Tuesday 30 July 2019

The weather girl says it's going to rain all day with thunderstorms tonight, so Lois and I decide to occupy ourselves with various household tasks, such as ironing, etc. - ugh!!!!

Our U3A Danish group is holding its fortnightly meeting here on Thursday. During the group meetings, we are currently taking turns to read a page or so of the Danish crime novel, Anna Grue's "Deep to Fall," before translating the page into English.

Today, I suddenly realise that we're getting to the end of the pages I've sent the members so far, and I need to send out more, as well as a vocabulary list for each page. The purpose of the vocabulary lists is to save them from looking up a lot of difficult words in the dictionary - I'm so thoughtful ha ha ha! 

I go on the computer and grab the next 3-4 pages and start compiling a vocabulary list for each page.

"The Further You Fall" - the Danish crime novel that’s

our U3A Danish group's current project.

Anna Grue, the author of the novel

A cleaning assistant, Lilliana, whom no one knows anything about (not even her last name), has been murdered (garrotted) while working late at night in the kitchen of a large Danish advertising agency.

Police have reacted by picking up Benjamin, Liliana's workmate, as their initial suspect - the young man has already lied to police about his movements on the night in question. And with his various weird fashion choices (makeup, piercings, safety pins, etc.) he’s the very prototype of a serial killer, many of the police seem to think.

However Flemming, the novel's principal police detective, doesn't himself believe that Benjamin is the murderer, no matter how weird his appearance  - Flemming’s  opinion is that it’s often  the youngsters who are the most painted and pierced and tattooed and back-combed etc etc,  who are the softest and most innocent ones underneath.

We readers, in any case, know that Flemming is wasting his time trying to track down the killer - his job is simply to pass on information to the balding real hero of the novel, the amateur detective Dan Sommerdahl, an advertising man who works at the same agency as Lilliana, the killer's victim. So why not give up now, Detective Flemming ha ha ha!

One of the Danish TV channels has started working on a Dan Sommerdahl crime series, and shooting of the series is actually already underway in the Helsingør area, north of Copenhagen.

Detective Flemming (left), along with Marianne and Dan Sommerdahl

According to the article, the new crime series will be starting on Danish TV in the spring of 2020. Lois and I are looking forward to it hopefully being shown on UK TV some time after that date.

Flashback to June 2017: we visit Helsingør Castle (Shakespeare’s Elsinore)

with our daughter Alison (right)

17:00  I have a strong gin and tonic and say "Skål !" to a bunch of men from the state of Virginia's largest English settlements who, according to an email sent to me by Steve, my American brother-in-law,  met in Jamestown exactly 400 years ago, on July 30, 1619. 

It was the first meeting of a representative legislature in what would become the United States, and it paved the way for an experiment in democracy that continues to this day.

"What happened in Jamestown July 30 through August 4 was the foundation of the Democratic model in America," said Kathy Spangler, CEO of Commemoration in 2019, American Evolution. "It has had a bearing on what our democracy became."

Hail, ye men of Virginia - you kept us out of war!

Kathy Spangler

18:00 Lois and I have dinner and listen to the radio, an interesting programme in the series "Word of Mouth". Today's episode is all about the influence of Old Norse and the Scandinavian languages ​​in general on the English language. The programme's host is the charming children's author Michael Rosen.

An interesting programme - but Lois's and my problem with it is, that we find we already know a lot of what is being said. Damn!

But there are some new insights:  it seems that philologists now think that the word "Viking" was originally an Anglo-Saxon word that meant "someone who leaves" or "someone leaving home," and that the Vikings themselves borrowed the word from English, and that later the word eventually came to mean, obviously, some sort of weird kind of pirate (without horns).

We hear that it was the northern and eastern areas of Britain that were most strongly influenced by the Scandinavians, while the southern and western regions of England received more influence from the French language.

Lois and I did not know that the word "poppet", which is often used in southern England as a common term of endearment when talking to a young child, and also “duck”, which  people in northern England use in the same way, both originally meant “doll”. 

"Poppet"  has a French origin (“poupet” in French), while "duck" has a Danish origin (“dukke” in Danish), both words meaning a doll.

The Danelaw jurisdiction and the various Anglo-Saxon jurisdictions

Also in this programme we get a reminder that London was once firmly within the Danes' sphere of influence:  many areas bordering the River Thames were originally named by the Vikings: areas such as Ivybridge, Templebridge, Butcher's Bridge, Privybridge, for example, where the "bridge" suffix does not mean a bridge, but derives from an old Danish word for a wharf or a quay.

Ivybridge Lane (top, towards left-hand corner), not far from the River Thames: 

the name is a reminder of the fact that the Vikings were once storming about round here

My god, what a crazy world we live in !!!!!

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzz !!!!!

Danish translation

Vejrpigen siger, det kommer til at regne hele dagen med tordenvejr i aften, så beslutter Lois og jeg at beskæftige os med forskellige huslige opgaver, som strygning osv.

Vores U3A danske gruppe holder sit fjortendagsmøde på torsdag hos os. Under gruppemøderne plejer vi at skiftes til at læse en side, eller deromkring, af den danske krimiroman, Anna Grues ”Dybt at falde”, og oversætte den til engelsk.

I dag bliver jeg pludselig klar over, at vi er ved at komme til enden af de sider jeg hidtil har sendt dem, og jeg har brug for at sende endnu flere ud, samt en ordforrådliste til hver side. Formålet med ordforrådlisterne er at spare dem for at slå en masse svære ord op i ordbogen – jeg er så betænksom ha ha ha! Jeg går i gang med at få fat på de næste 3-4 sider og jeg udarbejder en ordforrådliste til hver side.

”Dybt at falde” – den danske krimiroman, der er

vores U3A danske gruppes nuværende projekt.

Anna Grue, romanens forfatterinde

En rengøringsassistent, Lilliana, som ingen ved noget om, er blevet myrdet (garrotteret), mens hun arbejdede sent på aften i køkkenet af et stort dansk reklamebureau.

Politiet henter Benjamin, Lilianas arbejdskammerat som deres første mistænkt – den unge mand er allerede har lyvet til politiet om sine bevægelser i løbet af den pågældende aften. Og med sine forskellige modevalg (makeup, piercinger, sikkerhedsnåle osv) ligner han prototypen på en seriemorder, tror politiet, selvom Flemming, romanens førende detektiv, ikke tror at han er gerningsmanden – han tror, at de unge, der er allemest malet og piercet og tatoveret og touperet efter hans mening er sædvanligt de blødeste indeni.

Vi læsere ved i hvert fald, at Flemming spilder sin tid i at prøve at opspore morderen – hans funktion er blot at videregive information til romanens skaldede helt, den amatørdetektiv Dan Sommerdahl, en reklamemand, der arbejder hos samme bureauet som Lilliana, morderens offer. Så hvorfor ikke give op nu, Detektiv Flemming ha ha ha!

En af de danske tv-kanaler er begyndt at arbejde på en Dan Sommerdahl-krimiserie, og optagelser er faktisk allerede i gang i Helsingør-området.

detektiven Flemming (til venstre), sammen med Marianne og Dan Sommerdahl

Ifølge artiklen starter den nye krimiserie på dansk tv i foråret 2020.

Tilbageblik til juni 2017: vi besøger Helsingør (Shakespeare’s Elsinore)

sammen med vores daughter Alison (til højre)

17:00 Jeg drikker en stærk gin og tonic og udbringer en skål for et bundt mænd fra delstaten Virginias  største engelske bosættelser, der ifølge en email, som Steve, min amerikanske svigerbror sendte mig, nøjagtig 400 år siden til dagen, mødtes i Jamestown den 30. juli 1619. Det var det første møde i en repræsentativ lovgivningsmagt i det, der ville blive USA, og banede vejen for en eksperiment i demokrati, der fortsætter til i dag.

'Hvad der skete i Jamestown 30. juli til 4. august var grundlaget for den demokratiske model i Amerika,' sagde Kathy Spangler, administrerende direktør for Commemoration i 2019, American Evolution. 'Det har haft betydning for, hvad vores demokrati blev.'

Hyl jer, jer mænd af Virginia – i holdt os ud af krig!

18:00 Lois og jeg spiser aftensmad og lytter lidt til radio, et interessant program i serien ”Fra mund til mund”. Dagens afsnit handler om indflydelsen af oldnorsk og de skandinavske sprog i almindelighed på det engelske sprog. Programmets vært er den charmerende børneforfatter Michael Rosen.

Et interessant program – men Lois’ og mit problem ved det er, at vi finder, vi allerede ved en masse af hvad bliver sagt. Pokkers!

Men der er nogle nye indsigter:  det lader til, at filologer nu tror, at ordet ”viking” oprindeligt var et angelsaksisk ord, der betød ”én, der tager af sted” eller ”én, der forlader hjem”, og at selve vikingerne lånte samme ordet , og at ordet til sidst kom til at betyde en sørøver.

Det er for det meste Englands sydlige og vestlige regioner, der fik den mindre indflydelse fra den skandinavske sprog og den meste fra den franske sprog. Lois og jeg vidste ikke, at ordet ”poppet”, som man ofte bruger i det sydlige England som et almindeligt kælenavn, når man taler med et lille barn, men folk i det nordlige England bruger et tilsvarende kælenavn, ”Duck”. Både kælenavne betyder ”dukke”, men ”poppet” har en fransk oprindelse, mens ”duck” har en dansk oprindelse. Du godeste, sikke en skør verden vi lever i !!!!!

Danelaw-jurisdiktionen

Og i dette program får vi en skarp mindelse om, at London var fast indenfor danskernes indflydelsesfære: områder, der grænser op til floden Thames, blev navnet af vikingernes: områder såsom Ivybridge, Templebridge, Butcher’s Bridge, Privybridge, hvor ”-bridge” suffikset ikke betyder en bro, men stammer fra et gammelt danske ord for ”bolværk” eller ”kaj”.

Ivybridge Lane, ikke ret langt fra floden Thames: navnet er en mindelse om,

at vikingerne engang stormede rundt heromkring

Du godeste, sikke en skør verden vi lever i !!!!

22:00 Vi går is seng – zzzzzzzz!!!!!