Nyhavn

The seventeenth-century canal and harbour street in central Copenhagen; see Copenhagen (Literary).

At a glance

Source	Author	Role	In one line
Neither Here Nor There	Bill Bryson	setting	A piece of Amsterdam gone astray, and Bryson’s first proof that Copenhagen is fun.

Neither Here Nor There — Bill Bryson (1991)

Source: Readwise highlight

I walked along Nyhavn, a three-block-long street with a canal in the middle filled with tall-masted ships and lined with narrow, step-gabled seventeenth- and eighteenth-century houses, looking for all the world like a piece of Amsterdam gone astray.

• Role: setting
• In the book: Chapter 10, Bryson’s first evening walk in Copenhagen. He notes that the neighbourhood was settled by Dutch sailors and still has “a vaguely raffish air in parts”. The outdoor tables are full of young Danes, which leads him to contrast pleasure-loving Denmark with the sterner Scandinavian countries he has just come through.
• Why it matters: It’s where he sets out his case for Copenhagen’s relaxed character, which the rest of the chapter (the gentle police by the town hall, the museums) builds on.