Book meme- Day 16
Apr. 5th, 2019 03:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
scripsi16. Can't believe more people haven't read.
The Swedish author Selma Lagerlöf. I love her writing and think she should be read more widely. Her language is so poetical and magic, and her stories often very original, often with strong spiritual and/or supernatural themes. Almost all take place in the province of Värmland which is a very beautiful part of Sweden. She was the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1909, the first woman to enter the prestigious Swedish Academy in 1914 and in 1991 she was the first Swedish woman to be depicted on a banknote. She is also queer, something which didn’t come to light until the 1990’s when her correspondence with her partner Sophie Elkan was published. (And I’m distantly related to her, with emphasis on distant- we share an early 18th century forefather.)
If you want to try her I recommend her debut novel, The Story of Gösta Berling. It’s a rather complex story taking place in the early 19th century. Gösta Berling is a handsome young priest, but his drinking causes him to be desposed. He finds a place as one of the Mistress of Ekeby’s twelve cavaliers, and the book is basically his numerous love affairs, and the adventures of the cavaliers. But the book is also his redemption arc, as well as the Mistress of Ekeby’s. Lagerlöf rarely says it straight, but there are a lot of shrewd observations of how even a wealthy and powerful woman was ultimately rightless, and how women’s reputations depend on the men around them.
You can also try one of her novellas. Herr Arne’s Hoard or The Treasure takes place in the 16th century. A rich priest and his whole family are robbed and murdered (with the implication that the beautiful daughter is also raped), and the only survivor is the adopted daughter, Elsalill, who manages to stay hidden. Sometime later she meets a Scotsman who she falls in love with, and he with her. It seems to be going to a happy ending when Elsalil is visited by her dead sister’s ghost, who tells her who it was who murdered her…
I also enjoy The Löwenskiöld Ring which is a ghost story, featuring a courageous and practical housekeeper as the heroine. The General Löwenskiöld is buried with his valuable gold ring, a ring which is later taken from the grave. Over several decades people who have the ring meets their sticky end, followed by the general’s curse, until the housekeeper Malvina, who is in love with the latest victim, manages to break it.
This novella can be read on its own but is also part of a trilogy, and I believe the English translation often publish all three works as one volume.
Another favourite is the short story collection The Changeling. The most famous of the story is the title novella. A farmer and his wife get their baby swapped by a troll changeling. Swedish mythology advice in treating the changeling horribly to make the trolls swap back, something the father wants to do. But the mother not only treats the troll baby kindly, despite its nastiness, she also stops her husband’s abuse, which causes her to be ostracized. Guess whose behaviour it is which gets the real baby back?
So read some Selma Lagerlöf!
The Swedish author Selma Lagerlöf. I love her writing and think she should be read more widely. Her language is so poetical and magic, and her stories often very original, often with strong spiritual and/or supernatural themes. Almost all take place in the province of Värmland which is a very beautiful part of Sweden. She was the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1909, the first woman to enter the prestigious Swedish Academy in 1914 and in 1991 she was the first Swedish woman to be depicted on a banknote. She is also queer, something which didn’t come to light until the 1990’s when her correspondence with her partner Sophie Elkan was published. (And I’m distantly related to her, with emphasis on distant- we share an early 18th century forefather.)
If you want to try her I recommend her debut novel, The Story of Gösta Berling. It’s a rather complex story taking place in the early 19th century. Gösta Berling is a handsome young priest, but his drinking causes him to be desposed. He finds a place as one of the Mistress of Ekeby’s twelve cavaliers, and the book is basically his numerous love affairs, and the adventures of the cavaliers. But the book is also his redemption arc, as well as the Mistress of Ekeby’s. Lagerlöf rarely says it straight, but there are a lot of shrewd observations of how even a wealthy and powerful woman was ultimately rightless, and how women’s reputations depend on the men around them.
You can also try one of her novellas. Herr Arne’s Hoard or The Treasure takes place in the 16th century. A rich priest and his whole family are robbed and murdered (with the implication that the beautiful daughter is also raped), and the only survivor is the adopted daughter, Elsalill, who manages to stay hidden. Sometime later she meets a Scotsman who she falls in love with, and he with her. It seems to be going to a happy ending when Elsalil is visited by her dead sister’s ghost, who tells her who it was who murdered her…
I also enjoy The Löwenskiöld Ring which is a ghost story, featuring a courageous and practical housekeeper as the heroine. The General Löwenskiöld is buried with his valuable gold ring, a ring which is later taken from the grave. Over several decades people who have the ring meets their sticky end, followed by the general’s curse, until the housekeeper Malvina, who is in love with the latest victim, manages to break it.
This novella can be read on its own but is also part of a trilogy, and I believe the English translation often publish all three works as one volume.
Another favourite is the short story collection The Changeling. The most famous of the story is the title novella. A farmer and his wife get their baby swapped by a troll changeling. Swedish mythology advice in treating the changeling horribly to make the trolls swap back, something the father wants to do. But the mother not only treats the troll baby kindly, despite its nastiness, she also stops her husband’s abuse, which causes her to be ostracized. Guess whose behaviour it is which gets the real baby back?
So read some Selma Lagerlöf!
no subject
Date: 2019-04-05 04:37 pm (UTC)You have convinced me! I've been saying since I visited the Nobel Museum in Stockholm and was really hit by just how few women have received the Literary medal that I wanted to start a project of reading a book by every female recipient, and, well, where better to start than with the first?
...unfortunately the only book by her that my library seems to have is the Spanish translation of her Christ Legends, which is not very helpful to me, but I'll see what I can find elsewhere.
no subject
Date: 2019-04-06 08:12 am (UTC)But I like the idea of reading something from all female winners! I don't know if I read any apart from Selma lagerlöf and Toni Morrison! And I'd love to hear what you think of Lagerlöf!
no subject
Date: 2019-04-08 04:40 am (UTC)I'm not that far ahead of you--I've read Morrison in school (I think The Bluest Eye?) as well as Buck (The Good Earth). I think in both cases (as is so often true of assigned literary reading) I wasn't really old enough to contextualize everything they were saying, so they're probably due a revisit. And I read Lessing on my own, a few years ago--The Cleft, which I will flatly declare was awful. Probably she has written something better? I hope so, anyway.
no subject
Date: 2019-04-08 04:58 am (UTC)Oh yes, and I've read Sigrid Undset's Kristin Lavransdatter. I didn't like it much, but I think that had more to do with me disliking Kristin's personality, rather than the quality of the book. I understand Undset was an expert on Medieval Scandinavia, so I think the book is interesting in that aspect. My Mum absolutely adores it.
no subject
Date: 2019-04-08 03:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-04-05 06:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-04-06 08:08 am (UTC)