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    STUDIA PHILOLOGIA - Issue no. 3 / 2000  
         
  Article:   OLE EDVART RØLVAAG: EN AMERIKANSK FORFATTER SOM SKREV PÅ NORSK / OLE EDVART RØLVAAG: AN AMERICAN AUTHOR WHO WROTE IN NORWEGIAN.

Authors:  ORM OVERLAND.
 
       
         
  Abstract:  Ole Edvart Rølvaag: An American Author Who Wrote in Norwegian. Rølvaag, who immigrated to the United States from Norway in 1896 at the age of 20, insisted that Norwegian-American literature was not a provincial Norwegian literature, but American literature even though it was not written in English. Except for elementary school, Rølvaag’s education was American and he became a professor of Norwegian at St. Olaf College, one of the many colleges founded by Scandinavian immigrants in the Midwest and West. His first four novels were published in Minneapolis and show a development from a concern with the Norwegian emigrant experience to a focus on an ethnic American experience. His breakthrough came with his novel in two volumes about pioneers on the prairies of northeastern South Dakota, I de dage… (1924) and Riket Grundlægges (1925), that were published in Norway. This paved the way for American recognition and they were translated and published in one volume as Giants in the Earth in New York in 1927. This novel focuses on the contrasting characters of a married couple, Per and Beret Holm, and their very different reactions to the pioneer experience. Two other novels conclude the trilogy, Peder Victorious (1929) and Their Fathers’ God (1931), and they focus on the challenges that face the second generation.  
         
     
         
         
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