International Writers Scene: Lars Saabye Christensen (NO)
Experience Lars Saabye Christensen talk about his great authorship based on the interaction between fiction and reality.
Lars Saabye Christensen, with his sharp and poetic depictions of growing up and feeling like an outsider in novels such as Beatles (1986) and Halvbroderen (2002), has established him as one of Norway's most important living writers. On the occasion of his latest and critically acclaimed novel Vrageren, the audience can meet him in The Black Diamond.
Oslo and the universe
Vrageren is a great literary self-portrait of a writer. The novel tells the story of a long life and moves in the borderland between reality and fiction.
Saabye Christensen is known for drawing on his own upbringing in Oslo in the 1960s in his novels. In them, Oslo unfolds as a whole universe - both through the writing and for Saabye Christensen's characters, who often fight to live happy lives despite the lonely feeling of not belonging. This is especially expressed in Vrageren – a novel about the choices we make and how we become who we are.
A generational author
This evening, Lars Saabye Christensen's entire writing will be scrutinised - from the Beatles (1986) and Halvbroderen (2002) to Byens Spor Quartet (2017-2021) and Vrageren (2024) - in a conversation about the exchanges between literature and reality.
"Criticism means "to judge" in ancient Greek, and now that this critic has to pick and choose, the recommendation is that you should treat yourself to this long, beautiful and twisted novel of life this autumn. This is masterful.”
Contributory
Lars Saabye Christensen
Lars Saabye Christensen is one of today's most significant figures on the Norwegian writers scene. He has won many awards for his writing, including the Nordic Council's Literature Prize in 2002 for the novel Halvbroderen.
International Authors' Stage
