I loved to read this book, very informative and true. I can say that because i live in Iceland!

This is a fine book about the wee islands in the North Atlantic. But beware: It's heavy stuff for those just looking for travel descriptions and easy-to-access material on the subject. Having said that it is a gem if you are interested in e.g Social Anthropology or other social sciences.

Dennis Gaffin, an American anthropologist, spent a year studying the phenomenon of social control in an outlying Faeroese village. The resulting book is a surprisingly readable first-person narrative, not a turgid, theoretical work like so much academic writing. Gaffin's book is a description of how a small Faroese village functions - what people do for a living, their worldview, and the forces through which social norms are enforced. The topic of spatial order, to which the title refers, receives relatively little attention, with the exception that the author devotes a chapter to the issue of placenames. This book is principally about how a society pressures people to behave "properly" as defined in that culture.

I will long remember the description of how, in this isolated treeless village, every movement of every person is closely scrutinized and gossipped about. In such a close-knit, claustrophobic society with its geographic isolation, harsh weather, and suffocating social pressures, I'm amazed that more people don't turn into psychopaths or drunkards. Some readers might prefer Susanna Kaysen's "Far Afield," which covers the identical material in the form of a novel. However, I preferred Gaffin's non-fiction narrative to Kaysen's work of fiction.

I picked up this Lonely Planet guide before heading off on a recent long weekend in Iceland (courtesy of a particularly favorable Icelandair last minute weekend package deal), and was not too terribly disappointed. The background information on Icelandic history and culture was invaluable reading for one who had previously had little to no contact with said society. As testament to the well-written nature of the guide, it has also made me want to explore the North Atlantic beyond Iceland (Greenland and the Faroe Islands).

My one dissatisfaction with this Lonely Planet guide is found in the relatively brief treatment they give to Reykjavik - a bit ironic, seeing as how Reykjavik is the closest thing to a metropolis in Iceland, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands. Better city maps and perhaps more detailed bus/transit information would have been welcomed - as it stands, though, one can figure these things out well on the spot in Iceland (even without a reading knowledge of Icelandic, happily!)

Still, this is highly recommended for those travelling to Iceland, especially those travelling to places more off the beaten path than Reykjavik. More practical and comprehensive than the Insight Guide, but without the pretty pictures...and less expensive.

PS- Many thanks to both LP and other readers on the warning about the Icelandic specialty "hakarl".

I used this book during a recent week-long trip to Iceland that took me out of Reykjavik for almost the entire time. I found it well researched and a good source of practical information. It is not an "Intro to Iceland" sort of book (see the Insight Guide for that); it is instead a handy reference while traveling. In response to the comment that there isn't enough info on Reykjavik, the real gems in traveling to Iceland are in the countryside, and this book covers them quite well. I was also pleasantly surprised to discover the high level of accuracy in the listings, considering the edition is a few years old. I would strongly recommend bringing this book with you. (And I agree with the reader who said that his/her interest in Greenland and the Faroe Islands has been piqued by this book.)

We used this book to plan our trip to both Iceland and Greenland, and found it invaluable. We used it to phone and e-mail for reservations, which were not always possible to make, as LP also tells us, because of no English spoken at some of the tiny places. We trusted LP that little hostels existed in these places, however, and always found room. The maps were great, including hiking trails. The historical details were well-researched. The directions were amazing. It even got us to one historical site in Iceland that had no signs and even the locals had a hard time telling us how to find. Besides being practically helpful, it has lots of anecdotes and local flavour that make it interesting reading. Perhaps what should be emphasized more is how expensive Iceland is. Two small loads of laundry cost us about $35 Canadian! We could have bought all new underwear for that!

The Faroe Islands cover about 540 square miles of steep green territory in the stormy North Atlantic and only 34 square miles of that is arable. Most of the rest is turned over to sheep, whose wool long provided material for the export of stockings. Settled first by Scandinavian farmers and fishermen in the 9th century, the Faroes did not differ greatly from other Norse outposts of the time. They lost their independence in the 13th century, being ruled then from Norway, were decimated by plague in the 14th century, and soon transferred to Danish control under the Union of Kalmar which united Denmark with Norway for centuries. Though semi-autonomous---with their own postage stamps and World Cup football team---the Faroes are still linked to Denmark today.

Given the lack of much solid information about the early period of Faroese history, Jonathan Wylie had to concentrate on later times. His history has the feel of an anthropologist straining at the leash, dashing impetuously and gladly towards an anthropological theme, then reluctantly returning to the task at hand. Perhaps an out-and-out book of anthropology would have been better. Not that THE FAROE ISLANDS, INTERPRETATIONS OF HISTORY is bad, but Wylie excels in the "interpretations" rather than in the presentation of straight history. He concentrates on economic and church life in the 1500-1800 period when for a long time Faroes trade was completely dominated by a government monopoly, the result of which was that little change occured in society. To better portray the feel of society at the time, he analyzes some folk tales. This is among the most fascinating parts of the book and again shows where his true talents lie. The conservatism of Faroe society extended even to population control. The authorities prevented landless people from marrying ! The Danish language was used in religion and commerce, but at home people still spoke Faroese. When, in the 19th century, an economic revolution occured with the end of the Monopoly and the birth of a modern fishing industry, it was accompanied by a rise in population and in the status of the local language too. Language and literature became the vehicle for increasing demands for self-rule. Linguistics and linguistics professors played a major role in Faroese history, unlike in any other country I've ever heard of. Wylie does an excellent job in describing the links between language and national feeling. By 1920, he says, "...although the Faroes did not become a nation in political fact, they had essentially acquired a national culture: a shared sense of political and cultural distinctiveness articulated in locally based, locally staffed formal institutions as well as in a set of internationally and locally recognized symbols of nationhood."

This is an academic work, a book for scholars, not for Lonely Planet fans. You are going to find masses of names, wade through a lot of complicated information. And you will find references within the text, an unpleasant feature of many academic books. However, I note the above only to alert general readers. THE FAROE ISLANDS is a thoughtful, interesting work which must be useful to anyone with a serious desire to understand Faroe society in history. The comparisons with Iceland and the Shetlands in the conclusion are especially fascinating. If you stay the course, you will come away with many insights into a small, but interesting part of the world.

Europe's many international soccer tournaments see some phenomenal mismatches, as when Russia plays Andorra, for example, or when Germany plays San Marino. But I've always found the Faroe Islands team the bravest. Imagine a country of 40,000 people taking on countries of 50 million or more ! They do it every year. There's only one stadium that meets FIFA standards. Other than in soccer, though, you'd have to admit that news about the Faroe Islands is "slightly" sparse. How many people go there, how many people know much about this group of islands in the North Atlantic more or less between Norway and Iceland ? I was certainly one who knew almost nothing. THE RING OF DANCERS was published in 1981. At the time, judging from the no doubt-comprehensive bibliography in this volume, there were possibly two books in English on the Faroes, with a couple more mimeographed articles or studies in obscure places. There was also a National Geographic article in 1970. That was it.

Unfortunately this book will not be a satisfactory source of general information for most readers. It is meant for specialists---for those interested primarily in the anthropology of Scandinavia. The amount of detail is tremendous in three out of four chapters, much more than can be absorbed by readers who do not have a professional interest in the Faroes. Chapter Two explores a very interesting problem---how people refer to compass directions and how this relates to a general geographic conception of their land. In New England, people commonly say "over to" Salem, "into Boston" or "up to Boston" but "down to Maine", to name a few examples. The Faroese pattern is far more intricate, but who can remember the details of all this in an unknown language ? Geertz' "Local Knowledge" (1983) comes to mind. Chapter Three is an analysis of a Cinderella-like folktale which supposedly reveals much about 19th century Faroe society and the changes it was undergoing. I was not entirely convinced, but the attempt was interesting. Because we readers are plunged right into these analyses without any background, everything remains on the level of "Yeah ? Really ? Well, maybe, I guess....."

Chapter Four is about the development of the Faroese language---yes, OK---but it was only Chapter Five that grabbed my attention, both on the descriptive level---it's about sporadic pilot whale hunts when up to a thousand whales can be massacred on the beaches followed by night-long celebrations with dancing and drinking---and on the analytical level---the author used Geertz' Balinese cockfight article as a rough model. This chapter and the short interviews of Faroese intellectuals that followed were what saved the book for me. In short, if you are looking for a readable introduction to the Faroes, this is not it, though there are some tantalizingly fascinating parts. If you are a student of Anthropology or a professional, you can definitely find some interesting material here, though if you are unfamiliar with Scandinavia, you still may be left with quite a number of questions.