Karl Ove Knausgård

Karl Ove Knausgård (Norwegian: [ˈkɑːl ˈùːvə ˈknæ̀ʉsˌɡoːr]; born 6 December 1968) is a Norwegian author. He became known worldwide for six autobiographical novels, titled My Struggle (Min Kamp).[3] He has been described as "one of the 21st century's greatest literary sensations"[4] by the Wall Street Journal.[5] Since the completion of the My Struggle series in 2011, he has also published an autobiographical series entitled The Seasons Quartet, as well as critical work on the art of Edvard Munch.

Karl Ove Knausgård
Karl Ove Knausgård 2011
Born (1968-12-06) 6 December 1968
Oslo, Norway
OccupationAuthor, novelist
NationalityNorwegian
Alma materUniversity of Bergen
GenreFiction, memoir
SpousesTonje Aursland (1995-2004)[1]
Linda Boström Knausgård (-2016)[1]
Michal Shavit[2]

Biography

Born in Oslo, Knausgård was raised on Tromøya in Arendal and in Kristiansand, and studied arts and literature at the University of Bergen. He then held various jobs, including teaching high school, selling cassettes, working in a psychiatric hospital [6] and on an oil platform, while trying to become a writer. He eventually moved to Stockholm and published his first novel in 1998.[7]

Literary career

Debut and follow-up

Knausgård made his publishing debut in 1998 with the novel Out of the World, for which he was awarded the Norwegian Critics Prize for Literature. This was the first time in the award's history that a debut novel had won.[8]

His second novel, A Time for Everything (2004), partly retells certain parts of the Bible as well as the history of angels on earth. The book won a number of awards, and was nominated for the Nordic Council's Literature Prize. It was also nominated for the International Dublin Literary Award. It was called a "strange, uneven, and marvelous book" by The New York Review of Books.[9]

The Min Kamp books

While Knausgård´s two first books were well received, it was the six-volume Min Kamp series of autobiographical novels that made Knausgård a household name in Norway. Published from 2009 to 2011 and totaling over 3,500 pages, the books were hugely successful and also caused much controversy.[8][10] The controversy was caused partly because the Norwegian title of the book, Min Kamp, is the same as the Norwegian title of Hitler's Mein Kampf, and partly because some have suggested Knausgård goes too far in exposing the private lives of his friends and family—including his father, ex-wife, uncle, and grandmother. The books have nevertheless received almost universally favorable reviews, in particular, the first two volumes. In a country of five million people, the Min Kamp series has sold over 450,000 copies.[11]

The Min Kamp series is currently being translated into numerous languages. The earliest books have already been published to great critical acclaim in Denmark,[12] Sweden,[11] and several other countries. All six have been translated into English by Don Bartlett for publication by Archipelago Books (US) and Harvill Secker (UK), and have been retitled in Britain as A Death in the Family, A Man in Love, Boyhood Island, Dancing in the Dark, Some Rain Must Fall, and The End (The End translated by Bartlett and Martin Aitken). The audiobooks of the English translations were recorded by Edoardo Ballerini.[13]

Work following Min Kamp

Knausgård served as a consultant to the new Norwegian translation of the Bible.[14] In 2013, he published a collection of essays, Sjelens Amerika: tekster 1996–2013 ("The Soul's [or Mind's] America: Writings 1996–2013"), and as of September 2013 he is adapting his novel Out of the World into a screenplay.[15]

Between 2015 and 2016, Knausgaard published his Seasons Quartet, a series of four books entitled Autumn, Winter, Spring, and Summer. These books are also autobiographical in nature, consisting of diary excerpts, letters, and other personal materials. These books were released in English between 2017 and 2018.

Knausgaard has also written works devoted to the visual arts. He co-authored Anselm Kiefer: Transition from Cool to Warm, a book in 2018 on the German artist Anselm Kiefer with James Lawrence.[16] In 2019, Knausgaard published a monograph on the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch, and his interview about Munch also appeared as a highlight of the British Museum's 2019 exhibition catalog, Edvard Munch: Love and Angst, by curator Giulia Bartrum.[17]

In October 2019 Knausgård became the sixth writer chosen to contribute to the Future Library project.

In the Land of the Cylops is Knausgard's first collection of essays publised in English and released in January 2021. [18]

Editing career

Between 1999 and 2002 Knausgård was co-editor of Vagant, a Norwegian literary magazine founded in 1988. He was part of the first editorial team of Vagant in Bergen; until 1999 the magazine had been based in Oslo. Knausgård contributed essays about the writings of Don DeLillo and The Divine Comedy by Dante. He also conducted in-depth interviews with the Norwegian writers Rune Christiansen and Thure Erik Lund for the magazine. Just after he left Vagant and Bergen, his former co-editor Preben Jordal wrote a very negative review of Knausgård's second novel in the magazine, with the title «Mellom Bibel og babbel» ("Between the Bible and babble")—an episode discussed in the second volume of Min Kamp.

Publishing career

In 2010, he founded a small, eclectic publishing house, Pelikanen (Pelican), with his brother Yngve Knausgård and Asbjørn Jensen.[19] Pelikanen has so far published Denis Johnson, Peter Handke, Christian Kracht, Ben Marcus, Curzio Malaparte and Stig Larsson in Norwegian translations.

Personal life

Knausgård lived in Österlen, Sweden, with his wife, the writer Linda Boström Knausgård, and their four children until November 2016 when he and his wife separated.[20] He now lives between Blackheath, London and Sweden.[21]

In a radio interview with his estranged ex-wife, Tonje Aursland, who plays a part in several of the Min Kamp books, Knausgård admitted that he sometimes feels that he has made a "Faustian bargain"—that he has achieved huge success by sacrificing his relationships with friends and members of his family. In October 2010, Aursland presented her perspective on involuntarily becoming a subject of her ex-husband's autobiography in a radio documentary broadcast on NRK.[22] Knausgård's uncle, who is represented as Gunnar in the Min Kamp books, has been highly critical of the whole project in the Norwegian press.[23]

Bibliography
This list is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items with reliable sources.
  • Knausgård, Karl Ove (1998). Ute av verden [Out of the world]. Oslo: Tiden Norsk Forlag.
  • En tid for alt, Oktober, 2004, ISBN 9788249500918
  • 2009–2011: My Struggle (Min Kamp), six volumes
  • Sjelens Amerika, Oktober, 2013, ISBN 9788249511488
  • 2014: Nakker
    • Necks Photographs by Thomas Wagstrom, Max Strom, Bokforlaget, 2015, ISBN 9789171263155
  • 2015–2016: Årstid encyklopedien (Seasonal Encyclopedia)[25]
    • Om høsten (Autumn), 2015, Illustrated by Vanessa Baird, ISBN 9788249515608
      • Autumn, Penguin, 2017, ISBN 9780399563300
    • Om vinteren (Winter), 2015 Illustrated by Lars Lerin, ISBN 9788249515615
      • Winter, Penguin, 2018, ISBN 9780399563331
    • Om våren (Spring), 2016, Illustrated by Anna Bjerger, ISBN 9788249516490
      • Spring, Penguin, 2018, ISBN 9780399563362
    • Om sommeren (Summer), 2016, Illustrated by Anselm Kiefer, ISBN 9788249516506
      • Summer, Penguin, 2018, ISBN 9780399563393
  • 2015: Hjemme - Borte With Fredrik Ekelund
    • Home and Away: Writing the Beautiful Game, 2017 (English translation), with Fredrik Ekelund, translated by Don Bartlett and Sean Kinsella, ISBN 0374279837
  • — (May 25, 2015). Translated by Kerri Pierce. "The inexplicable : inside the mind of a mass killer". Letter from Norway. The New Yorker. 91 (14): 28–32.[26]
  • 2018: Anselm Kiefer: Transition from Cool to Warm with James Lawrence, ISBN 9780847862122
  • 2019: So Much Longing in So Little Space: The Art of Edvard Munch, ISBN 9781473555464
  • 2020: Morgenstjernen, October, 2020, ISBN 9781473524798

Awards and nominations

Nominations

Awards

References
  1. Rogers, Thomas (15 October 2019). "Writing From Real Life, in All Its Excruciating Detail" – via NYTimes.com.
  2. https://www.vg.no/rampelys/bok/i/e80RpM/knausgaard-og-kona-kom-sammen-paa-roed-loeper
  3. "Karl O. Knausgaard". Archived from the original on 7 October 2012. Retrieved 6 December 2012.
  4. Magazine, Liesl Schillinger | Photographs by Juergen Teller for WSJ (5 November 2015). "Why Karl Ove Knausgaard Can't Stop Writing" – via www.wsj.com.
  5. "On my radar: Karl Ove Knausgaard's cultural highlights". the Guardian. 24 January 2021. Retrieved 24 January 2021.
  6. Karl Ove Knausgaard (19 April 2016). My Struggle: Book 4. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. pp. 4, 270–. ISBN 978-0-374-53417-2.
  7. Karl Ove Knausgaard interview The New Republic 8 April 2014
  8. Hermione Hoby, "Karl Ove Knausgaard: Norway's Proust and a life laid painfully bare," The Guardian, March 1, 2014.
  9. Ingrid D. Rowland, "The Primordial Struggle," The New York Review of Books, October 14, 2010.
  10. James Wood, "Total Recall". The New Yorker, 13 August 2012.
  11. "Høye salgstall for Karl Ove Knausgård i Sverige / Pressemeldinger / Presse / Hovedsiden – Forlaget Oktober" (in Norwegian). Oktober.no. 29 January 2012. Retrieved 15 June 2012.
  12. "Får toppkarakterer i Danmark – Litteratur – NRK Nyheter". Nrk.no. Retrieved 15 June 2012.
  13. "Narrator of 133-hour audiobook proclaims boom in 'evolving art'". the Guardian. 1 January 2019. Retrieved 30 December 2020.
  14. "Bibel 2011". www.nlm.no. Archived from the original on 24 December 2014. Retrieved 3 October 2012.
  15. Nina Berglund (4 September 2013): "Knausgaard cancels all appearances", Views and News from Norway; retrieved 7 November 2013.
  16. Kiefer, Anselm (2017). Anselm Kiefer : transition from cool to warm. Gagosian Gallery. New York, NY. ISBN 978-0847862122. OCLC 995131691.
  17. Edvard Munch : love and angst. Knausgård, Karl Ove, 1968-, Bartrum, Giulia,, British Museum,, Munch-museet (Oslo, Norway),, Printer Trento SrL. London. 11 April 2019. ISBN 978-0500480465. OCLC 1052877485.CS1 maint: others (link)
  18. "In the Land of the Cyclops by Karl Ove Knausgaard review – anaemic essays". the Guardian. 5 January 2021. Retrieved 24 January 2021.
  19. "Om oss – Pelikanen forlang". Retrieved 17 June 2014.
  20. "Hennes kamp är explosiv". Archived from the original on 27 May 2013. Retrieved 21 June 2012.
  21. Adams, Tim (16 September 2018). "Karl Ove Knausgaard: 'I don't know why more people don't read Mein Kampf'" – via www.theguardian.com.
  22. Gundersen, Trygve Riiser (3 October 2010). "Knausgård burde være glad". Dagbladet (in Norwegian). Retrieved 4 October 2010.
  23. Eivind Kristensen, "«Onkel Gunnar» tar knallhardt oppgjør med Knausgård" (in Norwegian), Aftenposten, 17 November 2011.
  24. "A Time for Everything". Archipelago Books. Retrieved 6 February 2010.
  25. Farsethås, Ane (15 December 2015). "After My Struggle: An Interview with Karl Ove Knausgaard". theparisreview.org. The Paris Review. Retrieved 14 December 2016.
  26. Title in the online table of contents is "Anders Breivik’s inexplicable crime".
  27. ""Welt"-Literaturpreis 2015 an Karl Ove Knausgård". Die Welt (in German). 18 September 2015. Retrieved 24 September 2015.
  28. Izikovich, Gili (28 May 2017). "Karl Ove Knausgaard Named 2017 Laureate for Jerusalem Prize in Literature". Retrieved 18 October 2019.
  29. "Svenska Akademiens nordiska pris 2019". Swedish Academy (in Swedish). 20 February 2019. Retrieved 4 April 2019.

Reviews
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