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A House in Norway

de Vigdis Hjorth

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433581,229 (3.75)2
Tells the story of Alma, a divorced textile artist, who rents out an apartment in her old villa to a Polish family. Will it be possible for her to reconcile her desire to be tolerant and altruistic with the imperative need for personal space?
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Excellent novel. The character Alma is so thoroughly developed one is logically in her thought process but also able to see the human inconsistencies. The tensions between immigrants and natives, the tensions between landlord and tenant. The detail of her work as a tapestry artisan, it’s really very very good. The novel builds well and the climax is powerful.
  BookyMaven | Dec 6, 2023 |
An honest and brutal distillation of 21st century pathos. Brilliant. ( )
  philosojerk | Mar 19, 2023 |
For most of my reading of A House in Norway, I wasn’t thrilled with its story. It told of Alma, an older divorced woman who lived alone and worked on intricate tapestries she did on commission for companies and government agencies. In the book she becomes obsessed with the Polish family she’d rented the much smaller house next door to her own home in the countryside. The tenant’s husband seems abusive and eventually moves out. Alma became fixated on the all the things that the mother and child did wrong: using too much heat and hot water, parking in the wrong place, they’re too loud, leaving their stuff all around the property and its buildings, and so many other things.

Along the way, the landlady realizes she herself is also messy and noisy—a bad neighbor—but she’s the one in control, and after all, it’s her property and her country. She’s certainly not from Poland. She never states it overtly, but it’s always there, as she thinks about the tenant (Slawomira Bogumila Trzebuchwskai) as “the Pole.” Problems with the vaguely-drawn rental agreement slowly come to a head. Many texts, emails, and formal letters are exchanged between the two, and after months of nonpayment and few responses, her tenant finally and abruptly moves out.

For much of the time, the artist has been working on a grand tapestry about the country’s centenary celebration of women getting the vote in Norway. Her work will be going on a prestigious tour of the entire country and will surely lead to many more commissions. This tapestry tells the story of several actual people’s lives. The story of one particular foreign woman and her baby are told, but from incomplete information, as the requested information never came before she had to start stitching their story. Later she learns much more and has to quickly edit her stitching, just as the tenant problems are coming to a head.

Okay, even much abbreviated, this isn’t a fast-moving or engaging tale, much like the two other books I’ve read by this author. They haven’t demanded my attention until the end of their stories. With this book, the landlady starts having many misgiving about how she has handled the entire six-year relationship between herself and this Polish tenant. She feels guilt about this woman’s struggles in a country very foreign to her, with a sometimes absent and abusive husband, working poorly-paying jobs, with a child that needs a special diet, and all the stress caused by her landlady. After the tenant family has moved out, the final few pages reveal how Alma has started to see many things very differently.

“The days and the seconds, which were not hers alone but also communal property? Right now the Pole was living elsewhere and would never forget Alma. Alma was woven into the Polish woman’s psyche and that of little Izabela, who would probably live long after Alma had died, the image of Alma would live on in little Izabela as she grew up, and stay with her right until she died, because we remember those we have feared.”

“She hadn’t been observant enough, hadn’t realized that the mystery was right in front of her, right in front of her eyes. That the world and nature were unpredictable, and that if anything was boring and predictable, then it was her, the way she looked at things and her habits that made it so. That the potential lay in the ordinary, if only she could learn to see it. That the greatness which she longed for was right in front of her, right here, right now, that she already had everything she was looking for, if only she could give it her full attention. That every step she took was critical, that she came face to face with herself every single moment, she needed to realize that and see her own limitations and her weakness and her stupidity, because only those who lose their illusions, continue to learn. She had to bury her stupid wishes. From here on, she vowed, I will promote the earthly, ordinary life, the difficult, daily commitment.”

Hjorth’s writing is crafty. This book is almost entirely focused—until those brilliant final pages—on the everyday annoyances of “the Pole,” which are so troubling to Alma, a woman who carries a firm image of herself as a strong feminist, very open-minded, and a true liberal.

And then, on the last page, after rethinking the last six years, and having completely redone the entire rental unit, Alma signs new tenants, tenants who turn out to be—wait for it—Polish.

Hjorth is a very curious writer, one who creates such a unique timing in her books. I imagine there are some readers who wouldn’t make it through some parts, and would give up before the intriguing reveals that come in her stories’ conclusions. The next time I’m considering abandoning a book that isn’t working for me, I’m sure I’ll think about her books as a reason to keep on reading. And then, depending on how these future books turn out, I’ll either be thanking Hjorth or cursing her. ( )
  jphamilton | Jan 26, 2021 |
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Tells the story of Alma, a divorced textile artist, who rents out an apartment in her old villa to a Polish family. Will it be possible for her to reconcile her desire to be tolerant and altruistic with the imperative need for personal space?

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