The Classics with Klaus Rothstein: Hans Scherfig – EXTRA
FOR ANNUAL PASS HOLDERS ONLY – In this lecture series, we take an enthusiastic look at classic works from literary history that are worth remembering and rereading.
The Classics is the Diamond Club's very special lecture series, where literary critic and author Klaus Rothstein takes us on a journey into some of Denmark's greatest works of fiction. Each lecture is illustrated with archival photos, original manuscripts and the like from the library's collections, giving us completely new insights into literary history.
Hans Scherfig
We start this year's lecture series with the beloved visual artist and author Hans Christian Scherfig (1905-1979).
Hans Scherfig (1905-79) came to fiction through the visual arts, and with political roots in communism, he became one of the most significant satirists and social critics in modern Danish literary history.
As a writer, Hans Scherfig is best known for his novels The case of the missing clerk, The Stolen Spring, Idealists, The Scorpion and Frydenholm, in which he takes on important social pillars and institutions. Not least, his moral and razor-sharp criticism of the partisans of the occupation era is of great importance.
From Royal Danish Library's Special Collection we will retrieve the manuscripts for some of the original novels. Klaus Rothstein will, among other things, take a closer look at how Hans Scherfig, with formidable audacity, shaped his characters using authentic people as models, so that everyone knew who was being targeted.
The next two The Classics with Klaus Rothstein will come this fall and will be about the authors Agnes Henningsen (1868-1962) and Inger Christensen (1935-2009).
Previously, the authors Dea Trier Mørch, Tom Kristensen and Amalie Skram have been under loving treatment.
