I enjoyed the review by Karl Jacoby '87 of A Voyage Long and Strange by Tony Horwitz '80 ("Before the Rock," Arts & Culture, July/August).

I must, however, correct the reference to Eirik the Red's having established the "short-lived Viking settlement" in Newfoundland around 1000 A.D. According to the Sagas, it was Eirik's son, Leif Eiriksson, who led one of the early Vinland exploration and settlement expeditions (assumed by some scholars to have led to the establishment of the site uncovered in Newfoundland). The confusion may be due to Eirik's association with the settlement and naming of Greenland some years later.

We (very few) Brown alumni of Icelandic descent don't get much press that features our heritage, so we have to set the record straight when the opportunity presents itself!

Peter A. Gudmundsson '85
Dallas