News

Hallgrímur Helgason participated in the conference “Iceland and the Faroe Islands seen from within and without - cross-cultural perspectives, 17th-21st century” that was held in Tórshavn, Faroe Islands, on the 14th and 15th of June, 2022. Among participants were historians and professors from Iceland, Faroe Islands, Denmar [...]

Hallgrímur Helgason has won the Icelandic Literary Prize in fiction for his novel “Sixty Kilos of Knockouts”, the second volume in his Sixty Kilo-series. He also won the same prize for the first volume back in 2018, Sixty Kilos of Sunshine. This then is the third time Hallgrímur wins the prize, he also won in 2001, for his [...]

In collaboration with author/illustrator Rán Flygenring, Hallgrímur Helgason has published a children’s Christmas poetry book that plays on the local classic “Jólin koma” (Christmas Are Coming) by renown poet Jóhannes úr Kötlum, a book that was originally published in Iceland in 1932. It tells the stories of the thirteen Y [...]

Hallgrímur Helgason’s sequel to his award winning 2018 novel, Sixty Kilos of Sunshine, has just been published. The title is Sixty Kilos of Knockouts. It carries on with the saga of Gestur and his people in Segulfjörður Fjord, in the north of Iceland, at the turn of the twentieth century. The herring boom takes off for rea [...]

Hallgrímur Helgason opened a show of his recent paintings at the Neskirkja church’s community center in the west part of Reykjavik. The title of the show is “You Have to Teach People How to Die”, a sentence his father used a lot in his final days. Hallgrimur’s father, Mr. Helgi Hallgrimsson, passed away in October 2020. Al [...]

Hallgrímur Helgason has been awarded the highest honour the French Republic bestows on people for their merits in the field of culture. In a ceremony in Reykjavik, at the residence of the French ambassador to Iceland, Mr. Graham Paul, he received the medal designating him as an “officer” of the prestigious order. Hallgrímu [...]

To accompany his new book of poetry, We Shoot Pins, Hallgrímur Helgason rehearsed some chunks of it with one of Iceland's best drummers, Doddi Þorvaldsson. Out of those sessions grew an independent reading performance of 30 minutes. With the aid of the young and talented Krassasig, the most sought after director of music vi [...]

On September 24th Hallgrímur Helgason published his latest book of poetry, "Við skjótum títuprjónum" (We Shoot Pins). It contains one long poem in 22 chapters that was written between 2016 and 2020, mostly in airports and hotel rooms. It's a raging social critical poem that takes on the good life of people in the West, that [...]

On Sunday 1st of November, Hallgrímur Helgason was interviewed by Germany's first man of literature, Denis Scheck, on his famous TV show Druckfrisch. The interview was filmed in the north of Iceland, close to the setting of the novel Sixty Kilos of Sunshine, back in August of 2020. Helgason spoke about his novel, what he in [...]

Helgason's latest novel, the prize winning "Sixty Kilos of Sunshine", is out in Germany, published by Tropen Verlag, and translated by Karl-Ludwig Wetzig. Hailed as a "masterpiece" by the Icelandic critics it received the Icelandic Literature Prize in 2018. German is the the first foreign language it is published in. The no [...]

In October 2020 Hallgrímur Helgason went on a reading tour with his latest novel in German, 60 Kilo Sonnenschein. Despite the Corona virus, the trip was made possible with limited audiences and live streaming. Helgason read in Litarturhaus München, in the Buchhandlung Herschel in Berlin, in Literaturhaus Kiel, Literaturhaus [...]

Ísland er tjaldstæði - ræða Hallgrímur Helgason er meðal sýnenda á samsýningunni "Allt sem sýnist - Raunveruleiki á striga 1970 -2020" sem opnaði á Kjarvalsstöðum þann 25. júní 2020. Þar sýnir hann 5 málverk úr seríu sinni "Málað á myrkur" frá árinu 2015, og einnig málverkið stóra af Karlakórnum Heimi frá árinu 2000. Vi [...]