Literature of Scandinavia - Denmark History

The three northern countries, Denmark, Norway and Sweden, which have been linked together in history in varying ways, the first place in literature must be given to Denmark, although a remarkable number of writers who rank as Danish, were really Norwegians.

They had been drawn to Copenhagen when it was the educational center of the Danish-Norwegian state, before Norway joined Sweden in 1814, on her way to complete independence in 1905.

In poetry particularly, the Norwegians have been conspicuous, as might be expected from the inspiration given by the rugged grandeur of their natural surroundings compared with the tameness of the Danish landscape. It was only when Norway was withdrawn from the Danish partnership that national pride suggested a distinctive literature for her.

The man who first gave Denmark (with Norway) a literature of her own was Baron Ludvig Holberg, a Norwegian born at Bergen in 1684. He went to the university of Copenhagen in 1702. Before the eighteenth century Danish literature consisted of ballads and hymns. Back then, it was said that "a Danish gentleman wrote to his friends in Latin, talked to the ladies in French, called his dogs in German, and swore at his servants in Danish."

When Holberg died, in 1754, six years after he had been made a baron, he had written in an attractive style, books on history, law, politics, science and philosophy -- all in the national language, and he had furnished the first Danish theater with thirty-six dramas from his own pen, while his poems covered a wide range in style and subjects. He was, in short, one of the greatest literary forces in Europe, and his influence has been felt in Denmark to this day.

From such a start Denmark could not well go back, and the eighteenth century brought a succession of poets with lyrical genius of a high order.

One of them was Christian Tullin, also a Norwegian, who introduced the poetry of nature, inspired by Thomson's Seasons.

Then, there was Johannes Ewald who wrote the first Danish tragedy, and a lyrical drams, The Fishers, which still lives as a national poem, while as a lyrical poet he remains unexcelled. He also revealed to the Scandinavian nations the neglected sources of their own early literature. Ewald died in 1781, at the age of thirty-seven, after a life tragically mismanaged.

Another important contributor to Danish literature, was Herman Wessel, who again was a Norwegian and a brilliant but also short-lived poet of genius, so ridiculed on stage the revival of pompous style of French tragedy that it was laughed out of fashion. In its place the national language and a national spirit were established there.

Later, Jens Baggesen (1764-1826), the comic poet of Denmark, gave flexibility to the language by his satires and wit, but lessened his fame by the fierceness of his jealousies.

The most deservedly popular poet of the nineteen century was Adam Ohlenschlager, who, by the power of his romantic appeal, ranks as a literary influence with Baron Holdberg. Ohlenschlager went back for his subjects to the Icelandic Eddics. He so stirred the imagination of his countrymen, that in 1829 he was crowned with laurel in Sweden, as the "Scandinavian King of Song." His masterpiece is his tragedy Hakon Jarl.

Other Notable Danish Poets in Early Literature

Other notable poets were Steen Bilicher, whose realistic pastoral verse has points of resemblance to Crabbe; Christian Winther, whose studies of country life and rural scenery recall Wordsworth; Henrik Hertz, a dramatist and lyricist of Jewish birth; and Frederik Paluda and retiring nature contrasted with the keenness of his satire and the loftiness of his thoughts in his varied dramas.

It will be noted that much of the literary art of the Danish has been, expended on the stage. However, it has not been lacking elsewhere.

For instance, Hans Christian Oersted, the discoverer of electromagnetism, and Denmark's greatest scientist, was also such a clear writer that, like Tyndall and Huxley in England, he claims a place in the literature of his country.

Again the Danish philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855), is as notable for his command of style in writing as for the subtlety and originality of his thought.

Among the novelists, Herman Frederik Ewald (1821-1908) must be named for his historical stories, and his son, Carl Ewald (1856-1908), not only for his finer fiction, but above all, for his unique skill in teaching science and morals under the guise of fairy lore.

I have left to the last, the names of two men -- one of the past and one of more recently -- who have distributed farthest throughout the world, the finest fruits of the Danish mind. Hans Christian Andersen as a writer for children and Dr. Georg Brandes as a literary critic are in their different ways unsurpassed.

In the past, I've written more in depth about Han Christian Andersen, born in poverty in 1805 and educated himself as a small boy reading Holberg and Shakespeare. His formal education, after he had failed on the stage, as long and unsatisfactory. However his real education was in travel. No man ever understood himself less than he. He tried to b4 a poet, dramatist, novelist, and descriptive writer -- but with only moderate success in each.

However, what he could write, but did not value, were his exquisite sketches of fairy lore and human character in his books for children. They won the heart of the whole world, both then and now. They have kept it and will keep it, for they are among the best literature of the kind ever penned and the choicest product of Danish literature.