Megas

Megas (Magnús Þór Jónsson) was born in Reykjavík on April 7, 1945. He graduated from highschool in 1964. In 1971 he went to Oslo to study Folkloristics. He had then already started to write songs and lyrics and in 1972 his first album was published. It was named after the poet and the publication was possible with the assistance of Icelandic students in Norway. In 1968 and 1970 two booklets with texts, notes and drawings by Megas were published. Much of the material appearing there would later find its way into the author’s records. In 1973 he reissued the two booklets (Megas I and Megas II) and revised them for a bit bigger audience and added the third booklet (Megas III). In the eighties Megas had published five more albums.

Following the concert-album Drög að sjálfsmorði (Drafting a Suicide) (1979) Megas more or less disappeared from the public light. He became a worker and studied at The Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts. In 1983 he appeared again with the band Ikarus as well as singing a duet with the singer Bubbi Morthens for his album. In 1986 Megas published his first album in seven years and in addition his collected albums were reissued with new material. Since then, he has issued albums on a regular basis, and has by now published over twenty. Megas’ music now enjoys general respect, as indicated by the list of the one hundred best Icelandic albums of the twentieth century, published in the book Eru ekki allir í stuði? (Isn’t Everyone Having Fun) (2001). Nine of Megas’ albums are on the list.

Megas has also written prose works. To begin with his stories appeared in various newspapers and magazines, but in 1990 he wrote his own fictional autobiography together with historian Þórunn Valdimarsdóttir, Sól í Norðurmýri: píslarsaga úr austurbæ (Sunshine in Norðurmýri : A Martyr’s Story from the East side of Town). Megas’s first novel, Björn og Sveinn – eða makleg málagjöld (Björn and Sveinn – or Serves them Right), appeared in 1994. He has also written plays, short stories, translations and adaptations, papers and other material. His collection of poetry and lyrics was published in 1991.

Megas lives in Reykjavík.