Once Upon A Time In the West

Iceland’s wild western coast has bred a long line of storytellers, who share tales of super-human Vikings and meddlesome spirits across the millennia. We meet the people keeping the tradition alive and the landscapes that inspire them.

- Amanda Canning

THE MAN WHO LIVES WITH TROLLS

It’s a clear day when the two trolls set out on their journey. Snow sits on the distant mountains, but the valley is green and full of summer. Frazzled hair running amok above pale faces, the pair bob merrily through the hills. Their journey soon comes to an abrupt halt – a giant hand swoops in from above and yanks them into the firmament.

‘So this is my little theatre,’ explains Ingi Hans, inspecting the wooden puppets in the playhouse he conjured up from bits of scrap and uses to entertain children in his hometown of Grundarfjörour. He wheels it across the floor of his workshop – a building known to everyone in the region as the Storyteller’s Lodge – to join the other paraphernalia he’s amassed over the years: old cash machines, ships’ lanterns, tin cars, leather-bound books, vintage Barbie dolls still in their boxes.

Ingi, the thin strip of white beard running down his chin lending him a faint air of wizard, has been collecting and telling stories his entire life. ‘My father was a fisherman and every day I would visit an old man at the harbour who was fixing the nets,’ he says, hands clasped round a freshly brewed mug of coffee. ‘He was always telling stories. My father would come home from the sea and I would share them with him.’

The door swings open and his young grandson comes in, a whirl of snow blowing through behind him. He heads straight to the theatre and starts playing with the trolls. ‘Here we are all storytellers,’ says Ingi. ‘Maybe it’s our Celtic heritage, but our landscape and long winters also have an affect. We started to collect myths, to bring them back to life, to help us through the cold nights.’