SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE

Locating the subject within the study plan of the BA-programme

The course Scandinavian Literature 1 (6 ects) is offered at the first year of the MA-programme in European, American and Postcolonial Languages and Literature (LLEAP), and is addressed to students who choose Scandinavian Studies, with Swedish as a language of specialization. As Scandinavian Literature 2 the same course is offered to students at their second year at the LLEAP-programme. And with the name “Scandinavian Literature” (6 ects), the same course is offered to the students who choose Swedish as their language of specialization at the MA-programme in Language Sciences. Students of Scandinavian studies at both MA-programmes, at their first or second year, form therefore a common class.

Expected results

This course deals with “Scandinavian countryside and tramps on the threshold of modernity”, and it examines Swedish, Danish and Norwegian prose works written at the turn between the 19th century and the 20th century. Its purpose is to analyze the literary representation of the traditional rural world and the problem of its radical changes. Two nostalgic figures develop in the tradition, and they are both antithetical and interacting – the farmer and the tramp, the rooted man and the rootless one.
The aim of the course is to give an in-depth knowledge of the theme in its specific Swedish and Scandinavian version; the students should also learn to contextualize the studied works historically, socially and literarily, and to analyze their contents and forms.

Prerequisites

The course is addressed to former students of Scandinavian studies at BA-level and is held in Swedish for the most part. In order to give Scandinavian literature 2, students must have passed Scandinavian literature 1. Texts will be examined in the original language, but translations will help. The professor will assist students when reading texts in Norwegian and Danish.

Scandinavian countryside and tramps on the threshold of modernity

The threshold experience of passing from the ancient rural community, with its self-sufficient economy, to 20th century urban and industrial modernity, is a recurrent literary theme, and it is presented, with similarities and differences, by several Scandinavian authors. The Danish writer J.V. Jensen depicts, in his short stories, memorable figures of tramps and outsiders in the stern rural world of his Himmerland; the Norwegian fellow writer Knut Hamsun describes the wanderer of the Romantic tradition, but a wanderer who is also marked by 20th-century anxiety and disharmony. Hamsun’s quest wil lead him, in Markens grøde (The Growth of the Soil), to the praise of the rooted peasant as opposed to modern mobility. Finally, the Swedish writer Selma Lagerlöf depicts in her rural epic novel (but also tale of a journey and formation) Jerusalem, the contradictions of the end of the traditional country life and its meeting with modernity. The comparative work will help to highlight similarities and differences, as to both contents and form, between these works.

References

The preparation of the course is in progress. The studied works will be:
Johannes V. Jensen 1898-1910, selezione da Racconti (da Storie dello Himmerland), Milano, Fabbri, 1967 / Himmerlandshistorier: et udvalg, København, Gyldendal, 1981
Knut Hamsun 1906, Sotto la stella d’autunno, Milano, Iperborea, 1995 / Under høststjærnen, in K. Hamsun, Samlede verker, 4, Oslo, Gyldendal, 1976
Knut Hamsun 1909, Un vagabondo suona in sordina, Milano, Iperborea, 2005 / En vandrer spiller med sordin, in K. Hamsun, Samlede verker, 5, Oslo, Gyldendal, 1976

Knut Hamsun 1917, Germogli della terra, Torino, Einaudi, Torino, 2021 / Markens grøde, in Samlede verker, 10, Gyldendal, Oslo 2008

Selma Lagerlöf 1901, 1909, Jerusalem, Milano, Iperborea / Selma Lagerlöf, Jerusalem I-II, Stockholm, Bonniers

Students will prepare two novels by Hamsun, not three: Markens grøde and one chosen between Under høststjærnen and En vandrer spiller med sordin.

The preparation of the course is in progress. Sources of literary history and literary criticism will be included later on
Maria Ludovica Koch, “La vita e l’opera di Johannes V. Jensen”, in J.V. Jensen, Premio Nobel per la letteratura 1944 (1967), pp. 21-53
Carlo Picchio, “Johannes Vilhelm Jensen”, in J.V. Jensen, Premio Nobel 1944 (1969), pp. ix-xxxiv
Niels Ingwersen – Sven H. Rossel, “The early years of the new century”, in Sven H. Rossel (ed.), A History of Danish literature (1992), pp. 301-310
Claudio Magris, “Fra le crepe dell’io: Knut Hamsun”, in Id., L’anello di Clarisse. Grande stile e nichilismo nella letteratura moderna (1984), pp. 142-164
Fulvio Ferrari, “Introduzione”, in K. Hamsun, Sotto la stella d’autunno (1995), pp. 7-11
Fulvio Ferrari, “Postfazione”, in K. Hamsun, Un vagabondo suona in sordina (2005), pp. 203-207
James McFarlane, “Knut Hamsun”, in Harald S. Næss (ed.), A History of Norwegian Literature (1993), pp. 184-194
Mary Kay Norseng, “The Startling Vagueness of Knut Pedersen (From an American Point of View)”, Edda 1979, pp. 157-173
Marie Wells, “A Narratological Analysis of Knut Hamsun’s Novel En vandrer spiller med sordin”, Scandinavica 2003, pp. 239-254

Assessment

The examination is oral, it lasts about 40 minutes and it is in Swedish (unless otherwise agreed upon, according to the needs). Some of the texts dealt with in the course are analysed and discussed from the point of view of forms and contents, and they are referred to their significant biographical, authorial, historical, cultural and literary contexts. One question may include reading and translating a passage from one of the works in the syllabus from Swedish / Scandinavian.

Didactic methods

The course offers mainly frontal lectures, but with moments of participatory learning, as students may, on a voluntary basis, present and discuss in class and in Swedish one of the works included in the syllabus (the 4 novels and the selection of short stories). If students present a book in class, they will not have to prepare it again for the examination.

More information

Per domande e chiarimenti scrivere a massimo.ciaravolo@unive.it. Si consiglia di venire a ricevimento previo appuntamento via e-mail. Gli studenti non frequentanti contatteranno il docente per discutere il programma e le letture aggiuntive.

oral

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