New Releases by Knut Hamsun

New edition of the 1929 English-language version of Nobel Prize winner Knut Hamsun''s 1923 novel Det Siste Kapitel. Translated from the Norwegian by Arthur G. Chater. Chapter the Last is set in the Torahus sanatorium, where the sufferings of most of the patients are related to civilization. The novel has a group of central characters, but no distinct main character. Among the characters is "The Suicide," who entered the sanatorium following the discovery of his wife''s infidelity and threatens constantly to take his own life. Another guest is the lovely Julie d''''Espard. She enters into a relationship with the bogus Count Flemming and get pregnant. When Flemming disappears one day she turns to Daniel Utby, who runs a small farm near Torahus and who represents the novel''s ideological norm. Chapter the Last is one of Hamsun''s darkest novels. It was written at a time when he was much preoccupied by death. The novel is often compared with Thomas Mann''s The Magic Mountain, which was published the year after.

Shallow Soil is a novel that examines the complex human interactions and struggles for power in a rural context. Hamsun depicts life in a small Norwegian village, where characters confront their own desires, frustrations, and longings. Through a psychological approach, the work reveals the tension between individual impulses and social expectations, as well as the difficulties of everyday life. Since its publication, Shallow Soil has been recognized for its innovative style and deep analysis of human psychology. Hamsun uses poetic and evocative language to explore the inner lives of his characters, giving them palpable humanity. The novel addresses themes such as alienation, identity, and the struggle for authenticity in a world that often seems hostile. The work remains relevant for its representation of human vulnerability and its critiques of oppressive social structures. By examining the dynamics of power in interpersonal relationships, Shallow Soil offers reflections on the search for meaning and belonging that resonate in contemporary society.

"Victoria - A Love Story" stands all by itself in the long series of works by Knut Hamsun. The chief male character, to be sure, bears the stamp of the author’s own personality; he, like his predecessors, clashes with society and its unwritten laws, but succeeds in adjusting himself without betraying his innermost being. Only in his love he suffers disaster. In poetic quality Victoria vies with Pan. We find long passages of lyric prose in both, the beauty of which is hard to surpass, but they have nothing in common with regard to the general atmosphere. Victoria is only a simple love story in prose. But what a prose where the author is at his best! Two youthful lovers are separated by the insuperable barriers of social conventions and economic circumstances. The young man, Johannes, is the son of a humble miller, Victoria the daughter of the proud master of the neighboring castle Hamsun intentionally leaves his readers somewhat in the dark about the exact social status of this old aristocrat. Johannes and Victoria have grown up together, have been playmates, and have come to love each other long before they reached adolescence. To save her lavish father from utter ruin, Victoria consents to marry a rich suitor. During the period of her engagement, she confesses to Johannes that she loves him, only to send him away on the next day because the whole thing is impossible, even though Johannes has made a man of himself and has already achieved fame as a poet. Bu then, at the eleventh hour fate seems to intervene …

Hunger is Knut Hamsun''s breakthrough novel about a young writer''s efforts to practice his craft while battling extreme poverty and loneliness. Includes commentary by M. B. Ruud.

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The Nobel Prize winner’s poetic, psychologically intense portrayal of love’s predicament in a class-bound society A Penguin Classic Set in a coastal village of late nineteenth-century Norway, Victoria follows two lovers whose yearnings are as powerful as the circumstances that conspire to thwart their romance. Johannes, a miller’s son turned poet, finds inspiration for his writing in his passionate devotion to Victoria, a daughter of the impoverished lord of the manor, who feels constrained by family loyalty to accept the wealthy young man of her father’s choice. Separated by class barriers and social pressure, the fated duo hurt and enthrall each other by turns as they move toward an emotional doom that neither will recognize until it is too late. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

The Last Joy is the final part in Hamsun''s Wanderer Trilogy. With its richly varied contents, this work combines the lyricism of Hamsun''s Pan (1894) and the epic scope of his Nobel prize-winning Growth of the Soil (1917). The middle-aged narrator of this story is a Hamsun double, who leaves the wild, where he has lived in a turf hut, for a tourist resort and, later, the city, where he contacts Miss Torsen, a beautiful young school teacher he met at the resort. He follows her sexual escapades, including rape, with the intense, vicarious interest of a voyeur.

Der reiche Handelsmann und ungekrönte König des Ortes, Ferdinand Mack, hat aus einer Laune heraus beschlossen, aus dem kleinen Postbeamten Benoni Hartvigsen einen wohlhabenden Kaufmann zu machen. Ein Bestandteil des Planes ist die Verlobung mit Rosa Barfod, die früh zu erkennen gibt, dass Benoni nicht ihre eigene Wahl ist. Eine ernste Krise zwischen den Verlobten steht bevor, als Rosas Jugendfreund Nikolai Arentsen nach beendetem Studium in seine Heimat zurückkehrt. Hamsun macht in ''Benoni'' seelische Vorgänge sichtbar, die diesem Nordlandroman psychologisch-realistische Tiefe verleihen.

This title was written after the Second World War, at a time when Hamsun was in police custody for his openly expressed Nazi sympathies during the German occupation of Norway. A Nobel laureate deeply beloved by his countrymen, Hamsun was now reviled as a traitor. Published in 1949, this was a kind of apologia - a book filled with the proud sorrow of an old man, yet recalling the spirit of Hamsun''s early novels, with their reverence for nature, absurdist humour and quirky flights of fancy.

"In Under the Autumn Star, Nobel prize-winning author Knut Hamsun writes a novel magically permeated with the air and light of fall. The narrator, Knut Pedersen (Hamsun''s real name) first joins forces with Grindhusen, a man blessed with the faith that "something will turn up," and later with Lars Falkenberg, whose dubious talents include the tuning of pianos. Knut and Lars fetch up as workmen on the estate of Captain Falkenberg (no relation to Lars), with whose wife each falls or fancies himself in love - though this does not prevent either from doing "night duties" in other quarters. In time, Knut is laid off and, in futile pursuit of the woman with whom he is by now helplessly infatuated, finds himself sucked back into the city life he had fled."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

In a small Norwegian coastal town, society''s carefully woven threads begin to unravel when an unsettling stranger named Johan Nagel arrives. With an unsparing and often brutal insight into human nature, Nagel draws out the seemingly innocent townsfolk, exposing their darkest instincts and suppressed desires. At once arrogant and unassuming, righteous and depraved, sane and truly mad, Nagel seduces the entire community even as he turns it on end--before disappearing as suddenly as he arrived. Knut Hamsun (1859-1952) was a Norwegian novelist, poet, and playwright. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1920.

Aclamado por Isaac Bashevis Singer como «el padre de la literatura moderna», Knut Hamsun inspiró, de hecho, a autores de la talla de Thomas Mann, Maksim Gorki, Franz Kafka y Hermann Hesse, y se hizo merecedor del Premio Nobel de Literatura en 1920 por La bendición de la tierra, «una obra monumental» en palabras de la Academia Sueca. Esta novela, de una insuperable precisión expresiva, narra la historia de Isak, un hombre de campo, grande y fuerte, y de su mujer, Inger. Ambos, con su trabajo y fuerza de voluntad, se abren camino en una tierra que, en principio, les es hostil. Trabajan de sol a sol, cuidan de sus hijos y tratan de hacer lo correcto. Hamsun, en este canto a la vida rural y a esos primeros colonos que, con su esfuerzo, poblaron Noruega, critica el progreso, a la vez que idealiza la vida en contacto con la naturaleza y con esa tierra que, para él, es la base de la fuerza del hombre.