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Pär Lagerkvist (1891-1974) |
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One of the major Swedish writers of the first half of the
20th-century, a moralist, who used religious motifs and figures from
the Christian tradition without strictly following the doctrines of the
Church. A central theme in Pär Lagerkvist's work was the fundamental question
of good and evil, which he examined through such figures as the
medieval red-hooded hangman, Barabbas, and the wandering Jew Ahasuerus.
Lagerkvist was awarded the
Nobel Prize for Literature in 1951 "for the artistic power and deep
originality with which in his literary work he seeks the answers to the
eternal questions of mankind." "The countryside opened around them in every direction, with marshlands, little lakes, all sorts of waters, with tiled strips, grazing lands, countless ploughed squares, with fenced pastures, bogs and woodlands and farmsteads scattered among the oats and the rye out in the sun. The light was so friendly and open everything could be seen, and in the distance Grandfather's place was in sight, sheltered in a group of maples." (in Guest of Reality by Pär Lagerkvist, translated by Robin Fulton, Quartet Books, 1989, p. 27) Pär
Lagerkvist was born in Växjö, a small town in Småland in
southern Sweden, the son of Anders Johan Lagerkvist, a railroad
official, and Johanna Blad. (His surname means "laurel sprig".) The
family lived in an apartment above the station restaurant. From his
pietistically inclined parents and
grandparents Lagerkvist inherited a simple and unquestioning Lutheran
faith. Later in a notebook he confessed that he felt grateful for the
non-literary atmosphere of his home. He was an outsider, and did not
share his parent's religiosity. By the time Lagerkvist enrolled at the University of Uppsala, he had already become a convicted Darwinian, and had started to write poetry and fiction with philosophical themes. He studied art and literature for two years, but left his studies without taking a degree. The process of distancing himself from his grandparents' faith was not easy for the author. It is seen in his later works and autobiographical novel Gäst hos verkligheten (1925, Guest of Reality). As a writer Lagerkvist made his debut with Människor (1912). The next year he visited Paris, where he became aware of new trends in the visual arts. In his theoretical essay 'Ordkonst och bildkonst' (1913) Lagerkvist rejected literary naturalism in favor of the elevation and simplicity found in Greek tragedy, the Old Testament, and the Icelandic sagas. His first volume of poems, Motiv (1914), did not receive much critical attention. During the World War I Lagerkvist lived mostly in Denmark.
There he wrote among other things for the theater. Den sista
människan (1917, The Last Man), a play, was followed
by a collective work, Modern teater (1918), where he
defended August Strinberg's late plays and
his opposition to naturalism. Ångest
(1916, Anguish), published in the middle of WWI, was a
disillusioned collection of poems: "Anguish, anguish is my
inheritance," was the opening line (Ångest, ångest är min arvedel / min
strupes sår, / mitt hjärtats skri i världen). Lagerkvist's words were
an expression of his inner pain. He tried to explore how a person can
find a meaningful life in
a world where love is nothing, the anguish of living is everything.
This collection, which turned away from the traditional romantic
expression, marked the beginning of poetic modernism in Sweden. In Himlets hemlighet (1919, The Secret of Heaven), published in the collection Kaos, Lagerkvist posed the basic question, 'What is the meaning of life?' He implied that while this issue preoccupies human beings, it is a matter of total indifference to the Almighty. The play featured such symbolic figures as the Executioner and the Dwarf, who reappeared in subsequent works. Den svåra stunden (1918, The Difficult Hour) collected three one-act plays describing the moment of death. In the 1920s Lagerkvist travelled in France and Italy. Among
his works from the 1920s are Guest of Reality, Onda sagor (1924),
Hjärtats sånger (1926, Songs of the Heart), and the
drama Han som fick leva om sit liv (1928, The Man Who Lived
His Life Over), in which Lagerkvist moved towards more realistic stage
art. In his early books the author manifested socialistic and radical
views, but gradually started using religious and moral themes in a
historical context. In the novella Det eviga leendet (The
Eternal Smile, 1920) the setting is the realm of the dead, where the
characters join in a search for God, "to call him in account of
everything."
God turns out to be an old forester, he is sawing wood, his clothes are
old and worn, his hair is gray. In a dialogue about their creation
they get the answer, repeatedly: "I have done the best I could." ('The Eternal Smile', translated by Erik Mesterton, in The Eternal Smile, and Other Stories, translated by Alan Blair, Erik Mesterton, Denys W. Harding, Carl Eric Lindin, Random House, 1954, pp. 56-57)
The words echo Leibniz, "who invented the doctrine that
this is the best of all possible worlds (to which L.H. Bradley added
the sardonic comment "and everything in it is necessary evil."" (History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell, Routledge Classics, 2004, p. 533) Lagerkvist's belief in eternal love, and that life can be good and evil, is seen in Den lyckliges väg (1921)
and Hjärtats sånger, which
contains one of Lagerkvist's cited poems, 'Min älskade kommer inte
åter': "Min älskade kommer inte åter / men min kärlek kommer åter till
mig. / Det jag levat kommer inte åter, / men mitt liv är åter hos mig."
After
1930 Lagerkvist lived quietly in
Lidingö, an island community near Stockholm. He was introvert and shy
by nature, and rarely granted an interview and never allowed
photographers to enter his home. But, like
his countryman Eyvind Johnson, Lagerkvist reacted in several of his
works to rising totalitarian ideologies. Bödeln (1933, The Hangman) was first published
as a novella and
then adapted into a play, staged by Per Lindberg. In the first part the reader meets
the Hangman in a medieval tavern, from where he is transferred to modern times, to
a jazz café in Nazi Germany. The Hangman never
loses his essence as the embodiment of barbarism and brutality.
Lindberg's
stage version, premiered at The National Stage in Bergen, Norway, was
an enormous success, but in Stockholm the play was called a fiasco.
The Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs assured the German embassy that
it would probably not be staged elsewhere in Sweden. ('The Hangman by Pär Lagerkvist in the Netherlands: Politics and the Personal' by Petra Broomans, Scandinavica, Vol 51 No 2 2012, p. 107) Curiously, Lagerkvist's name and work was not in the 1933 "index" of books that were banned in Germany. Den knutna näven (1934, The Clenched Fist), a collection of essays, was another call against fascism. On his way to Greece, Egypt and Palestine – when traveling by boat from Palestine towards Athens Lagerkvist got seasick – with his wife in the spring of 1933, Lagerkvist travelled through Germany and became alarmed by the path the country had taken. The Acropolis inspired him to declare: "For thousands of years it has not yielded. It summons its faitful, collects them anew around their most preciois possession. Not to visions of beauty, not to dreams and idleness. But to struggle! To uncompromising, unwearying struggle! To militant humanism! The clenched fist!" (The Clenched Fist, in Five Early Works by Pär Lagerkvist, Edwin Mellen Press, 1989, p. 200) Moral problems
and the crisis of humanism dominated Lagerkvist's writing of the 1930s
and 1940s – he referred to himself as a "religious
atheist." In
September 1940 Lagerkvist was elected to the Swedish Academy, as
successor to the writer Verner von Heidenstam, who had died in May
1940. During
the early years of WW II Lagerkvist published two patriotic books, Sång
och strid (1940) and Hemmet och stjärnan (1942).
The allegorical novel Dvärgen (1944,
The Dwarf), about the
dualities in life, the struggle between creative forces and
destruction, was set in Renaissance Italy. Again the protagonist and
narrator is an exceptional person, he is of an ancient race, born evil;
his God is cruel and vengeful. After his services to the Prince,
a patron of arts, he is imprisoned. The Dwarf writes his diary: "I
await other times and they will surely come, for I am not destined to
sit here eternity. I shall have an opportunity of continuing my
chronicle by the light of day as before, and my services will be
required again." (The Dwarf, translated from the Swedish by Alexandra Dick, Hill and Wang, 1945, p. 228) Dvärgen, along with
Bödeln and Barabbas (1950), constitutes a
cornerstone in Lagerkvist's oeuvre. Barabbas was the first of six historical novels set
in the Holy Land and classical Delphi. Immediately hailed as a
masterwork by many writers, among them André Gide,
the work secured Lagerkvist's position as a leading candidate for the
current year's Nobel Prize. But there were other candidates too: in a questionnaire sent out in 1949,
Malcolm Cowley had suggested Mikhail Sholokhov, V.S. Pritchett
suggested François Mauriac, and Benno Reiffenberg of the German Die Gegenwart nominated the editorial board of the English periodical Punch. ('Pär Lagerkvist, Barabbas and the Nobel Prize for Literature' by Håkan Möller, in Journal of World Literature 1, 2016, p. 507) In
Sweden the novel sold sixty thousand copies in the first year of after
publication and it was in a short time translated into nine language
and made into a feature
film in 1961, starring Anthony Quinn. "What was lacking, it has been
agreed, were the spiritual subtlety, the simple beauty and the symbolic
points of Pär Lagerkvist's fable, and even Quinn's creativity and
acknowledged artistry were unable to infuse these elements into this
Barabbas." (The Films of Anthony Quinn by Alvin H. Marrill, Citadel Press, 1975, p. 193) The
title character, the criminal in the New Testament, is pardoned instead
of
Christ, and is sentenced to the silver mines. He is incapable of
loving, but in the course of events he becomes gradually aware of
greater forces guiding his life. At the end, when he is imprisoned and
condemned to be crucified, Barabbas acknowledges his fate: "Was there
any meaning in the life he had led? Not even that did he believe in.
But this was something he knew nothing about. It was not for his to
judge." (Barabbas, translated by Alan Blair, Vintage Books, 1986, p. 178) Sibyllan (1958, The Sybil) starts the story of
the Wandering Jew, cursed with eternal life. Struggling to understand
his fate, he seeks out an old priestess of the Oracle at Delphi, who
has been driven from the temple. The pilgrimage continues in Ahasverus
död (1960, The Death of Ahasuerus), where he meets Tobias, a
criminal, who is at the same time a good man. Ahasuerus finally finds
peace, and he is allowed to die as a reward for abandoning his
obsessive religious concerns. Other tales probing religious questions include Pilgrim på
havet (1964, Pilgrim at Sea), which deals symbolically with
loneliness and humanity's search for belief, Det heliga landet (1966,
The Holy Land), and Mariamne
(Herod and Mariamne, 1967).
The title character is the wife of Herod the Great. In the story she is portrayed as a Madonna-like woman. She never blames her
husband for anything. Herod hires a man, who looks just like him, to
kill Mariamne, and after her death, Herod continues his life just as before: "An emblem of
mankind : mankind that replenishes the earth but whose race shall one
day be erased from it and, so far as may be conjured, will leave no
memorial." (Herod and Mariamne, translated from the Swedish by Naomi Walford, Vintage Books, 1982, p. 119) In illustrations made by Olavi Vepsäläinen for the Finnish translation
from 1969 they are depicted as mythological figures, accompanied with
apocalyptic horses. Lagerkvist was married twice. His marriage with Karen
Sørensen, a Dane, was unhappy. They had one daughter, Elin. After
divorce he married in 1925 Elaine Luella Hallberg,
the widow of the painter Gösta Sandels, who had died tragically in
Grenada in 1919. Hjärtats sånger contained some love
poems dedicated to E. "Dig rörde aldrig mörket, / fast livet sorg dig
gav, / fast ibland mörka skuggor / du stod vid öppnad grav, / fast du i
smärta prövats, / fastän du led som vi / – men omkring dig var ljuset /
dom ej får mörker bli." Lagerkvist died in Stockholm on July 11, 1974. His personal material had been removed to Stockholm's Kungliga Bibliotek, not to be read until he was dead. Although Lagerkvist was reticent about his private life, he depicted in the novella Guest of Reality his early years in Småland. In 1977 Elin Lagerkvist published extracts from her father's diaries and notes under the title Antecknat. Ur efterlämnade dagböcker och anteckningar. There is also poems excluded from the final version of Aftonland. For further reading: In the Footsteps of Kierkegaard: Modern Ethical Literature by Józef Wittlin and Pär Lagerkvist by Katarzyna Szewczyk-Haake; translated by Agnieszka Gicala (2022); Pär Lagerkvist - den kämpande humanisten by Susanne Wigorts Yngvesson; redaktör: Magnus Eriksson (2021); Pär Lagerkvists landskap, edited by Magnus Eriksson, Peter Forsgren (2017); Tjörn genom Pär Lagerkvists ögon by Ann-Charlotte Dahlstedt (2016); Pär Lagerkvist: ögonblickets diktare och marknaden by Håkan Möller (2012); Den politiske Lagerkvist, ed. by Margareta Petersson, Christer Knutsson (2011); Pär Lagerkvist talar, ed. by Margareta Petersson, Christer Knutsson (2011); Pär Lagerkvist and Cubism: a Study of His Theory and Practice: a Critical Essay by Ellestad M. Everett (rev. ed., 2009); Brinn du eviga längtan: Pär Lagerkvists livslånga brottning med Gud och livets mening by Lars Holmberg (2008); Ett författarskap speglat i språket: struktur och stil i Pär Lagerkvists prosa by Bengt Brodow (2003; Sagan, myten och modernismen i Pär Lagerkvists tidigaste prosa och Onda sagor by Karin Fabreus (2002); 'Literature Democratized: Working-Class Writers of the 1930s' by Rochelle Wright, in A History of Swedish Literature, ed by L.G. Warme (1996); Pär Lagerkvist by Ingrid Schöier (1987); A History of Scandinavian Literature, 1870-1980 by Sven H. Rossel (1982); 'Lagerkvist, Pär' by R.D.S. [Robert D. Spector], in Columbia Dictionary of Modern European Literature, edited by Jean-Albert Bédé and William B. Edgerton (1980; Pär Lagerkvist in America by Ray Lewis White (1979); Gud, matos och kärlek by Willy Jönsson (1978); Pär Lagerkvist by Lennart Sjöberg (1976); Pär Lagerkvist’s Development as a Dramatist: A Study in Theory and Practice by Robert Thomas Rovinsky (1974); Pär Lagerkvist by R.D. Spector (1973); Menneske-hjertets verden by Gunnel Malmström (1970); Pär Lagerkvist: A Critical Essay by W. Weathers (1968); Främlingen Lagerkvist by Kai Henmark (1966); Pär Lagerkvist in translation by Anders Ryberg (1964); Pär Lagerkvist: An Introduction by I. Scobbie (1963); Pär Lagerkvist by Otto Oberholzer (1958); Pär Lagerkvist by Gustaf Fredén (1954); Livsproblemet hos Pär Lagerkvist by Jöran Mjöberg (1951) - Suomeksi on myös julkaistu novellikokoelma Kuolleet, jotka etsivät Jumalaa (1935) ja kokoelma Runoja (1953), suom. Viljo Kajava Selected works:
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