Knut Hamsun

Growth of the Soil, Knut Hamsun's Nobel Prize winning novel, is an abiding classic of Scandinavian literature. At the time it was published, the literary world was in the throes of shifting to a modernist style. Popular novels were set in the contemporary present, with technological and societal advancements forming part of the narrative backdrop. Growth of the Soil openly displays the conflicts between the old traditions of agrarian society, and the ever-mounting wonders and conveniences offered by modern society. The farmer Isak scarcely acknowledges the values of modern living. Illiterate but capable of carrying out the business of running a farm, he has physical strength and works with his hands. Although initially amazed by Isak's prowess - his wife Inger, who came into contact with modern society when imprisoned for killing her infant due to its birth defect, return to the home much less impressed by the country life.

Growth of the Soil, Knut Hamsun's Nobel Prize winning novel, is an abiding classic of Scandinavian literature. At the time it was published, the literary world was in the throes of shifting to a modernist style. Popular novels were set in the contemporary present, with technological and societal advancements forming part of the narrative backdrop. Growth of the Soil openly displays the conflicts between the old traditions of agrarian society, and the ever-mounting wonders and conveniences offered by modern society. The farmer Isak scarcely acknowledges the values of modern living. Illiterate but capable of carrying out the business of running a farm, he has physical strength and works with his hands. Although initially amazed by Isak's prowess - his wife Inger, who came into contact with modern society when imprisoned for killing her infant due to its birth defect, return to the home much less impressed by the country life.

Tri samykh izvestnykh proizvedenija Knuta Gamsuna, v kotorykh naibolee polno otrazilis osnovnye temy ego tvorchestva.'Golod' - vo mnogom avtobiografichnyj roman, prinesshij avtoru mirovuju slavu. Strashnaja v svoej prostote istorija molodogo nepriznannogo pisatelja, den za dnem balansirujuschego na grani golodnoj smerti. Realnost i prichudlivye, boleznennye fantazii perepletajutsja v ego soznanii, muchitelno perezhivajuschem nesootvetstvie mezhdu idealnym i materialnym mirom... 'Pan' - povest, v kotoroj raskryta tema svobody cheloveka. Ee glavnyj geroj, lejtenant Glan, zhivuschij otshelnikom v uedinennoj lesnoj khizhine, okazyvaetsja v tsentre treugolnika slozhnykh otnoshenij s dvumja ochen raznymi zhenschinami...'Viktorija' - roman o borbe chelovecheskikh chuvstv, emkij i dramatichnyj sjuzhet kotorogo povestvuet o glubokoj, muchitelnoj i nevozmozhnoj ljubvi dvukh ljudej iz raznykh soslovij - syna melnika Jukhannesa i docheri selskogo pomeschika Viktorii... Perevodchiki: Baltrushajtis Jurgis, Surits E. A., Jakhnina Ju. Ja.

This collection of literature attempts to compile many of the classic works that have stood the test of time and offer them at a reduced, affordable price, in an attractive volume so that everyone can enjoy them.

A few hours' rest, and he is on the move again: "Eyah, well...."-moving northward again, noting time by the sun; a meal of barley cakes and goats' milk cheese, a drink of water from the stream, and on again. This day too he journeys, for there are many kindly spots in the woods to be explored. What is he seeking? A place, a patch of ground? An emigrant, maybe, from the homestead tracts; he keeps his eyes alert, looking out; now and again he climbs to the top of a hill, looking out. The sun goes down once more. He moves along the western side of a valley; wooded ground, with leafy trees among the spruce and pine, and grass beneath. Hours of this, and twilight is falling, but his ear catches the faint purl of running water, and it heartens him like the voice of a living thing. He climbs the slope, and sees the valley half in darkness below; beyond, the sky to the south. He lies down to rest.

Hamsun was born on Aug. 4, 1860, in one of the sunny valleys of central Norway. From there his parents moved when he was only four to settle in the far northern district of Lofoden--that land of extremes, where the year, and not the day, is evenly divided between darkness and light; where winter is a long dreamless sleep, and summer a passionate dream without sleep; where land and sea meet and intermingle so gigantically that man is all but crushed between the two--or else raised to titanic measures by the spectacle of their struggle. The Northland, with its glaring lights and black shadows, its unearthly joys and abysmal despairs, is present and dominant in every line that Hamsun ever wrote. In that country his best tales and dramas are laid. By that country his heroes are stamped wherever they roam. Out of that country they draw their principal claims to probability. Only in that country do they seem quite at home. Today we know, however, that the pathological case represents nothing but an extension of perfectly normal tendencies.

An des Reiches Pforten - Schauspiel in vier Aufz gen ist ein unver nderter, hochwertiger Nachdruck der Originalausgabe aus dem Jahr 1895. Hansebooks ist Herausgeber von Literatur zu unterschiedlichen Themengebieten wie Forschung und Wissenschaft, Reisen und Expeditionen, Kochen und Ern hrung, Medizin und weiteren Genres. Der Schwerpunkt des Verlages liegt auf dem Erhalt historischer Literatur. Viele Werke historischer Schriftsteller und Wissenschaftler sind heute nur noch als Antiquit ten erh ltlich. Hansebooks verlegt diese B cher neu und tr gt damit zum Erhalt selten gewordener Literatur und historischem Wissen auch f r die Zukunft bei.

»Den moderna prosans fader.« | ISAAC BASHEVIS SINGER»Hamsuns genombrottsroman Svält från 1890 är än i dag lika drabbande som en blixt från blå himmel. Nu finns originalversionen i en glimrande svensk översättning av Henrik Petersen.« | MIKAEL VAN REIS, GPSommaren 1888 anländer Knut Hamsun till Köpenhamn, dåtidens kulturcentrum i Norden. Desillusionerad - euforisk - river han manuskriptet som skulle göra hans litterära karriär. Han stannar i staden, för nu vet han: Hamsun ska skriva sig fram till »det som ingen ännu känner«, till något litteraturen aldrig sett.» Nerverna« är på modet detta sekelskifte, men ingen text från tiden, och ingen senare, liknar Hamsuns Svält - i dag en lika omistlig klassiker som Kafkas romaner, Dostojevskijs Brott och straff eller Goethes Unge Werther. Henrik Petersens hyllade svenska översättning av Svält är den enda som gjorts av originalversionen av romanen från 1890. KNUT HAMSUN [1859 -1952] var en norsk författare. En av 1900-talets mest inflytelserika stilister, av många ansedd som den moderna romanens skapare. Debutromanen Svält var en av Franz Kafkas viktigaste inspirationskällor. Stilen i Svält är en föregångare även till den »medvetandeström« som kom att förknippas med James Joyce och Virginia Woolf. 1920 mottog Hamsun Nobelpriset i litteratur.» Det är en fantastisk utgåva. Jag rekommenderar den till alla som den bästa utgåvan som är utgiven i Norden, ja över huvud taget." | STÅLE DINGSTAD, professor vid Universitetet i Oslo och Hamsun-forskare»Alienation i den moderna storstaden, identitetskriser och jagupplösning, våldsamma djupdykningar i det omedvetna, ja rentav nedmontering av hela föreställningen att konsten och litteraturen bör avbilda verkligheten. Alltsammans finns redan i Hamsuns Svält.« | THURE STENSTRÖM, SvD»Varför förför Hamsun mig till den grad? För det första därför att hans prosa är före gott och ont, före arvsynden. Den är skamlöst lycklig, oskuldsfull. För det andra, därför att den har ett ständigt driv, den vilar inte, den halvsover inte, den går inte på rutin, den observerar alla detaljer och den hittar på nya.« | THEODOR KALLIFATIDES»Det är en svenska som utan spår av norska ger stark språkidentitet: den talar renaste hamsunska.« | SIGRID COMBÜCHEN, SYDSVENSKAN»Jag tror faktiskt att Henrik Petersen lyckats åstadkomma en perfekt översättning.« | HANNA NORDENHÖK, HD»Och jag, uppvuxen med två andra uttolkningar, en från 1937 och en annan från 1959, måste säga att detta är den ultimata. Råare och renare. Hårdare och härligare. Mörkare och mönstergillare.« | JAN KARLSSON, CORREN»Aldrig har någon varit mer förtjänt av Nobelpriset.« | THOMAS MANN

INTRODUCTION BY JO NESBØAFTERWORD BY PAUL AUSTERNineteenth-century Kristiania is an unforgiving place, and work is thin on the ground. Roaming the streets of Norway's capital, a penniless young writer searches for inspiration whilst trying desperately to make ends meet. Driven to extraordinary lengths, sleeping under the stars with his stomach growling, the writer's behaviour becomes increasingly irrational and his world spirals into chaos. Hunger was Knut Hamsun's first novel and earned him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1920. A disturbing and darkly humorous masterpiece of existential fiction, Hunger anticipated and influenced some of the twentieth century's most acclaimed writers including Camus, Kafka and Fante.

Fame, romanzo che ha dato la notoriet ad Hamsun, narra la discesa di un giovane ed egocentrico scrittore nel tunnel della pazzia, i suoi deliri e le sue amare riflessioni, mentre vaga per la capitale norvegese accompagnato dalla pi temibile antagonista: la fame. In un racconto parzialmente autobiografico, che si rivela di un'attualit sorprendente, Hamsun si propone di informare il lettore del difficile percorso che uno scrittore deve affrontare, dei "tanti rifiuti, le promesse dette a mezza voce, i molteplici no, le speranze illusorie".

In the autumn of 1888 a Danish magazine published a few chapters of an autobiographical novel which instantly created the greatest stir in literary circles throughout Europe. At that time Ibsen, Bj rnson, Brandes, Strindberg, and other Scandinavian writers were at the height of their cosmopolitan fame, and it was only natural that the reading world should keep in close touch with the literary production of the North. But even the professional star-gazers, who maintained a vigilant watch on northern skies, had never come across the name of Knut Hamsun. He was unknown; whatever slight attention his earlier struggles for recognition may have attracted was long ago forgotten. And now he blazed forth overnight, with meteoric suddenness, with a strange, fantastic, intense brilliance which could only emanate from a star of the first magnitude.