Norw literature02 handout

Norwegian Literature
Einar Vannebo, 16.07.02

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Pre Viking Age (3000BC-750AD)
Viking Age (750-1050)
Middle Ages – Literary Old Norse (1050-1370)
Reformation/Humanism (1500s)
Baroque (1600s)
Enlightenment (1700s)
Romanticism (1830s-1870)
Realism (1870s)
Naturalism (1880s)
Neo-Romanticism/Symbolism (1890s)
Neo-Realism (1905-40)
Political radicalism/psychological realism (1920-40)
Post-World War II(1945-2002)

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Pre-Viking Age (3000BC-750AD)
• Rock carvings
• Runes: Futhark
older version 24 letters (200
inscriptions)
younger version 16 letters (65
inscriptions)

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Viking Age (750-1050)
• Christianity
• National kingdom (Saint Olav)
• Norwegian/Icelandic common heritage

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Middle Ages –Literary Old Norse
(1050-1370)
• Eddic poetry (written down after 1270)
Hàvamàl - practical morality
Voluspà – cosmology
• Skaldic poetry – courtly poetry
• Literature in the service of the Church
- Religious verse

- Saints’ lives
- Sermons
• Laws
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Literary Old Norse ct
• Historical literature
- Kings’ sagas Snorri Sturluson:
Heimskringla
- Family sagas (approx 30)

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Medieval oral literature
• Ballads
- Dream Ballad
• Legends
• Folk tales

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Reformation/Humanism (1500s)
• Church under the sovereignty of the
King
• Service in the vernacular
• Bible
• Hymns

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Baroque (1600s)

• Hymns
• Ministers submitted reports to the King about
the conditions in their district
• Petter Dass (1647-1707)

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Enlightenment (1700s)
• Belief in reason, science, progress
• Ludvig Holberg (1684-1754)
- Poet, novelist, moral philosopher
- playwright 26 comedies
(Molière of the North)
- Jeppe on the Hill

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Romanticism (1830s-1870)
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Idealism
Artist – genius
History – growth
”Soul of the nation”
1814: National independence
- Henrik Wergeland (1808-45)
Creation, Man and Messiah

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National Romanticism 1840-1870
• Quest for national identity
• Orientation to the past
- National history: P.A. Munch
- Folk tradition: Asbjørnsen and Moe
- Language: Ivar Aasen
• National breakthrough
• History and folk tradition repository of
motifs for contemporary authors
- Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (1832-1910)
- Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906)

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Realism 1870s
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Modern breakthrough
Take up contemporary problems for discussion
Social, representative types
Plays, novels
The four great authors:
Bjørnson, Ibsen, Alexander Kielland, Jonas Lie
• Poetocracy

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Naturalism 1880s
• Heredity and environment
- Amalie Skram (1846-1905)
The People of Hellemyr
- Arne Garborg (1852-1928)
Peasant Students

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Neo-Romaticism/Symbolism 1890s
• Complex characters rather than social types
• Irrationality, the unconscious
• New style: poetic, break with normal syntax
- Knut Hamsun (1859-1952)
Hunger, Pan, Growth of the Soil

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Neo-Realism (1905-40)
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Interaction social setting/human psychology
Local setting, literary mapping of Norway
Quest for national identity: 1905
Emphasis on moral and religious values
Epic literature; historical novels
- Sigrid Undset (1882-1949)
Kristin Lavransdatter
- Olav Duun (1876-1939)
The People of Juvik
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Political radicalism/psychological
realism 1920s • Inspired by Freudianism and Marxism
- Sigurd Hoel (1890-1960)

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Post World War II
• Psychological realism (1945-65)
- Sigurd Hoel Meeting at the Milestone
- Johan Borgen Lillelord-trilogy
• Modernism (mid 1960s -)
Profile group: Dag Solstad
• Social Realism
Feminist literature (1970s -)
- Dag Solstad
- Bjørg Vik
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Post World War II
• Fantastic literature
Language conscious literature (1980s)
- Kjartan Fløgstad
- Jan Kjærstad
• The eternal life of the narrative (1990s -)
- Biographies
- Novels exploring roots and cultural traditions
Herbjørg Wassmo, Roy Jacobsen,
Lars Saabye Christensen
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