“Tove Ditlevsen has been my companion ever since. Also because of her life and her way of coping with life. Her fearlessness on all channels.” In this short video, the commended Norwegian writer Vigdis Hjorth quotes and talks about two writers – Tove Ditlevsen and Bertolt Brecht – who have been immensely important to her.
Hjorth’s grandparents were Danish, and one of the few books on their shelf was Danish writer Tove Ditlevsen’s childhood memoirs ‘Childhood’ (Barndom, 1967). This was the first adult book that Hjorth read, and it made a huge impact on her, not only because of Ditlevsen’s strength “but also her many tragedies…” German playwright and poet Bertolt Brecht has also been a great inspiration to Hjorth, not least due to his vast societal insight: “He is a master at summing up complex political issues in short sentences and poems.”
Vigdis Hjorth (b. 1959) is a Norwegian writer, who has published a large selection of novels, essays and children’s books since 1983. Her 20th novel ‘Arv og Miljø’ (Inheritance and Environment) was nominated for the Nordic Council’s Literature Prize 2017. The book deals with a family’s bitter inheritance dispute – and incest. The accusations about the father in the book led to intense debate in Norway about the boundaries between fiction and reality.
Vigdis Hjorth was interviewed by Anette Dina Sørensen at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark in May 2017.
Camera: Jakob Solbakken
Edited by: Klaus Elmer
Produced by: Marc-Christoph Wagner
Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2018
Supported by Nordea-fonden
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