Ich Bin Norwegian

Translated from Norwegian by Madeleine Dauer
Read by Madeleine Dauer
Length: 7 hrs and 34 mins

“I stared into the darkness outside the car. So dense it was when there were no reflections of the electric lighting the sky. No stars, no moon. Seen from the moon-glow from my rented German room the sky never got dark at all. Sometimes when sitting up all night I’d go out on the balcony that ran along the front of the building. I’d stand there and listen to the wind in the trees.”

I never really knew where I was in this book, and I don’t mean page number. Being alive in 2024 I am quite aware of time and place shifts in a piece of film or fiction. I like to think it’s part of our expanding creativity, but secretly suspect (and occasionally hope) it’s a literary fad.

Liv, the pastor lives in a small fishing village in far north Norway where she has relocated after losing her best friend Kristiane’s untimely death in Berlin. There, in Norway Liv faces and has ro deal with the trials and tribulations of her congregation.

That’s the plot, though it’s made more complicated by the reader never being quite sure of where she is. Within the course of one short paragraph we may be in Berlin or in Norway. Of course it’s fairly easy to work out, there being no fjords in Berlin, and we usually can see if they are around as Liv is prone to look out windows. But I’m being mean.

The Pastor is actually a fine novel. It’s beautifully written and the Nordic landscape is so delicately described with nuance. I felt that I was in a movie or poem, never a travelog. And though there’s little in the way of suspense, I was compelled to keep reading; in the end not bothering if I was in Berlin or a fishing village. Both places have teenagers with piercings and pastel-colored hair. Early on I thought the facial piercings were a clue as to location, but it seems, like time and place shifts, and so much else in this brave new world, that these too have become global.

I really enjoyed this book. ( )

This book was a tough one for me. A young woman goes to a remote part of Norway to be an assistant Pastor. It's clear she has ended up there in part to try to escape her demons. A friend/love of hers has committed suicide and she is haunted by it and grieving. But while she is in her new location, she finds people with just as many troubles.

I was so emotionally wrecked by this book that I had to skim parts of it. I suppose that says something positive about the quality of the writing, but I found the story claustrophobic and unrelentingly sad. It was just too much for me. ( )

Præsten af Hanne Ørstavik.
Forfatteren Hanne Ørstavik er forholdsvis ukendt i Danmark, men er efter sigende rimeligt velanset i hjemlandet Norge, hvor hun har fået en del priser. Tre af hendes romaner er oversat til dansk, heraf bl.a. Præsten (dansk udg. 2005).

Liv, en ung kvinde midt i 30’erne, tager til Norge langt nordpå til Sameland, for at arbejde som hjælpepræst. Hun flytter fra Tyskland, hvor hun studerede teologi - Livs gode veninde i Tyskland, Kristiane, begik selvmord, og den efterfølgende smerte får hende til at søge langt væk og starte forfra.

Det er langt fra alle i lokalsamfundet, der er villige til acceptere en kvindelig præst, og samtidig med at hun kæmper for at blive accepteret og skabe sig et netværk, må hun bruge meget af sin tid på krævende sorgarbejde, da en række selvmord finder sted og ripper op i gamle sår.

Der er en melankolsk og trist stemning gennem hele bogen – ikke anbefalet som let sommerferielæsning! Vil sikkert gøre sig godt til læsekredse og lign., da der er rum for diskussioner og fortolkninger, ikke mindst mht. en parallelhistorie omkring et sameoprør der fandt sted i 1800-tallet i samme lokalområde og en ikke altid krystalklar kobling til fortællingen om Liv.