The Boy Within

Civilization may have made a wrong turn when it abandoned communal long houses and fire pits for private homes. Leaving the long house meant abandoning the oral tradition; the evenings spent sharing sagas, stories and music with generations of a clan. Do today's children understand their place in history? Streaming a sitcom on a smartphone will never rattle young neurons like the saga of King Fjolna, a Viking relative who stumbled on his way back from the outhouse and drowned in a vat of mead. The Boy Within is a modern saga best read by a fire place. It's the story of an old Norwegian uncle, Kristoffer Dannevig whose DNA shouts collective conscience and Viking roots. Already as a child he was a dreamer, adventurer, and restless sort. He loved ships and sea, but he also loved airplanes. Dannevig was a student in Darmstadt, Germany in 1938 when Hitler's motives became too clear. He returned home to Norway to finish his studies. When Norway was occupied by the Nazis in 1940, Dannevig was sent to a Nazi prison for offering to carry the wounded from a battlefield. When he was released, he joined the resistance. After the war he left Norway for Alaska Territory to work as a polar engineer above the Arctic Circle.