The young Hamsun objected torealism andnaturalism. He argued that the main object ofmodernist literature should be the intricacies of the human mind, that writers should describe the "whisper of blood, and the pleading of bone marrow".[6] Hamsun is considered the "leader of the Neo-Romantic revolt at the turn of the 20th century", with works such asHunger (1890),Mysteries (1892),Pan (1894), andVictoria (1898).[7] His later works—in particular his "Nordland novels"—were influenced by theNorwegian new realism, portraying everyday life in rural Norway and often employing local dialect, irony, and humour.[8] Hamsun published only one poetry collection,The Wild Choir, which has been set to music by several composers.
Hamsun held strongAnglophobic views, and openly supportedAdolf Hitler andNazi Germany, travelling to meet Hitler during theGerman occupation of Norway.[9][10][11] Due to his professed support for the occupation of Norway and theQuisling regime, he was charged withtreason after the war. Due to alleged psychological problems and issues relating to old age, he was not convicted, but in 1948 he was heavilyfined.[12][13][14] Hamsun's last book,On Overgrown Paths, authored in semi-imprisonment inLandvik, concerned his postwar treatment and his rebuttal to accusations of mental ineptness.[15][14]
Knut Hamsun was born as Knud Pedersen inLom Municipality in theGudbrandsdalen valley,Norway.[16] He was the fourth son among the seven children of Tora Olsdatter and Peder Pedersen. When he was three, the family moved to Hamsund inHamarøy Municipality inNordland county.[17] They were poor and an uncle had invited them to farm his land for him.
At nine Knut was separated from his family and lived with his uncle Hans Olsen, who needed help with the post office he ran. Olsen used to beat and starve his nephew, and Hamsun later stated that his chronic nervous difficulties were due to the way his uncle treated him.
In 1874 he finally escaped back to Lom. For the next five years he did any job for money; he was a store clerk, peddler, shoemaker's apprentice, sheriff's assistant, and an elementary-school teacher.[18]
At 17 he became a ropemaker's apprentice; at about the same time he started to write. He asked businessmanErasmus Zahl to give him significant monetary support, and Zahl agreed. Hamsun later used Zahl as a model for the characterMack appearing in his novelsPan (1894),Dreamers (1904),Benoni (1908) andRosa (1908).[19]
He spent several years in America, traveling and working at various jobs, and published in 1889 his impressions under the titleFra det moderne Amerikas Aandsliv ("From the Spiritual Life of Modern America").
After Edvard Munch,Knut Hamsun, 1896, photogravure, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Rosenwald Collection, 1951.10.360
Working all those odd jobs paid off,[20] and he published his first book:Den Gaadefulde: En Kjærlighedshistorie fra Nordland (The Enigmatic Man: A Love Story from Northern Norway, 1877). It was inspired by job experiences and struggles he endured.
In his second novelBjørger (1878), he attempted to imitateBjørnstjerne Bjørnson's writing style. The melodramatic story follows a poet, Bjørger, and his love for Laura. This book was published under the pseudonym Knud Pedersen Hamsund. This book later served as the basis forVictoria: En Kærligheds Historie (1898; translated asVictoria: A Love Story, 1923).[21]
As of 1898 Hamsun was among the contributors ofRingeren, a political and cultural magazine established bySigurd Ibsen.[22]
Hamsun first received wide acclaim with his 1890 novelHunger (Sult). The semiautobiographical work described a young writer's descent into near madness as a result of hunger and poverty in the Norwegian capital ofKristiania (modern nameOslo). To many, the novel presages the writings ofFranz Kafka and other twentieth-century novelists with itsinternal monologue and bizarre logic.
A theme to which Hamsun often returned is that of the perpetual wanderer, an itinerant stranger (often the narrator) who insinuates himself into the life of small rural communities. This theme is central to the novelsMysteries,Pan,Under the Autumn Star,The Last Joy,Vagabonds,Rosa, and others.
Hamsun's prose often contains rapturous depictions of the natural world, with intimate reflections on the Norwegian woodlands and coastline. For this reason, he has been linked with the spiritual movement known aspantheism ("No one knows God," he once wrote, "man knows only gods.").[23] Hamsun saw mankind and nature united in a strong, sometimes mystical bond. This connection between the characters and their natural environment is exemplified in the novelsPan,A Wanderer Plays on Muted Strings, and the epicGrowth of the Soil, "his monumental work" credited with securing him theNobel Prize in Literature in 1920.[24]
DuringWorld War II, Hamsun supported the German war effort. He courted and met with high-ranking Nazi officers, includingAdolf Hitler. Nazi Minister of PropagandaJoseph Goebbels wrote a long and enthusiastic diary entry concerning a private meeting with Hamsun; according to Goebbels, Hamsun's "faith in German victory is unshakable".[25] In 1940 Hamsun wrote that "the Germans are fighting for us".[26] After Hitler's death, he publisheda short obituary in which he described him as "a warrior for mankind" and "a preacher of the gospel of justice for all nations".
On 13 June 1945, after the war, he was detained by police for treason, then committed to a hospital inGrimstad (Grimstad sykehus) "due to his advanced age", according toEinar Kringlen, a professor and medical doctor.[27] In 1947 he was tried in Grimstad and fined.[28] Norway's supreme court reduced the fine from 575,000 to 325,000Norwegian kroner.[29]
After the war, Norwegians were torn between aversion to Hamsun's Nazi sympathies and regard for his achievements and fame as a writer. At his trial Hamsun had pleaded ignorance. Other explanations have cited his contradictory personality, his distaste forhoi polloi, his inferiority complex, his distress at the spread of indiscipline, his dislike of Norway's interwar democracy, and especially hisAnglophobia.[30]
A fifteen-volume edition of Hamsun's complete works was published in 1954. In 2009, to mark the 150th anniversary of his birth, a new 27-volume edition of his complete works was published, including short stories, poetry, plays, and articles not included in the 1954 edition. For this new edition, all of Hamsun's works underwent slight linguistic modifications to make them more accessible to contemporary Norwegian readers.[34] New English translations of two of his major works,Growth of the Soil andPan, were published in 1998.
Hamsun's works remain popular. In 2009, a Norwegian biographer stated, "We can't help loving him, though we have hated him all these years.... That's our Hamsun trauma. He's a ghost that won't stay in the grave."[35]
In 1898, Hamsun married Bergljot Göpfert (née Bech), who bore daughter Victoria, but the marriage ended in 1906. Hamsun then marriedMarie Andersen (1881–1969) in 1909 and she was his companion until the end of his life. They had four children: sonsTore andArild and daughters Ellinor and Cecilia.
Marie wrote about her life with Hamsun in twomemoirs. She was a promising actress when she met Hamsun but ended her career and traveled with him to Hamarøy. They bought a farm, planning "to earn their living as farmers, with his writing providing some additional income".
After a few years they moved south, toLarvik. In 1918 they boughtNørholm, an old, somewhat dilapidated manor house betweenLillesand andGrimstad. The main residence was restored and redecorated. Here Hamsun could occupy himself with writing undisturbed, although he often travelled to write in other cities and places, preferring spartan housing.
From his youth onward, Hamsun espousedanti-egalitarian andracist beliefs. InThe Cultural Life of Modern America (1889), he denouncedmiscegenation: "TheNegros are and will remain Negros, a nascent human form from the tropics, rudimentary organs on the body of white society. Instead of founding an intellectual elite, America has established amulatto studfarm."[39]
Hamsun wrote several newspaper articles in the course of the Second World War, including his notorious 1940 assertion that "the Germans are fighting for us, and now are crushing England's tyranny over us and all neutrals".[26] In 1943, he sent Germany's minister ofpropagandaJoseph Goebbels hisNobel Prize medal as a gift.[36] Hamsun's biographerThorkild Hansen interpreted this as part of the strategy to get an audience withHitler.[40] Hamsun was eventually invited to meet with Hitler; during the meeting, Hamsun complained about the German civilian administrator in Norway,Josef Terboven and asked that imprisoned Norwegian citizens be released, enraging Hitler.[41]Otto Dietrich describes the meeting in his memoirs as the only time that another person was able to get a word in edgeways with Hitler. He attributes this to Hamsun's deafness. Regardless, Dietrich notes that it took Hitler three days to get over his anger.[42] Hamsun also on other occasions helped Norwegians who had been imprisoned for resistance activities and tried to influence German policies in Norway.[43]
Nevertheless, a week after Hitler's death,Hamsun wrote a eulogy for him, saying "He was a warrior, a warrior for mankind, and a prophet of the gospel of justice for all nations."[35] Following the end of the war, angry crowdsburned his books in public in major Norwegian cities and Hamsun was confined for several months in a psychiatric hospital.
Hamsun was forced to undergo a psychiatric examination, which concluded that he had "permanently impaired mental faculties," and on that basis the charges of treason were dropped. Instead, acivil liability case was raised against him, and in 1948 he had to pay the ruinous sum of 325,000kroner ($65,000 or £16,250 at that time) to the Norwegian government for his alleged membership inNasjonal Samling and for the moral support he gave to the Germans, but was cleared of any direct Nazi affiliation. Whether he was a member of Nasjonal Samling or not and whether his mental abilities were impaired is debated even today. Hamsun stated he was never a member of any political party.[citation needed] He wrote his last bookPaa giengrodde Stier (On Overgrown Paths) in 1949, a book many take as evidence of his functioning mental capabilities.[citation needed] In it, he harshly criticizes the psychiatrists and the judges and, in his view, proves that he is not mentally ill.
Danish authorThorkild Hansen investigated the trial and wroteThe Hamsun Trial (1978), which created a storm in Norway. Hansen viewed Hamsun's treatment as outrageous, writing, "If you want to meet idiots, go to Norway." In 1996, Swedish filmmakerJan Troell based the movieHamsun on Hansen's book. InHamsun, Swedish actorMax von Sydow plays Knut Hamsun; his wife Marie is played by Danish actressGhita Nørby.
Hamsun's writings have been the subject of numerous books and journal articles. Some of these writings compare and contrast Hamsun's literary works with the political and cultural ideas expressed in his non-fiction.
Hamsun produced a voluminous correspondence during his lifetime. Norwegian scholar and Hamsun expertHarald Næss spent four decades tracking these letters down in both the United States and Europe, producing a collection of thousands of letters.[44] He published a selection in various volumes between 1994 and 2000.
Prime among all of Hamsun's works adapted to film isHunger, a 1966 film starring Per Oscarsson. It is still considered one of the top film adaptations of any Hamsun works. Hamsun's works have been the basis of 25 films and television mini-series adaptations, starting in 1916.[45]
Landstrykere (Wayfarers) is a Norwegian film from 1990 directed by Ola Solum.
The Telegraphist is a Norwegian movie from 1993 directed by Erik Gustavson. It is based on the novelDreamers (Sværmere, also published in English asMothwise).
^Contemporary Authors Online. Farmington Hills, Michigan: Gale. 2009.ISBN978-0-7876-3995-2.
^Citation: [...] dobbeltromanen Benoni og Rosa fra 1908. I skikkelse av oppkomlingen BenoniHartvigsen tegner Hamsun her for første gang et portrett av en allmuens mann i full skikkelse, med ironisk distanse, men også med betydelig sympati.
^Hamsun, Knut (1940).Look Back on Happiness. Translated by Wiking, Paula. Coward-McCann. p. 65.ISBN978-0-598-68722-7.{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
^The Goebbels Diaries, 1942–1943, translated, edited, and introduced by Louis P. Lochner, 1948, pp. 303–304. Goebbels also claimed that "from childhood on he [Hamsun] has keenly disliked the English".
^Reinhard H. Friederich (Winter 1976). "Hamsun's and Kafka's Mysteries".Comparative Literature.28 (1). Duke University Press:34–50.doi:10.2307/1770132.JSTOR1770132.
^Sjølyst-Jackson, Peter.Troubling legacies: migration, modernism and fascism in the case of Knut Hamsun. Continuum International Publishing Group. p. 16.
Ferguson, Robert. 1987.Enigma: The Life of Knut Hamsun. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Hamsun, Knut. 1990.Selected Letters, Volume 1, 1879-98. Edited by Harald Næss and James McFarlane. Norwich, England: Norvik Press.
Hamsun, Knut. 1998.Selected Letters, Volume 2, 1898-1952. Edited by Harald Næss and James McFarlane. Norwich, England: Norvik Press.
Haugan, Jørgen. 2004.The Fall of the Sun God. Knut Hamsun - a Literary Biography Oslo: Aschehoug.
Humpal, Martin. 1999.The Roots of Modernist Narrative: Knut Hamsun's Novels Hunger, Mysteries and Pan. International Specialized Book Services.
Kolloen, Ingar Sletten. 2009.Knut Hamsun: Dreamer and Dissident. Yale University Press.ISBN978-0-300-12356-2
Sjølyst-Jackson, Peter. 2010.Troubling Legacies: Migration, Modernism and Fascism in the Case of Knut Hamsun. Continuum / BloomsburyISBN978-1-4411-3476-9
Larsen, Hanna Astrup. 1922.Knut Hamsun. Alfred A. Knopf.
Nergaard, Siri. 2004.La costruzione di una cultura: la letteratura norvegese in traduzione italiana. Guaraldi.
Shaer, Matthew. 2009.Tackling Knut Hamsun. Review of Kollen Sletten,Dreamer and dissenter and Žagar,The dark side of literary brilliance. InLos Angeles Times, 25 October 2009.
D'Urance, Michel. 2007.Hamsun. Editions Pardès, Paris, 128 p.
Žagar, Monika. 2009.The dark side of literary brilliance. University of Washington Press.
