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Klappentext Plangently Hamsum writes about the joys! sufferings and unrequited love of a middle-aged man who abandons the literary cafe life for the wanderings (in search of "wisdom about people") of a seasonal laborer at the turn of the century. Two short novels comprise The Wanderer! whose protagonist is Knut Pederson (Hamsun's real name) and there's a six-year lapse between their events. The first concerns how he comes to fall in love with the "Madame" of the manor where he's employed as a workman. The sequel is a sensational development of their repressed relationship! the decline of her "bored but faithful" marriage! her fall from virtue with a persistent young man and climactic suicide! and seems to be in part a response to Ibsen's much earlier Doll's House. Her story is narrated in tandem through Knut's good but dim-witted mates and the other peasants and servants. Much of the plot is unspoken and conveys a sense of strangeness about human nature equivalent to the mystery of the seasons and the soil. Age is a repeated theme as Knut finds himself "playing on muted strings" at fifty. This is vintage Hamsun - subtle and resonant - (1906 and 1909 - midway between the early novels and Growth of the Soil! which was cited for his Nobel Prize in 1920)! written in the autumn of his career - a welcome translation of a great modern master. (Kirkus Reviews) Zusammenfassung In the two closely related short novels which make up this title! Hamsun reaches the peak of his achievement. The narrator! in search of the simple life! wanders around Norway! his quest continually frustrated by the women he meets.
