Þessi kjóll er hvorki of víður né of þröngur, svo ég tek hann.

Because kjóll is masculine singular nominative, and þessi has to match it.

• kjóll = dress, masculine noun
• In this sentence, kjóll is the subject, so it is in the nominative
• The correct nominative singular masculine form of this is þessi

So:

• þessi kjóll = this dress

If the noun were a different gender, the form would change. For example:

• þessi jakki = this jacket (masculine)
• þessi peysa = this sweater (feminine)
• þetta hús = this house (neuter)

Because they are agreeing with kjóll, which is masculine singular nominative.

In Icelandic, adjectives usually agree with the noun they describe in:

• gender
• number
• case

Here the structure is:

• Þessi kjóll er víður
• Þessi kjóll er þröngur

Since kjóll is masculine singular nominative, the predicate adjectives also appear in that form:

• víður = wide / loose
• þröngur = narrow / tight

This is very common after er (is). English does not change adjectives this way, but Icelandic does.

Hvorki ... né ... means neither ... nor ....

In this sentence:

• hvorki of víður né of þröngur
• neither too wide nor too tight

This is the standard Icelandic pair used to connect two negative alternatives.

A useful pattern is:

• hvorki A né B = neither A nor B

Examples:

• Hann er hvorki svangur né þreyttur.
  = He is neither hungry nor tired.
• Ég vil hvorki kaffi né te.
  = I want neither coffee nor tea.

Because hvorki ... né ... already contains the negative meaning.

So:

• Þessi kjóll er hvorki of víður né of þröngur.
  already means This dress is neither too wide nor too tight.

You normally do not add ekki here.

For an English speaker, this is worth noticing because English can sometimes stack negatives differently in informal speech, but standard Icelandic treats hvorki ... né ... as the negative structure by itself.

No. Here of means too or excessively.

So:

• of víður = too wide / too loose
• of þröngur = too narrow / too tight

This of is an adverb, not the English preposition of.

A few more examples:

• of heitt = too hot
• of kalt = too cold
• of stór = too big

So in clothing contexts, of is very common when talking about fit.

Yes, but in clothing contexts víður often means something like:

• wide
• loose
• baggy

So when talking about a dress, of víður usually means it is too loose or too roomy, not just geometrically wide.

Likewise:

• þröngur literally means narrow
• but for clothes it often means tight

So the natural clothing-related sense is:

• of víður = too loose
• of þröngur = too tight

Tek is grammatically present tense, but Icelandic often uses the present tense to talk about a decision about the near future, just like English can.

So:

• ég tek hann
• literally: I take it
• natural meaning here: I’ll take it

This is very common in everyday speech, especially when deciding to buy or choose something.

Compare:

• Ég tek þennan. = I’ll take this one.
• Ég kem á morgun. = I’m coming tomorrow / I’ll come tomorrow.

So although the verb form is present, the meaning can be future-like from the context.

Hann refers back to kjóll.

Since kjóll is a masculine noun, the pronoun used for it/him is hann in the relevant case.

Here it is the direct object of tek (take), so it is accusative singular masculine:

• nominative: hann
• accusative: hann

That is why you get:

• ég tek hann = I’ll take it

For English speakers, it can feel strange that a thing is referred to with what looks like he, but Icelandic nouns have grammatical gender, and pronouns follow that gender.

It could be repeated, but hann is perfectly natural because the noun has just been mentioned.

So both are possible depending on style and emphasis:

• svo ég tek hann = so I’ll take it
• svo ég tek kjólinn = so I’ll take the dress

Using hann avoids repetition and sounds natural in conversation.

Here svo means so, therefore, or as a result.

It links the first clause to the conclusion:

• Þessi kjóll er hvorki of víður né of þröngur
• svo ég tek hann

So the sense is:

• The dress fits well enough,
• so I’ll take it.

In other contexts, svo can also mean other things, such as then, so, or as, depending on usage. But here it is clearly a result/consequence word.

Because the sentence contains two clauses:

1. Þessi kjóll er hvorki of víður né of þröngur
2. svo ég tek hann

The comma helps separate the statement from the result.

In Icelandic punctuation, commas are often used to mark clause boundaries more than in modern English. So even if English might sometimes omit a comma in a short sentence, the Icelandic comma here is very normal.

It is mostly basic Icelandic word order.

The first clause is straightforward:

• Þessi kjóll = subject
• er = verb
• hvorki of víður né of þröngur = predicate/adjectival complement

The second clause is also simple:

• svo = so
• ég = subject
• tek = verb
• hann = object

So this sentence is a good example of standard Icelandic clause order and does not involve any unusual inversion.

A few pronunciation points that English speakers often ask about:

• þ in Þessi is like the th in thing
• ð does not appear in this sentence, but learners often compare it with þ; ð is like the th in this
• hv in hvorki is often pronounced roughly like kv in modern Icelandic speech
• þr in þröngur can feel difficult at first; start with th and move quickly into r
• ö in þröngur is somewhat like the vowel in French peur or German hören, not like English oh

A rough learner-friendly approximation might be:

• Þessi ≈ THESS-i
• hvorki ≈ KVOR-ki
• víður ≈ VEE-thur or VEE-dhur depending on how you approximate it
• þröngur ≈ THRUNG-ur but with a rounded vowel, not exactly English u

These are only approximations, but they help as a starting point.