Hans Herbjørnsrud (2 January 1938 – 15 November 2023) was a Norwegian author of

short stories A short story is a piece of prose fiction. It can typically be read in a single sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the old ...

. His works frequently play with the differences between Norwegian languages

Bokmål Bokmål () (, ; ) is one of the official written standards for the Norwegian language, alongside Nynorsk. Bokmål is by far the most used written form of Norwegian today, as it is adopted by 85% to 90% of the population in Norway. There is no cou ...

and

Nynorsk Nynorsk (; ) is one of the two official written standards of the Norwegian language, the other being Bokmål. From 12 May 1885, it became the state-sanctioned version of Ivar Aasen's standard Norwegian language (''Landsmål''), parallel to the Da ...

and the various Norwegian dialects. His stories' characters sometimes playfully mix and invent languages, sometimes become caught up in their linguistic games and start losing their identity.

Biography

Hans Herbjørnsrud was born in Heddal on 2 January 1938. He grew up on a remote farm in

Telemark Telemark () is a Counties of Norway, county and a current electoral district in Norway. Telemark borders the counties of Vestfold, Buskerud, Vestland, Rogaland and Agder. In 2020, Telemark merged with the county of Vestfold to form the county o ...

and became a farmer himself. After working as a teacher for some time, he started writing in his early forties and published his first collection of stories, ''Vitner'' (''Witnesses''), in 1979. This collection was recognized as the best literary début of the year with Tarjei Vesaas' debutantpris. Since then, he has published six more collections of stories, which have been well received by critics. Herbjørnsrud has been awarded several prizes for his work, including the prestigious ''Kritikerprisen'' in 1997, the ''

Dobloug Prize The Dobloug Prize (, ) is a literature prize awarded for Swedish and Norwegian fiction. The prize is named after Norwegian businessman and philanthropist Birger Dobloug (1881–1944) pursuant to his bequest. The prize sum is 4 * 150,000 Swedish crow ...

'' in 2005 and ''Aschehougprisen'' in 2005. He was nominated for

The Nordic Council´s Literature Prize The Nordic Council Literature Prize is awarded for a work of literature written in one of the languages of the Nordic countries, that meets "high literary and artistic standards". Established in 1962, the prize is awarded every year, and is worth ...

in 1998 and 2002. In 1999 Herbjørnsrud was nominated for the European Aristeion Prize. His short stories have been translated into several languages, including German, English, French, Russian and Hindi. Herbjørnsrud's playful mixing of dialects poses great challenges to translators; his most prolific story, ''Kai Sandemo'' (1997), has long been considered untranslatable to any other language. It tells the story of a murderer who flees his home in Telemark and settles in Denmark where he starts writing letters to people he grew up with – first in Danish, then, as he remembers more and more dark secrets of his past, gradually switching to Nynorsk, Bokmål and the dialect of Telemark until at the end, virtually every sentence becomes a complex mixture of various languages and dialects. An ambitious project undertaken by the universities of

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

and

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

worked on a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

translation of the story for several years and released a finished version in 2005. The team moved the story to

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

and substituted

standard German Standard High German (SHG), less precisely Standard German or High German (, , or, in Switzerland, ), is the umbrella term for the standard language, standardized varieties of the German language, which are used in formal contexts and for commun ...

Swiss German Swiss German (Standard German: , ,Because of the many different dialects, and because there is no #Conventions, defined orthography for any of them, many different spellings can be found. and others; ) is any of the Alemannic German, Alemannic ...

, Romansh and various Swiss dialects for the original's languages and dialects. Herbjørnsrud was married to Danish-born historian Anna Tranberg, former associate professor at Telemark University College in Bø. Their son, Dag Herbjørnsrud, is an author and journalist and currently an editor at the weekly news magazine ''

Ny Tid ''Ny Tid'' (English: ''Modern Times Review'') is Norway's largest international quarterly review of non-fiction books – up to 50 in each issue. It is currently owned by Ny Tid & Orientering AS. ''Ny Tid'' is headed by the newspaper founder ...

''. Hans Herbjørnsrud died on 15 November 2023, at the age of 85.Hans Herbjørnsrud (85) er død

Works

* Brønnene (''The Fountains'', 2006) ISBN 978-82-05-36064-8 * Samlede noveller (''Collected Short Stories'', 2003) ISBN 82-05-31274-5 * Vi vet så mye (''We know so much'', 2001) ISBN 82-05-27724-9 * Blinddøra (''The Blind Door'', 1997) ISBN 82-05-25262-9 * Eks og Sett (1992) ISBN 82-05-20699-6 * Han (''Him'', 1987) ISBN 82-05-17540-3 * Vannbæreren (''The Water Bearer'', 1984) ISBN 82-05-15039-7 * Vitner (''Witnesses'', 1979) ISBN 82-05-11827-2

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Herbjoernsrud, Hans 1938 births 2023 deaths People from Notodden Norwegian male writers Norwegian Critics Prize for Literature winners Norwegian male short story writers Dobloug Prize winners