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 specialisation. As Scandinavian Literature 2 (6 ects) 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 students who choose Swedish as their language of specialisation 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

The course “Literary Scandinavian classics and their film adaptations” examines Swedish, Danish and Norwegian literary works, written between the 1890s and the 1950s. These works have become famous films thanks to their quality as literary classics; in its turn, the film versions have contributed to construct and actualise their status as “classics” in the course of time. Both the literary works and the film texts, moulded on them, will be studied, observing the devices of transformation according to adaptation theory. A central case, for both theory and practice, but also a peculiar case, is Ingmar Bergman’s work, as encompassing literature and film. It will be the starting point of the course. Bergman authored the scripts of the films he directed. Those script were, in his own description “semi-manufactures”, as the film was their final destination and fulfilment. Thanks to the fame and fortune of the films, and to the literary quality of their scripts, however, the scripts have become literature and books in their own right.
The aim of the course is an in-depth knowledge of the literary works, of the films and of the main devices and strategies of adaptation; the students should also learn to contextualize the studied works in terms of literary and cultural history, and to critically analyse 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. 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.

Contents

“Literary Scandinavian classics and their film adaptations”


Bergman’s films Det sjunde inseglet (The Seventh Seal) and Smultronstället (Wild Strawberries), both from 1957, will be studied as films and literary works, with respect to the author’s reflections on the relationship between literature and film, word and image, in his own work. Sult (Hunger) will be then examined, as Knut Hamsun’s main novel from 1890, and as a film directed by Henning Carlsen (1966), which renders the literary text’s modernistic traits through another medium. Film has also been a powerful means of canonisation of children’s literature; a double masterpiece is, in this respect, Astrid Lindgren’s novel Lillebror och Karlsson på taket (Karlsson on the Roof) from 1956, with its film version Världens bästa Karlsson from 1974, directed by Olle Hellbom and with the collaboration of the author Astrid Lindgren. Finally, a Danish literary classic, although originally written in English is the long short story Babette’s Feast / Babettes Gæstebud, included in Karen Blixen’s collection Anecdotes of Destiny / Skæbne-Anekdoter from 1958. Gabriel Axel’s film from 1987 is a powerful Danish rendering of Blixen’s cosmopolitan genius, starting from the landscape. Moreover, it announces the great season of Danish film soon to come between the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the new millennium.

References

Literary works

Knut Hamsun 1890, Sult, Gyldendal, Oslo 2009 (BALI library, Ca’ Foscari) / Fame, Adelphi, Milano 2012 (BALI library, Ca’ Foscari)

Astrid Lindgren 1956, Lillebror och Karlsson på taket, Rabén & Sjögren, Stockholm 2003 (BALI library, Ca’ Foscari) / Karlsson sul tetto, Salani, Milano 2021

Ingmar Bergman 1957, Det sjunde inseglet, Norstedts, Stockholm 2018 (BALI library, Ca’ Foscari) / Il settimo sigillo, Iperborea, Milano 2017 (BAUM library, Ca’ Foscari)

Ingmar Bergman 1957, Smultronstället, Norstedts, Stockholm 2018 (BALI library, Ca’ Foscari) / Il posto delle fragole, Iperborea, Milano 2004

Karen Blixen 1958, Babettes Gæstebud, in Skæbne-Anektdoter, Gyldendal, København 2006 / Babette’s Feast in Anecdotes of Destiny, Penguin, London 1989 (BALI library, Ca’ Foscari) / Il pranzo di Babette, in Capricci del destino, Feltrinelli, Milano 1978 (BAUM library, Ca’ Foscari)

Films

The films Det sjunde inseglet, Smultronstället, Världens bästa Karlsson e Babettes Gæstebud will be made available through online platforms; the students and the teacher will watch them together in the original version

Critical sources

Linda Hutcheon with Siobhan O’ Flynn 2006, A Theory of Adaptation, 2nd edition, Routledge, London / New York 2013 (BALI Library, Ca’ Foscari)

Excerpts from:

Ingmar Bergman, Laterna magica, Norstedt, Stockholm 2018 (BALI library, Ca’ Foscari) / Lanterna Magica, Garzanti, Milano 1990 (BAUM Library, Ca’ Foscari)

Ingmar Bergman, “Monolog”, in Id., Femte akten, Norstedts, Stockholm 1994, pp. 7-15 (pdf) / “Monologo”, in Id., Il quinto atto, Garzanti, Milano 2000

Assessment

The examination is oral, it lasts about 45 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.

oral

Grading scales

28-30 cum laude: the student masters the topics presented in the course and in the assigned readings and is capable of ordering information and making use of a convenient terminology;
26-27: the student has a good knowledge of the topics presented in the course and - to a lesser extent - in the assigned readings; he/she generally succeeds in ordering information and is familiar with terminology;
24-25: the student does not fully master the topics presented in the course and in the assigned readings; his/her oral presentation is clear, although concepts are not always expressed through a convenient terminology;
22-23: the student has a rather superficial knowledge of the topics presented in the course and in the assigned readings; his/her oral presentation is not always clear and generally lacks terminology;
18-21: the student has a superficial knowledge of the topics presented in the course and in the assigned readings; his/her oral presentation is confused and does not resort to terminology.

The correspondence with the European grading scales (from A to F) is the following: less than 18 = F; 18-21 = E; 22-25 = D; 26-28 = C; 29-30 = B; 30 cum laude = A.

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 (as a literary work; as a film; both things). If students present a book / a film in class, they will not have to prepare it again for the examination.

More information

For questions and explanations please write to massimo.ciaravolo@unive.it and agree upon a meeting at office hours. Students who do not attend the course should come and agree upon the syllabus with the teacher.

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