Books like The Emperor of Portugallia

I bow to Selma Lagerlöf! It is hard to describe what Selma Lagerlöf means to my understanding of literature. She has an obvious place on a piedestal since she was the first woman to be accepted into the Swedish Academy, and also the first to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Her work occasionally shows signs of her early teaching profession, most notably Nils Holgersson, which I still love to consult to teach students from all parts of the world about Swedish geography, so she means a lot for me in my own professional life.But that is not what she really is to me. Like Strindberg, she has provided endless Swedish sayings, and my father has a habit of quoting the opening lines of Gösta Berling after completing some physically exhausting task, with a sarcastic smile evoking the morally ambiguous character, who preaches drunk in his small Värmland community: "Äntligen stod prästen i predikstolen. (Finally, the priest stood on the pulpit)"Her stories are magical, and appealed to me as a child, drawing me into a universe of Swedish woods, harsh lives and magical stories to lighten up dark and heavy feelings. Whoever has spent childhood years in remote Swedish landscapes, between dark green trees, rocks, bushes and berries, will know that is natural to expect trolls, fairies and strange creatures to appear on the narrow paths. The woods are closing in on the human communities, on the shores of the lakes, on the rivers. Ronja The Robber's Daughter is as real to me as a walk in Swedish nature can be, smelling of moist vegetation, fighting for the sparse sun rays.Selma Lagerlöf, whose mansion Mårbacka in Sunne in Värmland evokes the stuff on which dreams and nightmares are made, had deep psychological insight into the traditions and stories of rural Swedish life, she understood more than most others the strange connectedness to nature that was an integral part of it. At the same time, she was a brilliant and modern mind, politically active, and she felt the choking atmosphere of tradition colliding with modern wishes for freedom and a wider horizon.In "The Emperor of Portugalia", this is heartbreakingly shown. It is the story of a young girl who wants to see the world but is held back by the endless love of her father. She breaks free, and her father never recovers from the pain of losing her. He retreats into a fantasy world, imagining a glamorous life for his daughter and losing touch with reality as a result.The tragic end brings the daughter back to the woods she escaped from. With her, she is carrying all the melancholy of not fitting in and not being able to adjust to the modern world of the bigger towns either. She is torn between her disgust for the ancient way of life and her inability to build a constructive future for herself, independently and freely. The story reminds me of Virginia Woolf's reflections on women and their struggles in A Room of One's Own, making the case that they simply lacked the time, space and financial means to rise to the same level of creativity as men, historically speaking. Woolf's anecdote, telling the story of a fictitious sister of Shakespeare, equally talented, but closed off from the stage that William could enter, reflects the anti-heroine in "The Emperor of Portugalia" and her dilemma. When I first read the story many years ago, I identified fully with her, even though she is not depicted in a favourable way, letting her parents down over and over again. It was her wish to embrace the world, at all costs, that made me understand her, relate to her. I had also wanted to flee the imposing, dark, lonely woods and the chains of family life.Now, however, with children becoming adolescents, getting ready to leave my nest in a couple of years, I cry with the father who is broken, looking fatally ill when he realises that his daughter does not want to stay, that she longs for the world beyond his horizons:"Jan gick krokig och såg dödssjuk ut. På rocken hade han mossa och jord. [...] hon längtade bort från dem ut i världen,... "I feel with the older generation now that time catches up with me. I guess that is one of those gifts you receive from world literature: the story grows with you, accompanies you and holds your hand on your life journey just like Virgil in Dante's The Divine Comedy.To make the connection between Astrid Lindgren's and Selma Lagerlof's family stories complete, I found myself crying hysterically when I read aloud to my children, some years ago, the lines, yelled out in desperation by Ronja's unruly father Mattis, when she moved out to a cave to escape his oppressing moods: "Jag har inge barn! (I have no child!)"So if I am standing here, lost in a dark forest, middle aged, looking for guidance how to approach this new experience in life, swapping from being young and adventurous to not-so-young and protective of my offspring, I hope to take these two wise ladies of Swedish literature by the hand, and slowly grow old in their way, climbing trees and telling mythical stories, in touch with the woods they grew up in and with the world they chose for themselves!I hope the "Emperor of Portugalia" with his broken heart and mind will have cathartic effects on generations of parents: love your children, nurture them, but set them free as well, so they will happily come flying back to the nest to check in on the life in the woods occasionally!Mattis managed to find the balance, with a lot of help from his wise wife Lovis:"JAG HAR MITT BARN! (I HAVE MY CHILD!)" echoes in the robber's woods for miles, when he and Ronja make peace and give Lindgren's version of "Romeo and Juliet" a happy ending, with a twist:Ronja and Birk upset their proud robber fathers with the official announcement that they will never be robbers themselves! An act of development...