"Tredelt er Nordens stamme – men Roden er dog én"
In my previous blog I recounted of Per Adolf Granberg, the poet with the wooden hand. I have been somewhat unkind to him. Although he may be forgotten today, in his own time he was quite successful. His opera Jorund (1812) won a prestigious prize and his piece Freyas högtid (Freya's Feast) was performed at the occasion... Continue Reading →
Is this a blog about failure? The question popped up in my head when I was browsing through my last few posts. I mean, I wrote about the poor Høyer, who owing to his pigheadedness lost his membership of the Royal Art Academy, his workshop, his clientele, and his good name. And I wrote about... Continue Reading →
The Danish-Norwegian naval hero Tordenskjold and the Swedish "Father of Modern Taxonomy" Carl von Linné - perhaps better known as Linnaeus - are connected through the taxidermied remains of a seven-headed hydra. The mysterious beast indirectly caused the young Tordenskjold's death and forced Linnaeus to leave Hamburg in a hurry. Hannover, 9 November 1720 After... Continue Reading →
Writing means killing, killing darlings. My latest journal article - on the afterlives of the naval hero Peter Wessel Tordenskjold - is no exception to this gruesome rule. The article has many a deleted scene. One of the more enjoyable ones is related to Henrik Hertz's play Tordenskjold i Dynekilen from 1844 (see pages 33-37... Continue Reading →
In the Norwegian TV series Okkupert - the first episode aired in 2015 - Norway is in a near alternative future occupied by Russia, with the approval of the European Union (no irrelevant detail in the Norwegian context). Direct cause is the coming to power of the Green Party and its policy to stop the production... Continue Reading →
The title of this painting by Frederik Christian Lund says it all really. What we see here is The Dutch fleet under Admiral Opdam passing the Sound on October 29, 1658 during the Swedish war. During the Second Carl Gustaf War (1658-1660), the Swedish forces had occupied the whole of Denmark and laid siege to... Continue Reading →
Blog van Jona Lendering
words by r. brantley
February 22- 23, 2019, Berkeley, California
and I had to go
Scandinavism 