Reading Conversation (A)

Photo Essay / 2018

My friend M lends me her copy of The Ice Palace by Tarjei Vesaas. She wants me to read it so that we can have a conversation about it. The day after she gives me the book, I open it to begin reading and see that certain phrases are overlaid with transparent colour. M has marked them because they caught her attention.

In the book, eleven-year-old Unn arrives in the village where Siss lives, and Siss decides to try and befriend her. The story that unfolds is about their relationship and what it isn’t always possible to speak of. It takes place over a long Norwegian winter, full of ice and snow. Because there is so much snow in the story there is a lot of white - just like the pages of the book.

Because in Norway the winter days are very short and the nights are very long, the book is also full of the dark. Black and white are almost all there is for the eye to see. The colours of M’s transparent sticky-notes gain additional vibrancy and as I read the book I feel that I’m in between different conversations: the one between Siss and Unn; the one between M and what she’s reading; and the one between the book and myself.

The book affected me deeply and I was excited to talk about it. However, M and I never managed to find the right moment to speak and before we knew it she had to move back home to a different country.

Wanting to read The Ice Palace again, I get my own copy of the book. But as I re-read it I miss the marks that were there before – like footprints in the snow.

I ask M if she will send me photographs of some pages from her copy of the book. I place her notated pages next to mine so that the pages can talk to each other.