Review -Copenhagen Trilogy

US book cover, via Thriftbooks

If you haven’t heard of Tove Ditlevsen before this book that’s understandable.  And if you are wondering why you should a read a one volume trilogy by Danish poet/novelist who was born in 1917 and died in 1976, who lived in a largely homogenous society, and whose experiences in wartime Denmark take a backseat to the interior and familial drama, the answer is pretty simple.

               The complete and brutal honesty.  The fact that we are still dealing with addiction today.

               The trilogy is comprised of “Childhood”, “Youth,” and “Dependency”.   

Vesterbero, Copenhagen

               In “Childhood, Ditlevsen writes, “Childhood is a long and narrow, like a coffin, and you can’t get out of it on your own” (27).  Her family live in Vesterbro in Copenhagen.  At the time it was a poor area, and in fact, one of the neighbors is a prostitute.  Her family is poor, work is unsure, and if her father goes on welfare, he loses the right to vote.  Education is  luxury, and well, girls do not get to be poets. She is an outsider in both school and family, though it does offer glimpses of hope, like her brother.  The reader does wonder what the story of Ditlvsen’s parents, what brought them together.  Her mother is both a terror and a joy, and perhaps mother and daughter are more alike than Ditlevsen wants to admit.

               Stressful situation it is.

She ate here; so did I

               "Childhood and Youth" are about a poet struggling to overcome the hideous stacked deck arranged against her.  Both Childhood and Youth are harsh in their own way.  There is the causal violence, the family fighting, the sexism, the stress of finding a place to live, to afford a place to live.  The struggle for a lower class girl with a bare minimum of education  trying to get published.  Even when there is hope, there is always, at least in the reader’s mind, the coming of the Nazis.  There is also an increase in tempo and drive as she gets older.

 

              The most wrenching read is “Dependency” which refers to her addiction.  While many reviews have pointed out how harrowing she writes of addiction, it should also be noted that struggle to find an abortionist is equally so.  Not only for the search itself but also because of the time were the success of the marriage rests in large part on the women and her ability to please her husband, who in part blames her for his affair.  And the specter of addiction also raises the question of abuse.

Famous Elephant gate, Carlsberg Brewery

 

              It is not a happy read. Yet, it is a brutally honest read.  The strangest thing, perhaps, is almost the complete lack of mention the Occupation.  Ditlevsen herself notes this, wondering if it was perhaps the influence of her father.  But she is not untouched by the war – a friend dies, she loses an apartment because she is not a Nazi, she worries about her husband when he joins the Resistance.  One wonders if the intense focus on personal issues was also a way of shielding oneself.  And that loss is made all the more terrible when her addiction starts.  Ditlevsen herself is blunt about it, she speaks of never recovering, and how it becomes more than just her battle.

               It is an harrowing read, but important because her struggles are still struggles that we face today  - overcoming poverty, trying to be something in the face of our parents disapproval, the presence of addiction.

Tove Ditlevsen