Swedish Woman Wins Fame

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7865, 29 July 1911, Page 13

Swedish Woman Wins Fame

Selma Lagerlof, Nobel Prize Winner, Ranks Among the Finest Modern Story Writers,

SELMA LAGERLOF. tho gifted Swe-' dish woman who won the Nobel prize for literaituro in 12C9, is not only a notable figure in Swedish literature, bnt one of tiie finest writers of the mod-orn~-world. Her stories are ranked with those of Hans Christian Andersen in tlie popular sentiment they have awakened, and,, while they are essentiality national in character and setting, their tender humanity and imaginative spontaneity aro the delight of the many peoples who read them in translation. , The Stockholm “Dagblad” says of her that her writing “has sprung direct from the soul of the Swedish nation." Salma Lagerlof was bom in Varmland, a quiet country province of Sweden, and hero she learned to know and love the things of out of doors, as well as tho wonderful old Scandinavian leI goads which she -was to embody in her writing later on. In her early twenties she went to Stockholm to prepare herself for teaching, For fen years she taught in the siris’ high school at Landskrona. Her first successful literary venture was “Gosta Belting's Saga.” which won a prize of T 250 . offered by the Swedish woman’s magazine, “Iduu.” Here is her own account of how she cam© to think of the Htory: “One day the young girl, during the first days of her college life in Stockholm, walked along with her books under her arm, her thoughts bent upon the lecture which she has attended. Tho lecture must have been about Beiiman or Euneberg, because she thought of them and of the characters .in their works. She remarked to herself that Eunebexg’s martial heroes and Bellman’s' companions offered splendid opportunities for literary treatment. Then suddenly it occurred to her: ‘The world / of Varmiaßd _ in which you have lived is no less original than that of Fredman or Fanrit Stal. If you can only give form to it, your material offers as splendid opportunities as that of Euneberg or Bellman.’ And so it happened that the Saga first flashed upon her. When tho vision come to her the ground seemed to sway 'beneath her feet. The whole long Malmskilnadsstreot from the Hamnstrect to the firehouse seemed to rise high into flue air and to sink again. , She stood still until the house had resumed its wonted appearance.” . From this time on. Miss Lager! of continued to discover beauty and Interest and all kinds of imaginative possibilities in the common. things about her, and she has written a number of books which confirm and extend the literary reputation won for her through her first attempt. But her most , original, possibly her most; remarkable', work’is a book which she wrote to order for the Association of Common School Teachers, for primary

schools. That sounds dry enough, as an order; but Miss Selma Lagerlof-has disproved the old proverb that there is no royal road to learning, by providing one for the school .children of Sweden, in “The Wonderful Adventures of Nils.” Nils is an average boy of Sweden, about fourteen years old, and equipped with the .boy’s usual aversion to doing anything particularly useful or profitable in the eyes of bis parents. ■ One Sunday morning when ho. is sitting sleepily at home, trying tb keep awake over the Commentaries ‘that he is supposed to read (because he is noit going to church), there are some wonderful happenings, dating, from the sudden appearance of a certain off. As n result of it all Nils is changed into am elfm person just like himself in everything but size, and he is carried away on the back of “goosey-gander” (the tame goose belonging to Nits’ people), who is lured away by the cries of B, flock of wild geese flying overhead. In this way—on tho back of goosey-gander—Nils takes an airy journey over all Sweden, learning all kinds of interesting things about geography and history, together, with many fascinating things connected with the life of birds and animals and even plants. To all this, the story-interest in not a .mere introduction, ' The entire volume reads like fiction, and the otyLa is so individual, so fresh, that the book is entirely acceptable to grown-up readers, who are very ready to be so agreeably guided through, a country about which they are glad to fearn. Delightful as it is to the'outsider, it must have a peculiar -charm to those who are already hailf-familiar with tho facte the book embodies; and it is certainly a sublimated schoolbook, pointing to am -interesting -opportunity in connection with our' own wonderful and varied country. According to one critic “Tho Adventures of Nils" contains twice as much information as tire old readers. “It acquaints the children with Sweden’s nature,” he writes; “it interests them in the world—both tame- and wild; in its domestic and forest animals, oven in its .rats. It explains its vegetation, its soil, its mountain' formations, its climatic conditions. It gives one customs, it takes in farming industry, it has a word fox everything. She knew how to combine the useful with the beautiful as no pedant of the practical- or the aesthetic has ever dreamed it.”

Ho that is proud (eats up himself; pride is his own glass, bis own trumpet, his own chronicle; and whatever praises itself but in the deed, devours tho deed in the praise.—Shakespeare.