Kim Simonsen featured in New York online event

On March 10 Kim Simonsen’s poetry collection What good does it do for a person to wake up one morning this side of the new millennium in translation by Randi Ward is the topic in the monthly online Nordic book club of New York institution Scandinavia House.

The poetry collection was originally published in 2013 with the Faroese title Hvat hjálpir einum menniskja at vakna ein morgun hesumegin hetta áratúsundið. It was published in USA by Deep Vellum in 2025.

The rhetorical title of the collection posits the crisis that is underway. Simonsen asks: as a species among species, all composed of the matter of the universe, how has our compulsion to classify everything hierarchically estranged us from ourselves, each other, and Earth’s ecosystems? Simonsen challenges our anthropocentric pursuit of knowledge, exploring humankind’s relationship with itself as an element of the natural world.  follows the struggles of its narrator as he reckons with intensifying estrangement from his fellow organisms, gradually turning to the greater kinship of matter to find continuity, connection, and solace.

Read more about Scandinavia House’s online book club here: https://www.scandinaviahouse.org/event/nordic-book-club-online-what-good-does-it-do/