Les écrits de Selma Lagerlöf sont célébrés pour leur noble idéalisme, leur imagination vive et leur perception spirituelle. S'inspirant des contes de fées suédois et des récits bibliques, elle a été pionnière dans un style unique de réalisme magique. Avant de se consacrer pleinement à l'écriture, elle a passé une décennie en tant qu'enseignante, une expérience qui a probablement éclairé ses représentations nuancées de la connexion humaine. Son travail explore souvent des thèmes de foi, de communauté et de justice sociale.
Pour avoir voulu se jouer d’un tomte, sorte de lutin du folklore suédois, le jeune Nils devient pareil à sa victime, c’est-à-dire à peine plus haut que la main. Voulant retenir son jars blanc, tenté par l’appel des oiseaux migrateurs, Nils oublie sa taille minuscule, et le voici emporté dans les airs. S’ensuivent un voyage à travers la Laponie et la Suède, en compagnie des oies sauvages, et une série d’aventures mi-merveilleuses mi-réelles. Comme toutes les grandes œuvres pour la jeunesse, ce texte, paru en 1907, est devenu un classique qui a enchanté des générations de lecteurs.
The book Marbacka, the first part of a trilogy written in 1922-32, can be read
as many different things: memoir, fictionalised autobiography, even part of
Lagerlof's myth-making about her own successful career as an author.
Nils Holgersson, a mischievous boy who enjoys tormenting farm animals, captures a tomte but refuses to free him for a gold coin. As punishment, the tomte shrinks Nils, allowing him to communicate with animals, who seek revenge for his past misdeeds. Meanwhile, a domestic goose attempts to join a flock of wild geese, and in a desperate bid to escape, Nils clings to the goose as it takes flight. This adventure leads Nils on a transformative journey, exploring themes of redemption and the consequences of one's actions.
GÖsta Berling is a failed parson in nineteenth century rural Sweden, too fond of pleasure and the drink, torn by conflicting aims -- the charm and deceit, love and laziness in him fighting for supremacy. He teams together with a group of sometimes dissolute, often well-meaning freemen of their district to evict the seemingly mad owner of a great rambling house at the centre of its own semi-feudal estate, Ekeby. This group call themselves the cavaliers. In her telling of what happens next, LagerlÖf creates a strange fusion between the realism of authors like Ibsen and Strindberg and the mythic force of the Scandinavian sagas. GÖsta's great loves, his enemies, those to whom he teaches lessons about life, either intentionally or accidentally, and others whose stories he has only a small part in, all start up from the page into a strange, elemental clarity, creating a sprawling mosaic of romance and realism. This first novel from the deeply original mind of the 1909 Nobel Prize winner weaves a balance between everyday rural reality and underlying dreams and fable to create a patchwork of extraordinary complexity and looming fascination, in which the reader can detect the author's passion for the stories of her country, and her sceptical warmth for the troubled human spirit.
The preservation of "Invisible Links" highlights its significance throughout human history. This modern edition has been meticulously reformatted and retyped to ensure clarity and readability, making it accessible for both present and future generations. Unlike traditional republishing methods, this version is not a scanned copy, enhancing the reading experience.
JERUSALEM (1901-1902) by Selma Lagerlof, first woman author to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, is a story of Swedish families caught up in desire and divine exultation. Homestead tradition and religious inspiration, love and duty, come in conflict in this inspirational and gently bittersweet period novel that follows a pilgrimage of the idealist human spirit of Ingmar Ingmarsson and his kin.
Selma Ottilia Lovisa Lagerlf (1858-1940) was a Swedish author and the first woman writer to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Known internationally for her children's story The Wonderful Adventures of Nils (1906-07) she was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1909 in appreciation of the lofty idealism, vivid imagination and spiritual perception that characterize her writings. She began her first novel, The Story of Gosta Berling (1891) while working as a teacher in Landskrona. Her first break as a writer came when she submitted the first chapters to a literary contest, and won a publishing contract for the whole book. Lagerlf's other important works include Jerusalem (1901-1902), The Emperor of Portugalia (1914), The Ring of the Lwensklds (1925), The Treasure, and Invisible Links.
