By the end of the 19th century, the Swedish women's movement was overshadowed by Strindberg's misogynistic writings. Nevertheless, a series of women writers continued to uphold the spirit of women's liberation inherited from the 18th century.
Among them, Ellen Key (1849-1926) emerged. The daughter of a landowner politician, she moved from Christian ideals to utopian, positivist socialist ideas, following the path of Geijer, Bremer, Almqvist.
She defended women's rights, highlighted the social role of mothers, and demanded emotional liberation for women. She joined the labor movement. Against the World War, she fought for world peace; she was a friend of the French writer R. Roland, a peace fighter. Her most famous work: The Century of the Children (1901), placed children in the most respected position in the family and society, signaling the concept of the role of child education in the 20th century.
After World War II, poetry almost dominated Swedish literature. In the 1960s, prose and especially fiction emerged with a generation of energetic and talented writers who remain influential today.
Among them, we must mention female writer Brigitta Trotzig, born in 1929. Her works raise metaphysical concerns, tinged with existentialism and Catholicism.
She deals with evil, sin, suffering, hatred, humiliation, and the absence of God. Man can, with God's grace, master suffering, emerge from darkness and become a new man. In The Dispossessed, a 17th-century priest finally finds inner light. The Illness (1972) links the fate of a mentally ill child to the destructive events of evil.
In the world, Swedish literature has a female literary section whose largest representative is Selma Lagerlöf.
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| Female writer Selma Lagerlof. |
Among Swedish women writers, Selma Lagerlöf is the brightest star. Her reputation in Swedish and international literature is not necessarily less than that of Strindberg. She is one of the most translated Swedish authors in the world. In 1909, she was the first woman to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature. In 1914, she was the first woman to be elected a member of the Swedish Academy.
Selma Lagerlöf (1858-1940) was born in the hamlet of Marbacka in the Varmland region. During her childhood and adolescence, she lived a sickly, lonely life, immersed in the folk legends told in the village. She belonged to a bankrupt landlord family; her father was sick and had to sell the hamlet; later, when she had money, she redeemed the hamlet. She studied pedagogy and worked as a teacher for ten years, from the age of 27 to 37. After that, she devoted herself entirely to literature. She made several trips abroad: to the Near East, Italy... From the age of 51 until her death at the age of 82, she lived in her old hamlet, taking care of the work herself while pursuing literary activities.
With The Legend of Gästa Berling, published in 1891, 33-year-old teacher Selma Lagerlöf suddenly became famous. The story is set in the countryside of Varmland in the early 19th century, still full of superstition. Gösta Berling is a newly educated priest, with a complicated personality and a drinking habit. The bishop hears about his bad habits and comes to investigate; that day, Berling preaches so eloquently that he is pardoned. But then he is disciplined, lives as a vagrant and is later accepted by "Mistress" Elkeby, the wife and talented manager of a foundry owner, to live with a group of "knights".
Playing the role of the benefactor, she entertained these “knights,” who were ex-soldiers, adventurers, and half-baked artists. A newcomer, Sintram, was very cruel, the embodiment of the Devil, harassing and sowing discord; the whole group turned against their benefactor; someone accused her of adultery, which led to her being expelled by her husband and forced to beg in the snow-covered fields. The “knights” freely destroyed the smelter’s wealth that the “Mistress” had built up over many years.
Meanwhile, the talented, handsome and charming Berling was pursued by a cruel fate, and whoever he touched brought disaster to that person. He ruined the lives of many women he seduced. Finally, starving, the "knights" had to work to revive the smelter. At that time, the "Mistress" appeared, but died after forgiving the traitorous "knights". The "cobra pastor" Berling had to atone for his sins through humiliation and labor in the smelter; the love of a exiled noblewoman saved him.
The story is based on the legends of Varmland, a distant land. There are scenes of critical realism, such as when the author contrasts the lavish life of the “knights” in the hamlet with the foundry with the miserable life of the people. However, the value of the work lies mainly in the dramatic storytelling art, reviving the legend, half-fiction, half-reality. With symbolic and philosophical nature of life.
The author expresses the eternity of Scandinavian emotions: the doubts of Protestantism, the endless struggle between Good and Evil, the contradiction between willpower and intuition, the sometimes harmonious, sometimes harsh relationship between nature and man. Berling abandons God and follows Evil, because his instincts are too strong. However, at times he is mean and selfish, at times he is generous; he is torn between God and the devil. Finally, he finds his inner truth by living like everyone else.
[To be continued]
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