Kategoria BISAC: Literary Criticism >> European - Scandinavian

Ross Shideler offers an in-depth introduction to the works of Per Olov Enquist and discusses the writer's central themes and the imagery and motifs he uses to develop them. This in-depth study begins with a brief introduction to the social and literary backgrounds that are the foundations for Enquist's writing. His work is presented in chronological fashion beginning with his early psychological novels written in the tradition of the French nouveau roman and proceeding to his highly regarded documentary novels and popular plays. Shideler traces Enquist's fascination with modern man's...

This analytical history is the most comprehensive and accurate record of the Ibsen campaign in London. Postlewait places major emphasis on the activities of William Archer, the theatre critic, translator, and director who zealously campaigned for the acceptance of Ibsen's works in particular and the new drama in general. He argues that proper appreciation of Archer's often devious role as the foremost advocate of Ibsen is vital to understanding how and why Ibsen was ultimately received on the London stage. Postlewait's reassessment challenges all previous histories and critical studies of...

The poems of Elmer Diktonius place him in the forefront of literary expressionism. His idylls and his novel give him high rank among Northern Europe's greatest literary innovators in the twentieth century. He has an unusual drama because of his ambiguous involvement with the politics of the left and his hesitation between internationalism and a deep Finnish patriotism. George C. Schoolfield provides the uninitated reader with a biographical and critical overview of Diktonius's life and work and calls attention to his artistic triumphs, defeats, and contradictions.

This is the first comprehensive analysis of the life and work of Tryggve Andersen. Stressing that Andersen was a transitional writer, Schiff deftly shows him torn between defunct traditions of the recent past and a sterile, hopeless future. Andersen's prose fiction, according to Schiff, contains elegant, finely crafted works of art. His works are highly relevant to today's reader, for they reflect some of the most compelling characteristics of the Western experience of the last century and a half: despair, isolation, ambivalence, and equivocality. Throughout his commentary, Schiff makes it...

Hermundsgard's knowledge of Vesaas is undeniable and he has read widely, carefully, and thoughtfully in other sources for this book. He provides a working definition of primitivism (not just a literary style, but a philosophy of life), explains how this is expressed in Vesaas's writing, and demonstrates how the primitivism of Vesaas fits into the context of Scandinavian primitivism in general. He succeeds in presenting this complex thesis in a clear style that encourages the reader to turn to Vesaas's own works not only to verify that thesis but for personal enrichment. Extensive...

Ibsen's Drama was first published in 1979. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.

"A dramatist for all seasons" Einar Haugen calls Henrik Ibsen in this series of lectures given in honor of the 150th anniversary of the Norwegian playwright's birth. Using a modified version of the communications model developed by linguist Roman Jakobson, Haugen provides a readable, succinct analysis of Ibsen's thinking and dramaturgy. He...

Awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1920, Knut Hamsun (1859-1952) was a towering figure of Norwegian letters. He was also a Nazi sympathizer and supporter of the German occupation of Norway during the Second World War. In 1943, Hamsun sent his Nobel medal to Third-Reich propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels as a token of his admiration and authored a reverential obituary for Hitler in May 1945. For decades, scholars have wrestled with the dichotomy between Hamsun's merits as a writer and his infamous ties to Nazism.

In her incisive study of Hamsun, Monika Zagar refuses to...