Jógvan Isaksen

Jógvan Isaksen (born 25 August 1950 in Tórshavn) is a Faroese writer and literary historian. He is best known for his crime novels and for his book about Faroese literature (1993, in Danish). He is leader of the Faroese publication house which has its address in the Faroe Islands, though its committee is located in Copenhagen. It publishes Faroese books and is the oldest Faroese publishing house, having been founded in 1910.

Biography

Jógvan Isaksen is the son of Magnhild Isaksen née Olsen and Reimar Isaksen, who both come from the village of Gøta. After finishing high school in 1970 he moved to Denmark in order to study Nordic Philology at Aarhus University. He finished his MA in Scandinavian Literature Science in 1982. Since 1986 he has been associate Professor in Faroese language and Faroese literature at the University of Copenhagen. Since 2000 he has been the main editor of the magazine (Nordic Literature), put out by the Nordic Council.

Since 1978 Isaksen has also worked as a writer. His crime novels are popular in the Faroe Islands and are often best sellers just before Christmas. Some of them have been translated into other languages. Isaksen has also written some children's books and books about Faroese writers and literature. For his work about the Faroese writer Hanus Kamban (whose name at that time was Hanus Andreassen) and for his work for Faroese Literature, Isaksen received the Faroese Literature Prize in 1994. In 2006 he received one of the prizes of the Faroese Government, called Heiðursgáva landsins.

The crime novel was Isaksen's first in that genre, and one of the first written in Faroese where the events take place in the Faroe Islands. It has been translated into Danish, Icelandic and German.