Karl Gjellerup

THE LAUREATE: Karl Gjellerup was born in 1857 in Zealand, the son of a vicar. He rejected the romantic nonsense he was born into and threw himself into naturalism. Later in life, he threw himself into a sort of Wagnerian neo-romanticism. He moved to Germany in the 1880s and stayed there, supporting their aims through the war. Late in life, he took up Buddhism as a theme, and his novel The Pilgrim Kamanita is actually on Indonesia’s school reading list for some reason.

WHAT I’M READING: Minna

Henrik Pontoppidan

THE LAUREATE: Henrik Pontoppidan was born in Jutland in 1857. He came from a family of vicars and writers, studied engineering, taught in public schools and finally ended up writing bitingly accurate accounts of Danish life. He was apparently a pioneer of the Danish novel, and his most famous work, Lykke-Per, was recently enrolled in the Danish Cultural Canon. He died in 1946

WHAT I’M READING: One of his few works in English, Emanuel, or Children of the Soil