The Ice Palace

‘It is hard to do justice to
The Ice Palace …
The narrative is urgent, the descriptions relentlessly beautiful, the meaning as powerful as the ice piling up on the lake.’
- The Times

‘Vesaas’s laconic sentences are as cold and simple as ice – and as fantastic.’
- Daily Telegraph

‘Believable and haunting … this beautiful neo-prose poem is as sombre and Scandinavian as a Bergman film.’
- Nova

Tarjei Vesaas received Scandinavia’s most prestigious literary award, the Nordic Council Prize, for
The Ice Palace (Is-Slottet),
an original and captivating novel.

Eleven-year-old Unn is a recent arrival in a rural community where she lives with her aunt. Shy and introverted, she strikes up an unlikely friendship at school with a boisterous classmate, Siss, and an unusual bond develops between them. When Siss visits Unn they declare their intense feelings for each other, but Siss suddenly feels threatened and leaves. Unn, who has been wanting to share a secret, cannot face Siss the next day. Learning of a forthcoming school outing to the ‘ice palace’ – a giant structure formed by a frozen waterfall – she sets off alone to visit it never to return.

Siss’s struggle with her fidelity to the memory of her friend, the strange, terrifyingly beautiful frozen chambers of the waterfall and Unn’s fatal exploration of the ice palace are described in prose of a lyrical economy that ranks among the most memorable achievements of modern literature.

Tarjei Vesaas was born on a farm in the small village of Vinje in Telemark, an isolated mountainous district of southern Norway, in 1897 and, having little taste for travel and an abiding love of his native countryside, died there in 1970 aged seventy-two. A modernist who wrote, against literary convention, in Nynorsk rather than the Danish-influenced literary language Bokmål, he is regarded as one of Norway’s greatest twentieth-century writers. The author of more than twenty-five novels, five books of poetry, plus plays and short stories, he was three times a Nobel Prize candidate, although he never won the laureate. He did, however, receive Scandinavia’s most important literary award, the Nordic Council Literature Prize. He first began writing in the 1920s, but he did not gain international recognition until the mid-1960s when Peter Owen first published his books in translation; since then they have appeared in many languages. Doris Lessing described
The Ice Palace
as a ‘truly beautiful book … poetic, delicate, unique, unforgettable, extraordinary’. The other work of fiction which, together with this novel, is generally regarded as his best is
The Birds.
At the time of his death he was considered Scandinavia’s leading writer, and to this day coachloads of his fans go on pilgrimage to his farmhouse home.

A young, white forehead boring through the darkness. An eleven-year-old girl. Siss.

It was really only afternoon, but already dark. A hard frost in late autumn. Stars, but no moon, and no snow to give a glimmer of light – so the darkness was thick, in spite of the stars. On each side was the forest, deathly still, with everything that might be alive and shivering in there at that moment.

Siss thought about many things as she walked, bundled up against the frost. She was on her way to Unn, a girl she scarcely knew, for the first time; on her way to something unfamiliar, which was why it was exciting.

She gave a start. A loud noise had interrupted her thoughts, her expectancy; a noise like a long-drawn-out crack, moving further and further off, while the sound died away. It was from the ice on the big lake down below. And it was nothing dangerous, in fact it was good news: the noise meant that the ice was a little bit stronger. It thundered like gunshot, blasting long fissures, narrow as a knife-blade, from the surface down into the depths – yet the ice was stronger and safer each morning. There had been an unusually long period of severe frost this autumn.

Biting cold. But Siss was not afraid of the
cold.
It wasn’t
that.
She had started at the noise in the dark, but then she stepped out steadily along the road.

The way to Unn was not long. Siss was familiar with it, it was almost the same as the way she went to school, only with
the addition of a side path. That was why she had been allowed to go alone, even though it was no longer light. Father and Mother were not nervous about things like that. It’s the main road, they had said when she left this evening. She let them say it. She was afraid of the dark herself.

The main road. All the same it was no fun to be walking down it alone now. Her forehead was boldly erect because of it. Her heart thumped slightly against the warm lining of her coat. Her ears were alert – because it was much too quiet along the roadsides, and because she knew that even more alert ears were there, listening to her.

That was why she had to step out firmly and steadily on the stone-hard road: the clatter of her footsteps had to be heard. If she gave way to the temptation to go on tiptoe, she was finished, let alone if she foolishly began to run. Then she would soon be running in panic.

Siss had to go to see Unn this evening. And she should have plenty of time, considering how long the evenings were. The darkness came so early that Siss could stay with Unn for a good while and still be home by her usual bedtime.

Wonder what I shall find out at Unn’s. I’m sure to find out something. I’ve been waiting for it all the autumn, ever since the first day Unn came new to school. I don’t know why.

The idea of meeting each other was so completely new it had only come about that very day. After long preparation they had dived in head first.

On her way to Unn, quivering with expectancy. Her smooth forehead breached an ice-cold stream.

On her way towards something exciting … Siss thought about what she knew of Unn, as she walked stiff and erect, trying to shut out her fear of the dark.

She did not know much. And it would have been no use asking people here; they were not likely to be able to tell her more about Unn.

Unn was so new here. She had come to the district last spring, from another district quite far away, so there had been no communication between the two. She had come last spring after she had been orphaned, it had been said. Her mother had been taken ill and died, somewhere in their home district. She had been unmarried, with no close relatives there, but here in this district she had an older sister, so Unn had come to her aunt.

Her aunt had been here for a long time. Siss scarcely knew her, though she lived quite close. She kept house all alone in a little cottage, managing as best she could. She was seldom seen, except on her way to the store. Siss had heard it said that Unn had been made very welcome in her house. Siss had gone there with her mother once; Mother had needed help with some sewing. That had been several years ago, before she had known of Unn’s existence. Siss could remember a lonely person sitting there, full of good nature. Nobody ever spoke ill of her.

It had been the same with Unn when she came: she had not joined the group of girls straight away, as they had expected and hoped. They caught sight of her on the road
and at other places where one could not help but meet people. They looked at each other like strangers. There was nothing to be done about it. She had no parents, and it put her in a different light, an aura they could not quite explain. They knew, too, that this strange situation would soon be ended: in the autumn they would meet at school – and that would be the end of that.

Siss had made no move to approach Unn during the summer either. She had seen Unn now and again, together with her kind old aunt; had met her and noticed that they were about the same height. They looked at each other in astonishment and brushed past. They did not know why they were astonished, but for some reason or other -

Unn was shy, it was said. It sounded exciting. All the girls had looked forward to meeting Unn, who was shy, at school.

Siss looked forward to it for a special reason: she was the acknowledged leader in their noisy breaks. She was used to being the one who made suggestions; she had never thought it over, it was so, and she did not dislike it. She had looked forward to being the leader when Unn arrived and had to be taken up.

When school started the class gathered as usual round Siss, the boys as well as the girls. She knew she was enjoying it this year, too, and perhaps made an effort to keep her position.

Unn was standing shyly a short distance away. They looked at her critically and accepted her at once. There didn’t seem to be anything the matter with her. An attractive girl. Likeable.

But she stayed where she was. They made small attempts to entice her to them, but it was no use. Siss stood in the
middle of her group waiting for her, and the first day went by.

Several days went by. Unn made no sign of approach. Finally Siss went across to her and asked, ‘Aren’t you going to join us?’

Unn replied with a shake of the head.

But they were quick to see that they liked each other. A curious look flashed between them.
I must meet her!
Perplexing, but beyond doubt.

Siss repeated in astonishment, ‘You’re not going to join us?’

Unn smiled in embarrassment. ‘No.’

‘But why not?’

Unn still smiled in embarrassment. ‘I can’t.’

At the same time it seemed to Siss that they were both playing some game of enticement.

‘What’s the matter with you?’ asked Siss bluntly and stupidly, and regretted it at once. Unn did not look as if there was anything the matter with her. On the contrary.

Unn flushed. ‘No, it’s not that, but -’

‘No, I didn’t mean it like that either. But it would have been fun to have you with us.’

‘Don’t ask me about it any more,’ said Unn.

Siss felt as if cold water had been thrown on her, leaving her speechless. Mortified, she went back to her companions and told them.

So they did not ask Unn again. She was left to stand alone, taking no part in their games. Some of them said she was conceited, but it did not gain currency, and nobody teased her – there was something about her that put a stop to anything like that.

In class it was immediately apparent that Unn was one of
the brightest. But she did not put on airs and they acquired a grudging respect for her.

Siss took note of it all. She sensed that Unn was strong in her lonely position in the schoolyard, not lost and pathetic. Siss used her power to win over the group and was successful; all the same she had the feeling that Unn over there was the stronger, even though she did nothing and had no support. She was losing to Unn, and perhaps the group saw it this way, too? It was just that they dared not go over. Unn and Siss stood there like two combatants, but it was a silent struggle, a matter between herself and the newcomer. It was not even hinted at.

After a while Siss began to feel Unn’s eyes on her in class. Unn sat a couple of desks behind her, so she had plenty of opportunity.

Siss felt it as a peculiar tingling in her body. She liked it so much she scarcely bothered to hide it. She pretended not to notice but felt herself to be enmeshed in something strange and pleasant. These were not searching or envious eyes; there was desire in them – when she was quick enough to meet them. There was expectancy. Unn pretended indifference as soon as they were out of doors and made no approach. But from time to time Siss would notice the sweet tingling in her body: Unn is sitting looking at me.

She saw to it that she almost never met those eyes. She did not yet dare to do so – only in a few swift snatches when she forgot.

But what does Unn want?

Some day she’ll tell me.

Out of doors Unn stood by the wall without taking part in any of their games. She stood watching them calmly.