Dorthea Dahl (March 20, 1881 – September 11, 1958) was a Norwegian-born American writer. Dahl has been recognized for her great contributions to Norwegian-American literature. She wrote numerous short stories for magazines, wrote and published collections of short stories and a novel.

Biography

Dahl was born at Osen in Åmot, previously Hedmark, now Innlandet, Norway. She was the daughter of Peder Person Dahl (1846–1925) and Lene Martinusdatter Ulvevadet Dahl (1839–1918). She came to America in 1883 at the age of two along with her parents and six older siblings. Her family initially lived in a homestead in Day County, South Dakota. In 1900, Dahl began at the State Normal School in Madison, Wisconsin, but the signs of tuberculosis prevented a future as a teacher. She briefly attended

St. Olaf College St. Olaf College is a private liberal arts college in Northfield, Minnesota. It was founded in 1874 by a group of Norwegian-American pastors and farmers led by Pastor Bernt Julius Muus. The college is named after the King and the Patron Saint Olaf ...

but starting during 1903 would spend her adult life in Kootenai County, near Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. She worked as an accountant for a grain firm, in various trading companies and insurance companies. Poor health thwarted her hopes of becoming a missionary, but she found consolation in taking part in temperance movement work. Religious by nature, Dahl was active within

Lutheran Church Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

organizations, including Daughters of the Reformation and the Rocky Mountain Women's Missionary Federation.

Writing career

Dorthea Dahl was equally competent in both the Norwegian and English languages. She began writing her many stories of small-town and farm immigrant life exclusively in Norwegian, publishing in a variety of periodicals. Dahl wrote several books and a number of short stories published in the Norwegian-American press, most notably in ''The Friend'', published in Minneapolis by

Nils Nilsen Ronning Nils Nilsen Ronning (also N. N. Rønning; May 19, 1870 – June 25, 1962) was an American author, journalist and editor. Background Nils Nilsen Rønning was born at Bø in Telemark, Norway. After he emigrated to America in 1887, he attended F ...

. Between 1917 and 1935, Dahl worked as a staff writer for two Norwegian language publications, the Christmas annual ''Jul i Vesterheimen'' and the Norwegian Lutheran Church publication ''Lutheraneren''. She published two collections of short stories. The first, ''Fra Hverdagslivet'', was written in Norwegian and translated as ''From Everyday Life''. For her second, ''Returning Home'', she wrote in English. ''Byen paa Berget'', her first novel was published in 1925 and was written in Norwegian. That book was later translated as ''The City Upon A Hill''. Dahl continued to write short stories for the rest of her life. Woven into Dahl's immigrant theme is always the conflict between service to others and pursuit of personal success. Dahl showed a pragmatic attitude to the many questions of Norwegian American assimilation and she was an early advocate of the use of English as a church language. She was honored by the Norwegian Society in America (''Det Norske Selskab i Amerika'') with its annual literary prize in 1918. She was a representative from the State of Idaho at the Norse-American Centennial in Minneapolis in June 1925.''Dorthea Dahl'' (Hilde Petra Brungot. Store norske leksikon)
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Selected bibliography

*'' Fra Hverdagslivet '' (Augsburg Publishing. Minneapolis, MN. 1915) *''Returning Home'' (Augsburg Publishing. Minneapolis, MN. 1920) *''Byen paa Berget'' ( Augsburg Publishing. Minneapolis, MN. 1925)

References

Other sources

*Brungot, Hilde Petra (1977) ''Dorthea Dahl: Norwegian American Author of Everyday Experience '' (University of Oslo thesis, Norwegian American Historic Association) * Øverland, Orm (1996) ''The Western Home: A Literary History of Norwegian America'' (Norwegian American Historical Association. University of Illinois Press. Chapter 19)

External links

The Promise of America
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Dahl, Dorthea 1881 births 1958 deaths American Lutherans 20th-century American novelists People from Sør-Trøndelag People from Åmot People from Day County, South Dakota People from Coeur d'Alene, Idaho Writers from South Dakota Novelists from Idaho Norwegian emigrants to the United States University of Wisconsin–Madison alumni St. Olaf College alumni American women novelists 20th-century American women writers 20th-century Lutherans