There’s Still Life in the Grand Old Men of Norwegian Literature. Norway’s Frankfurt 2019 initiative has given the old classics fresh relevance too. This is particularly true of Knut Hamsun and Tarjei Vesaas.
‘Vesaas’s The Birds (translated by Michael Barnes and Torbjørn Stoverud for Peter Owen Publishers, norw. Fuglane) has enjoyed a real Stoner effect,’ says Bjarne Buset of Gyldendal Agency. ‘It started with publication of a new translation in (Batzer Forlag), which attracted enormous attention and had fantastic reviews. The book has recently sold to Israel and the Netherlands, for example.’
Ian McEwan has described The Birds as ‘A masterpiece’. Major Danish paper, Politiken, gave the novel top marks and wrote: ‘Read, read, read The Birds by Tarjei Vesaas … This is the highlight of his life.’
Over the years, Vesaas has been translated into a total of 30 languages.
Hamsun Opera
Knut Hamsun has won an even larger readership in the outside world. He has been translated into more than 40 languages, and his works are very much alive.
‘In the context of Frankfurt 2019, Victoria, On Overgrown Paths and Growth of the Soil will be republished in German (Ullstein Buchverlage). There are also plans to produce opera and theatre works based on Hamsun’s texts,’ Buset says. Isaac Bashevis Singer described Hamsun’s influence in the following terms: ‘The whole modern school of fiction in the twentieth century stems from Hamsun.’
Fore more information
Find the book at the publishing house: The birds
Gyldendal: Tarjei Vesaas
Books from Norway: Tarjei Vesaas