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HALLGRIMSSON, JONAS (1807-1844)

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Originally appearing in Volume V12, Page 857 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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HALLGRIMSSON, See also:JONAS (1807-1844) , the See also:chief lyrical poet of See also:Iceland, was See also:born in 1807 at Steinsstabir in Eyjafjarbarsysla in the See also:north of that See also:island, and educated at the famous school of Bessastabr. In 1832 he went to the university of See also:Copenhagen, and shortly afterwards turned his See also:attention to the natural sciences, especially See also:geology. Having obtained pecuniary assistance from the Danish See also:government, he travelled through all Iceland for scientific purposes in the years 1837-1842, and made many interesting See also:geological observations. Most of his writings on geology are in Danish. His renown was, however, not acquired by his writings in that See also:language, but by his Icelandic poems and See also:short stories. He was well read in See also:German literature, See also:Heine and See also:Schiller being his favourites, and the study of the German masters and the old classical writers of Iceland opened his eyes to the corrupt See also:state of Icelandic See also:poetry and showed him the way to make it better. The misuse of the Eddie metaphors made the lyrical and epical poetry of the See also:day hardly intelligible, and, to make matters worse, the language of the poets was mixed up with words of German and Danish origin. The See also:great Danish philologist and friend of Iceland, Rasmus See also:Rask, and the poet Bjarni Thorarensen had done much to purify the language, but Jonas HallgrImsson completed their See also:work by his poems and tales, in a purer language than ever had been written in Iceland since the days of Snorri Sturlason. 'The excesses of Icelandic poetry were specially seen in the so-called rimur, See also:ballads of heroes, &c., which were fiercely attacked by JOnas Hallgrimsson, who at last succeeded in converting the educated to his view. Most of the See also:principal poems, tales and essays of JOnas Hallgrimsson appeared in the periodical Fjolnir, which he began See also:publishing at Copenhagen in 1835, together with KonrhS Gfslason, a well-known philologist, and the patriotic See also:Thomas Saemundsson. Fjolnir had in the beginning a hard struggle against old prejudices, but as the years went by its See also:influence becameenormous; and when it at last ceased, its See also:programme and spirit still lived in Ny Fflagsrit and other patriotic See also:periodicals which took its See also:place. JOnas Hallgrimsson, who died in 1844, is the See also:father of a See also:separate school in Icelandic lyric poetry.

He introduced See also:

foreign thoughts and metres, but at the same See also:time revived the metres of the Icelandic classical poets. Although his poetical See also:works are all comprised in one small See also:volume, he strikes every See also:string of the old See also:harp of Iceland. (S.

End of Article: HALLGRIMSSON, JONAS (1807-1844)

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