Wayfarers

I read this book in two sittings, so I must have enjoyed it quite a lot. It details the lives of August and Edevart, two boys from rural Northern-Norway, and their adventures during their youth. It is the first part of the August-trilogy, and if the rest of the trilogy is like this then I've got quite some nice time ahead of me. The tale is very typical of Hamsun, with gradual "colonization" of barren lands, and exploitation of the potential we all have in ourselves. This being said, he doesn't hesitate to show us the lesser sides of our human existence, even though I feel he might have overdone it a bit. I don't particularly enjoy the constant theme of promiscuity and infidelity that runs rampart in this book, but I guess he was trying to show how badly the modern world has affected the North. August is something of a joker in the book, always bringing some new profitable idea to Edevart and others around them, just when it is needed the most, and then returning to poverty or the high seas after the seeds are sown. Edevart on the other hand, is working himself up to quite a respectable man, through twists and turns of fate. Although he often gets brought down to earth painfully fast, he is steadily improving his lot. I won't say much more about the book than this, it is very much a typical Hamsun-book, and that says a lot. Highly recommended reading from our very own "right-wing" anti-modern conservative Norwegian author. (I read a different edition)

Born in 1859, Hamsun received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1920. Credited by many as being one of the key influencers of modern literature style, his work is largely forgotten today. In part, that amnesia has been caused by Hamsun's resolute support of the Germans during World War II. Even today, he is a figure of great controversy in Norway. The Wayfarers (written in 1927) is one of his later novels, and is largely about his concerns with the insatiable need for travel and the corrupting influence of the modern on traditional life. August and Edevart are two boys from a small town who move across Norway earning and losing small fortunes in a constant quest to better themselves. This is the second book by Hamsun that I have read, and I was moved and impressed by what a lovely novel it is. Hamsun scrapes the surface of small town life and builds brilliantly ambiguous characters who manage to be neither idealized nor grotty. There is a kind of realism that works very well at conveying small town life without either idealising or judging. The McFarlane translation seems very good. It was clean and free from awkwardness. Highly recommended.

I"ve read everything (in English) by Hamsun I've been able to find and, along with Growth of the Soil, this is my favorite. What some call lightness I think of as a calmness (absent from Hunger and Mysteries) that allows more of the character of Norway to show through. The timescale is long here and the kinds of immediate panic that move his more urban characters (and Glahn in Pan) are not as important in lives that stretch over time. These characters are friends, rather than loners (though they, as are we all, are that too), and I feel this book has more to communicate about ordinary people's lives than those about purely solitary men.

As winter turns to spring and spring to summer, the characters in "Wayfarers" go through their own transformations, which seem to parallel the passing of the seasons.One of the running themes is the issue of where a person belongs, their roots, the dichotomy between the drive to get away and the simple happiness which comes from living on one's native land, surrounded by familiar people.But Hamsun's approach is never a theoretical, intellectual one, but rather a heart-breaking and painfully personal journey.This novel will stay with me as an overwhelming memory, not because it gives answers to life's dilemmas, but because it poses crucial questions which stir the mind and awaken reflections on the human experience, all with the background landscape of sailboats on the Norwegian sea --

While there are numerous comments on novels like "Hunger", "Pan", "Growth of the soil" and so on, little seems to be said about the "August-Trilogy", of which "Wayfarers" is the part one. In this trilogy many of Hamsuns most beloved qualities comes to its climax. Unlike "Hunger" and "Pan", - "Wayfarers" and "August" is full of hamsunian humour, that highly poetic sympathy that embraces his characters. The triology also exposes life in a poor norwegian fishing village from the Old days, in a realistic but also satirical way. It is quiet a piece of norwegian folklore, but still a part of world litterature. Its the work by Hamsun that is most likely to give you a good laugh, without missing the overall seriousness of matter. (The disastrous consequences of Capitalism in a small, vulnerable society). Its full of tragedy too, and, I think, as an artwork comparable to all his internationally more known works, like "Hunger" and "Growth of the soil".