: Bókastóð. Ágrip af íslenskri bókmenntasögu. Reykjavík, Iðnú, 1999, 83.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Jón Þorláksson |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Icelandic writer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 13, 1744 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Selárdalur , Iceland |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 21, 1819 |
| Place of death | Bægisá , Iceland |