The History of Danish Dreams - Hardcover

Hoeg, Peter

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0374171386 ISBN 13: 9780374171384

Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux, 1995

Synopsis

One of Scandinavia's most talented young authors follows an eccentric family as they try to cope with the transition of Denmark from medieval society to modern welfare state. By the author of Smilla's Sense of Snow.

About this title

Reviews

His name having been established here through his second and third novels, Smilla's Sense of Snow and Borderliners, Hoeg now offers his debut work, first published in Denmark in 1988. As its subtitle indicates, this is an ambitious and quirky novel, reading like an epic fairy tale in which the magic elements are the social revolutions of the modern era. These revolutions are fancifully cast in terms of the characters' ever-evolving "dreams"-such as "the dream of rebellion" or the "dream of the Village"-in a sprawling plot that progresses as a sort of surreal family saga. Introduced in the first section are four characters born around the turn of the century: Carl Laurids, whose ambitions lead him beyond his estate, where, in the 16th century, the resident count had banned the keeping of time; Amalie Teader, a girl whose delusion that she has been "chosen" springs from a wealthy and powerful grandmother, who writes a newspaper that predicts the future; Anna Bak, a pastor's innocent child who is deemed worthy of bearing "the new Messiah"; and Adonis Jensen, the son of roving thieves, who refuses to learn how to steal because of "his compassion for mankind." In Part II, which ends at 1939, these four become couples: Carl and Amalie have a golden child, Carsten, for a son, while Anna and Adonis produce rebellious Maria; in the final section, Carsten and Maria marry and have children of their own. The characters are as vivid and believable as they are eccentric; unfortunately, they become somewhat buried under an over-staged plot, which seems intent on reflecting every trend of the 20th century, itself fated to bear "the weight of so many dreams that refuse to amalgamate." Luckily, Hoeg's use of a casual first-person narrative voice to frame the story infuses humor and a certain earthy wisdom into his philosophical musings.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In a series of linked vignettes that move from 16th-century aristocratic arrogance to 20th-century social crisis, Hoeg offers a wildly inventive account of Danish history. He opens with the story of Carl Laurids, a steward's son at the manor of Morkhoj, where time has stood still for four centuries following a decree from the count. Amalie Teander, scion of a newspaper family whose matriarch cannot read but magically predicts the future; Anna Bak, a parson's daughter who seems to be one of God's elect; Adonis Jensen, who veers from the family profession of thievery?all are remarkable creations embedded in an ornate, carefully observed text. In the book's second half, these characters link up in explosive combinations. While profoundly different in style from the suspenseful Smilla's Sense of Snow (LJ 8/93) and Borderland (LJ 8/94), a hard-edged social fable, this new novel?actually, the author's first, though the third published here?sustains Hoeg's attack on conformity and social injustice. A dark but brilliant fairy tale; highly recommended.
-?Barbara Hoffert, "Library Journal"
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Readers of Hoeg's best-selling Smilla's Sense of Snow (1993) are in for a surprise if they expect this novel to grip them the way Smilla did. Whereas that book, and Hoeg's second novel published in the U.S., Borderliners (1994), combine twisting, open-ended thriller plots with compelling philosophical ruminations on such abstract issues as time and solitude, this more ambitious but less successful work leaves out the thriller plot and replaces it with a tangled, multigenerational saga spanning four centuries of Danish history and attempting to chart the effect on the citizenry's inner lives of the move from a medieval society to a modern welfare state. The characters, ranging from an obsessed landowner in the sixteenth century, who attempts to stop time while he searches for the secret to the universe, to a master criminal who fails in passing along his talent to his son, are saddled with so much symbolic baggage that they are never able to emerge as individuals or make us feel their pain. Significantly, this book was Hoeg's first novel, published in Denmark before either Smilla or Borderliners. That is exactly how it reads--as the awkward but intermittently brilliant attempt of a uniquely talented writer to funnel his overarching vision of life in the twentieth century into a form that can support it and into a narrative that can make it breathe. The breathing is labored here, but the vision still sparkles: unlike so many modern writers who are only willing to work on a small scale, Hoeg wants to tackle the big issues in a big way. If his Dickensian ambition leads inevitably to illusions of grandeur, it also leads to Smilla a near-perfect melding of form, content, and character. Smilla's fans will want to read this book, too, but they are likely to be disappointed when Hoeg's reach exceeds his grasp. Bill Ott

Edition details

• Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0374171386
• ISBN 13: 9780374171384
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 356