PAN E-Book

Knut Hamsun

• Herausgeber: Lebooks Editora
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Serie: Prêmio Nobel
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Seitenzahl: 210

Beschreibung

Pan is an evocative exploration of isolation, nature, and the emotional turbulence of human desire. Knut Hamsun delves into the mind of Lieutenant Thomas Glahn, a solitary man living in the wilderness of northern Norway, who forms a complex and destructive attachment to Edvarda, a woman from a nearby village. Through Glahn's interactions with the natural world and his tumultuous relationship with Edvarda, Hamsun presents an introspective look at the thin line between passion and self-destruction. Since its publication, Pan has been acclaimed for its raw portrayal of psychological conflict and the profound effects of solitude on the human spirit. Hamsun's vivid descriptions of the Scandinavian wilderness mirror Glahn's inner struggles, making nature both a refuge and a reflection of his mind. This unique narrative style, often associated with Hamsun's early works, has influenced existential and modernist literature deeply, leaving an enduring impact. The novel remains relevant due to its introspective view on human nature and its exploration of the complexities of love and obsession. By delving into Glahn's psyche and his interactions with the natural world, Pan raises timeless questions about identity, the pursuit of happiness, and the often-destructive nature of unrestrained passion.

Leseprobe

Knut Hamsun

PAN

Contents

INTRODUCTION

PAN

GLAHN'S DEATH

A DOCUMENT OF 1861

INTRODUCTION

Knut Hamsun

1859 – 1952

Knut Hamsun was a Norwegian author and Nobel laureate, celebrated as one of the most innovative and controversial figures in modern literature. Born in the rural town of Lom, Norway, Hamsun’s work captures the complexities of human psychology and the tensions between individual desires and societal expectations. His novels often delve into themes of isolation, irrational impulses, and the connection between people and nature, influencing generations of writers and redefining the literary landscape.

Early Life and Education

Knut Hamsun was born Knud Pedersen, the fourth of seven children in a poor farming family. Due to financial struggles, his family moved to the northern coast of Norway, where Hamsun spent his formative years. Largely self-taught, Hamsun showed an early passion for literature, writing his first poems and stories as a young man. In his twenties, he traveled to America twice, working a variety of jobs that exposed him to different social classes and lifestyles. These experiences enriched his worldview and later inspired many of his literary works, which often reflect a critical view of industrialized society and urban life.

Career and Contributions

Hamsun’s writing style broke with traditional literary forms of the 19th century, focusing instead on the interior lives and fragmented consciousness of his characters. His novel Hunger (1890) is widely regarded as his breakthrough work and is considered a precursor to modernist literature. The story follows an impoverished writer in Oslo who undergoes intense psychological and physical deprivation, capturing a raw and intimate portrayal of the human psyche that fascinated readers worldwide.

Among Hamsun’s other notable works are Pan (1894), which explores the natural world and the primal instincts of its characters, and Growth of the Soil (1917), for which he won the Nobel Prize in Literature. This novel, a homage to rural life, extols the virtues of simplicity and self-sufficiency in nature and reflects Hamsun’s skepticism toward industrial progress. His ability to portray the complexities of human motives with poetic yet sparse language set him apart as a master of psychological narrative.

Impact and Legacy

Hamsun’s influence on modern literature is profound. He inspired writers such as Franz Kafka, Thomas Mann, and Ernest Hemingway, who admired his unique portrayal of subjective experience and psychological depth. However, his reputation remains controversial due to his vocal support of Nazi Germany during World War II, which led to a decline in his standing post-war. Despite this, his contributions to literature continue to be acknowledged, and he is credited with pioneering narrative techniques that shaped 20th-century fiction.

Hamsun’s characters often struggle against societal constraints, embodying the tension between civilization and primal nature. His narrative style, rich in introspection and ambiguity, resonates with existentialist and modernist themes, making his work a vital part of the literary canon despite the complexities surrounding his legacy.

Knut Hamsun passed away in 1952 at the age of 92. His literary achievements continue to captivate readers and scholars alike, though his political views cast a shadow on his legacy. Today, Hamsun’s work is studied as both a remarkable contribution to modernist literature and a complex reflection of the turbulent social issues of his time. Despite the controversies, Hamsun’s exploration of human emotions and instincts endures, offering a profound and unsettling vision of the human experience that remains relevant in contemporary literature.

About the Work

Pan is an evocative exploration of isolation, nature, and the emotional turbulence of human desire. Knut Hamsun delves into the mind of Lieutenant Thomas Glahn, a solitary man living in the wilderness of northern Norway, who forms a complex and destructive attachment to Edvarda, a woman from a nearby village. Through Glahn’s interactions with the natural world and his tumultuous relationship with Edvarda, Hamsun presents an introspective look at the thin line between passion and self-destruction.

Since its publication, Pan has been acclaimed for its raw portrayal of psychological conflict and the profound effects of solitude on the human spirit. Hamsun’s vivid descriptions of the Scandinavian wilderness mirror Glahn’s inner struggles, making nature both a refuge and a reflection of his mind. This unique narrative style, often associated with Hamsun’s early works, has influenced existential and modernist literature deeply, leaving an enduring impact.

The novel remains relevant due to its introspective view on human nature and its exploration of the complexities of love and obsession. By delving into Glahn’s psyche and his interactions with the natural world, Pan raises timeless questions about identity, the pursuit of happiness, and the often-destructive nature of unrestrained passion.

PAN

I

These last few days I have been thinking and thinking of the Nordland summer, with its endless day. Sitting here thinking of that, and of a hut I lived in, and of the woods behind the hut. And writing things down, by way of passing the time; to amuse myself, no more. The time goes very slowly; I cannot get it to pass as quickly as I would, though I have nothing to sorrow for, and live as pleasantly as could be. I am well content withal, and my thirty years are no age to speak of.

A few days back someone sent me two feathers. Two bird's feathers in a sheet of note-paper with a coronet, and fastened with a seal. Sent from a place a long way off; from one who need not have sent them back at all. That amused me too, those devilish green feathers.

And for the rest I have no troubles, unless for a touch of gout now and again in my left foot, from an old bullet-wound, healed long since.

Two years ago, I remember, the time passed quickly — beyond all comparison more quickly than time now. A summer was gone before I knew. Two years ago, it was, in 1855. I will write of it just to amuse myself — of something that happened to me, or something I dreamed. Now, I have forgotten many things belonging to that time, by having scarcely thought of them since. But I remember that the nights were very light. And many things seemed curious and unnatural. Twelve months to the year — but night was like day, and never a star to be seen in the sky. And the people I met were strange, and of a different nature from those I had known before; sometimes a single night was enough to make them blossom out from childhood into the full of their glory, ripe and fully grown. No witchery in this; only I had never seen the like before. No.

In a white, roomy home down by the sea I met with one who busied my thoughts for a little time. I do not always think of her now; not any more. No; I have forgotten her. But I think of all the other things: the cry of the sea-birds, my hunting in the woods, my nights, and all the warm hours of that summer. After all, it was only by the merest accident I happened to meet her; save for that, she would never have been in my thoughts for a day.

From the hut where I lived, I could see a confusion of rocks and reefs and islets, and a little of the sea, and a bluish mountain peak or so; behind the hut was the forest. A huge forest it was; and I was glad and grateful beyond measure for the scent of roots and leaves, the thick smell of the fir sap, that is like the smell of marrow. Only the forest could bring all things to calm within me; my mind was strong and at ease. Day after day I tramped over the wooded hills with Æsop at my side, and asked no more than leave to keep on going there day after day, though most of the ground was covered still with snow and soft slush. I had no company but Æsop; now it is Cora, but at that time it was Æsop, my dog that I afterwards shot.

Often in the evening, when I came back to the hut after being out shooting all day, I could feel that kindly, homely feeling trickling through me from head to foot — a pleasant little inward shivering. And I would talk to Æsop about it, saying how comfortable we were. "There, now we'll get a fire going, and roast a bird on the hearth," I would say; "what do you say to that?" And when it was done, and we had both fed, Æsop would slip away to his place behind the hearth, while I lit a pipe and lay down on the bench for a while, listening to the dead soughing of the trees. There was a slight breeze bearing down towards the hut, and I could hear quite clearly the clutter of a grouse far away on the ridge behind. Save for that, all was still.

And many a time I fell asleep there as I lay, just as I was, fully dressed and all, and did not wake till the seabirds began calling. And then, looking out of the window, I could see the big white buildings of the trading station, the landing stage at Girilund, the store where I used to get my bread. And I would lie there a while, wondering how I came to be there, in a hut on the fringe of a forest, away up in Nordland.

Then Æsop over by the hearth would shake out his long, slender body, rattling his collar, and yawning and wagging his tail, and I would jump up, after those three or four hours of sleep, fully rested and full of joy in everything ... everything.

Many a night passed just that way.

II

Rain and storm — 'tis not such things that count. Many a time some little joy can come along on a rainy day, and make a man turn off somewhere to be alone with his happiness — stand up somewhere and look out straight ahead, laughing quietly now and again, and looking round. What is there to think of? One clear pane in a window, a ray of sunlight in the pane, the sight of a little brook, or maybe a blue strip of sky between the clouds. It needs no more than that.

At other times, even quite unusual happenings cannot avail to lift a man from dulness and poverty of mind; one can sit in the middle of a ballroom and be cool, indifferent, unaffected by anything. Sorrow and joy are from within oneself.

One day I remember now. I had gone down to the coast. The rain came on suddenly, and I slipped into an open boathouse to sit down for a while. I was humming a little, but not for any joy or pleasure, only to pass the time. Æsop was with me; he sat up listening, and I stopped humming and listened as well. Voices outside; people coming nearer. A mere chance — nothing more natural. A little party, two men and a girl, came tumbling in suddenly to where I sat, calling to one another and laughing:

"Quick! Get in here till it stops!"

I got up.

One of the men had a white shirt front, soft, and now soaked with rain into the bargain, and all bagging down; and in that wet shirt front a diamond clasp. Long, pointed shoes he wore, too, that looked somewhat affected. I gave him good-day. It was Mack, the trader; I knew him because he was from the store where I used to get my bread. He had asked me to look in at the house any time, but I had not been there yet.

"Aha, it's you, is it?" said Mack at sight of me. "We were going up to the mill, but had to turn back. Ever see such weather — what? And when are you coming up to see us at Sirilund, Lieutenant?"

He introduced the little black-bearded man who was with him; a doctor, staying down near the church.

The girl lifted her veil the least little bit, to her nose, and started talking to Æsop in a whisper. I noticed her jacket; I could see from the lining and the buttonholes that it had been dyed. Mack introduced me to her as well; his daughter, Edwarda.

Edwarda gave me one glance through her veil, and went on whispering to the dog, and reading on its collar:

"So, you're called Æsop, are you? Doctor, who was Æsop? All I can remember is that he wrote fables. Wasn't he a Phrygian? I can't remember." A child, a schoolgirl. I looked at her — she was tall, but with no figure to speak of, about fifteen or sixteen, with long, dark hands and no gloves. Like as not she had looked up Æsop in the dictionary that afternoon, to have it ready.

Mack asked me what sport I was having. What did I shoot mostly? I could have one of his boats at any time if I wanted — only let him know. The Doctor said nothing at all. When they went off again, I noticed that the Doctor limped a little, and walked with a stick.

I walked home as empty in mind as before, humming all indifferently. That meeting in the boathouse had made no difference either way to me; the one thing I remembered best of all was Mack's wet shirt front, with a diamond clasp — the diamond all wet, too, and no great brilliance about it, either.

III

There was a stone outside my hut, a tall grey stone. It looked as if it had a sort of friendly feeling towards me; as if it noticed me when I came by, and knew me again. I liked to go round that way past the stone, when I went out in the morning; it was like leaving a good friend there, who I knew would be still waiting for me when I came back.

Then up in the woods hunting, sometimes finding game, sometimes none...

Out beyond the islands, the sea lay heavily calm. Many a time I have stood and looked at it from the hills, far up above. On a calm day, the ships seemed hardly to move at all; I could see the same sail for three days, small and white, like a gull on the water. Then, perhaps, if the wind veered round, the peaks in the distance would almost disappear, and there came a storm, the south-westerly gale; a play for me to stand and watch. All things in a seething mist. Earth and sky mingled together, the sea flung up into fantastic dancing figures of men and horses and fluttering banners on the air. I stood in the shelter of an overhanging rock, thinking many things; my soul was tense. Heaven knows, I thought to myself, what it is I am watching here, and why the sea should open before my eyes. Maybe I am seeing now the inner brain of earth, how things are at work there, boiling and foaming. Æsop was restless; now and again he would thrust up his muzzle and sniff, in a troubled way, with legs quivering uneasily; when I took no notice, he lay down between my feet and stared out to sea as I was doing. And never a cry, never a word of human voice to be heard anywhere; nothing; only the heavy rush of the wind about my head. There was a reef of rocks far out, lying all apart; when the sea raged up over it the water towered like a crazy screw; nay, like a sea-god rising wet in the air, and snorting, till hair and beard stood out like a wheel about his head. Then he plunged down into the breakers once more.

And in the midst of the storm, a little coal-black steamer fighting its way in...

When I went down to the quay in the afternoon, the little coal-black steamer had come in; it was the mail-packet. Many people had gathered on the quayside to see the rare visitor; I noticed that all without exception had blue eyes, however different they might be in other ways. A young girl with a white woolen kerchief over her head stood a little apart; she had very dark hair, and the white kerchief showed up strangely against it. She looked at me curiously, at my leather suit, my gun; when I spoke to her, she was embarrassed, and turned her head away. I said:

"You should always wear a white kerchief like that; it suits you well."

Just then a burly man in an Iceland jersey came up and joined her; he called her Eva. Evidently she was his daughter. I knew the burly man; he was the local smith, the blacksmith. Only a few days back he had mended the nipple of one of my guns...

And rain and wind did their work, and thawed away the snow. For some days a cheerless cold hovered over the earth; rotten branches snapped, and the crows gathered in flocks, complaining. But it was not for long; the sun was near, and one day it rose up behind the forest.

It sends a strip of sweetness through me from head to foot when the sun comes up; I shoulder my gun with quiet delight.

IV

I was never short of game those days, but shot all I cared to — a hare, a grouse, a ptarmigan — and when I happened to be down near the shore and came within range of some seabird or other, I shot it too. It was a pleasant time; the days grew longer and the air clearer; I packed up things for a couple of days and set off up into the hills, up to the mountain peaks. I met reindeer Lapps, and they gave me cheese — rich little cheeses tasting of herbs. I went up that way more than once. Then, going home again, I always shot some bird or other to put in my bag. I sat down and put Æsop on the lead. Miles below me was the sea; the mountainsides were wet and black with the water running down them, dripping and trickling always with the same little sound. That little sound of the water far up on the hills has shortened many an hour for me when I sat looking about. Here, I thought to myself, is a little endless song trickling away all to itself, and no one ever hears it, and no one ever thinks of it, and still, it trickles on nevertheless, to itself, all the time, all the time! And I felt that the mountains were no longer quite deserted, as long as I could hear that little trickling song. Now and again, something would happen: a clap of thunder shaking the earth, a mass of rock slipping loose and rushing down towards the sea, leaving a trail of smoking dust behind. Æsop turned his nose to the wind at once, sniffing in surprise at the smell of burning that he could not understand. When the melting of the snow had made rifts in the hillside, a shot, or even a sharp cry, was enough to loosen a great block and send it tumbling down...

An hour might pass, or perhaps more — the time went so quickly. I let Æsop loose, slung my bag over the other shoulder, and set off towards home. It was getting late. Lower down in the forest, I came unfailingly upon my old, well-known path, a narrow ribbon of a path, with the strangest bends and turns. I followed each one of them, taking my time — there was no hurry. No one waiting for me at home. Free as a lord, a ruler, I could ramble about there in the peaceful woods, just as idly as I pleased.

All the birds were silent; only the grouse was calling far away — it was always calling.

I came out of the wood and saw two figures ahead, two persons moving. I came up with them. One was Edwarda, and I recognized her, and gave a greeting; the Doctor was with her. I had to show them my gun; they looked at my compass, my bag; I invited them to my hut, and they promised to come someday.

It was evening now. I went home and lit a fire, roasted a bird, and had a meal. To-morrow there would be another day...

All things quiet and still. I lay that evening looking out the window. There was a fairy glimmer at that hour over wood and field; the sun had gone down, and dyed the horizon with a rich red light that stood there still as oil. The sky all open and clean; I stared into that clear sea, and it seemed as if I were lying face to face with the uttermost depth of the world; my heart beating tensely against it, and at home there. God knows, I thought to myself, God knows why the sky is dressed in gold and mauve to-night, if there is not some festival going on up there in the world, some great feast with music from the stars, and boats gliding along river ways. It looks so! — And I closed my eyes, and followed the boats, and thoughts and thoughts floated through my mind...

So more than one day passed.

I wandered about, noting how the snow turned to water, how the ice loosed its hold. Many a day I did not even fire a shot, when I had food enough in the hut — only wandered about in my freedom, and let the time pass. Whichever way I turned, there was always just as much to see and hear — all things changing a little every day. Even the osier thickets and the juniper stood waiting for the spring. One day I went out to the mill; it was still icebound, but the earth around it had been trampled through many and many a year, showing how men and more men had come that way with sacks of corn on their shoulders, to be ground. It was like walking among human beings to go there; and there were many dates and letters cut in the walls.

Well, well...

V

Shall I write more? No, no. Only a little for my own amusement's sake, and because it passes the time for me to tell of how the spring came two years back, and how everything looked then. Earth and sea began to smell a little; there was a sweetish, rotting smell from the dead leaves in the wood, and the magpies flew with twigs in their beaks, building their nests. A couple of days more, and the brooks began to swell and foam; here and there a butterfly was to be seen, and the fishermen came home from their stations. The trader's two boats came in laden deep with fish, and anchored off the drying grounds; there was life and commotion all of a sudden out on the biggest of the islands, where the fish were to be spread on the rocks to dry. I could see it all from my window.

But no noise reached the hut; I was alone, and remained so. Now and again, someone would pass. I saw Eva, the blacksmith's girl; she had got a couple of freckles on her nose.

"Where are you going?" I asked.

"Out for firewood," she answered quietly. She had a rope in her hand to carry the wood, and her white kerchief on her head. I stood watching her, but she did not turn round.

After that I saw no one for days.

The spring was urging, and the forest listened; it was a great delight to watch the thrushes sitting in the tree-tops staring at the sun and crying; sometimes I would get up as early as two in the morning, just for a share of the joy that went out from bird and beast at sunrise.

The spring had reached me too, maybe, and my blood beat at times as if it were footsteps. I sat in the hut, and thought of overhauling my fishing rods and lines and gear, but moved never a finger to any work at all, for a glad, mysterious restlessness that was in and out of my heart all the while. Then suddenly Æsop sprang up, stood and stiffened, and gave a short bark. Someone coming to the hut! I pulled off my cap quickly, and heard Edwarda's voice already at the door. Kindly and without ceremony she and the Doctor had come to pay me a visit, as they had said.

"Yes," I heard her say, "he is at home." And she stepped forward, and gave me her hand in her simple girlish way. "We were here yesterday, but you were out," she said.

She sat down on the rug over my wooden bedstead and looked round the hut; the Doctor sat down beside me on the long bench. We talked, chatted away at ease; I told them things, such as what kinds of animals there were in the woods, and what game I could not shoot because of the closed season. It was the closed season for grouse just now.

The Doctor did not say much this time either, but catching sight of my powder-horn, with a figure of Pan carved on it, he started to explain the myth of Pan.

"But," said Edwarda suddenly, "what do you live on when it's closed season for all game?"

"Fish," I said. "Fish mostly. But there's always something to eat."

"But you might come up to us for your meals," she said. "There was an Englishman here last year — he had taken the hut — and he often came to us for meals."

Edwarda looked at me and I at her. I felt at the moment something touching my heart like a little fleeting welcome. It must have been the spring, and the bright day; I have thought it over since. Also, I admired the curve of her eyebrows.

She said something about my place; how I had arranged things in the hut. I had hung up skins of several sorts on the walls, and birds' wings; it looked like a shaggy den on the inside. She liked it. "Yes, a den," she said.

I had nothing to offer my visitors that they would care about; I thought of it, and would have roasted a bird for them, just for amusement — let them eat it hunter's fashion, with their fingers. It might amuse them.

And I cooked the bird.