Jón Gnarr - The Pirate

Later that summer, Mom and Dad called me down and asked me to sit with them at the kitchen table.

“I’ve found a school for you, Jón,” said Mom. “We are going to enroll you there this fall.”

“What school is that?” I asked.

“Hérað School at Núpur in Dyrafirð.”

Núpur in Dyrafirð? I had never heard of it before. What was it? And, what’s more, where was it? This sounded exciting. I was happy and looking forward to getting away from everything.

JÓN GNARRwas born in 1967 in Reykjavík. As a child, Gnarr was diagnosed with severe mental retardation due to his emotional and learning differences, including dyslexia and ADHD. He nevertheless overcame his hardships and went on to become one of Iceland’s most popular actors and comedians.

In the wake of the global economic crisis that devastated Iceland’s economy, Gnarr formed the joke Best Party with a number of friends with no background in politics, which parodied Icelandic politics and aimed to make the life of the citizens more fun. Gnarr’s Best Party managed a plurality win in the 2010 municipal elections in Reykjavík, and Gnarr became major of Reykjavík.

His term as mayor ended in June 2014, whereupon he served as artist-in-residence at Rice University’s Center for Energy and Environmental Research in the Human Sciences in Houston, where he finished work on the final book in his trilogy of childhood memoir-novels: The Outlaw .

He plans to use his post-mayor years to continue writing and speaking on the issues that are most important to him: freedom of speech, human rights, protecting the environment, tolerance, compassion, the importance of philosophy, and achieving world peace.

Gnarr currently writes weekly columns for the newspaper Fréttablaðið and serves as the head of domestic content for 365 Media in Iceland, overseeing the production of original entertainment in the Icelandic language. His first big project is to produce a television show about a man who runs for mayor of Reykjavík as a joke — and wins. Gnarr, of course, will star as the mayor.

LYTTON SMITHis the author of two collections of poetry, both from Nightboat Books, and several translations from the Icelandic for both Deep Vellum and Open Letter, including Jón Gnarr’s The Indian (Deep Vellum, 2015), The Ambassador , by Bragi Ólafsson (Open Letter, 2010), and Childreen in Reindeer Woods by Kristín Ómarsdóttir (Open Letter, 2012). He has received awards from the Poetry Society of America and the Icelandic Literature Fund. He is Assistant Professor of English at SUNY Geneseo in upstate New York.