Selma Lagerlöf, the first woman and Swedish woman to receive the Nobel Prize, author of The Miraculous Journey, was born on November 20, 1858 in Mårbacka, Sweden.
The Nobel laureate was born in the wealthy Mårback estate in Värmland, bordering Norway. She was the fifth of six siblings. She was born with a hip joint injury, and at the age of three she suffered leg paralysis. Fortunately, the disease went away on its own after a while, but it affected her childhood. From an early age, she loved reading and wrote poetry. At the age of 10, she read the entire Bible, believing that this would make her sick father recover. He lived a further 17 years, but after his death the property was sold. Selma was so attached to her land that with Nobel Prize money she bought the manor and the adjacent lands and lived there for the rest of her life. But before that, she worked as a teacher and studied (against her father’s will) at the Royal College of Women.
Lagerlöf wrote many novels, but for some reason only a few were translated into Polish. In 1891, her debut book by Göst Berling was published , a fairy-tale collection of stories with elements of folk fantasy.
She paved the way for women’s literary talents in many fields. She was awarded the most famous literary award in 1909 “for the exalted idealism, vivid imagination and spiritual perception present in her writings.” She had been nominated many times before, but the then permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy did not want the woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. In 1914, she was also the first female person to become a member of the Academy. It was mentioned by Olga Tokarczuk in her Nobel Prize speech.
One of her most famous novels is Wonderful Journey , now a classic of children’s literature. A cruel dozen years old Nils finds the dwarf’s trail and wants to catch him. The elf casts a diminishing spell on him and the boy has to defend himself against the dangers awaiting him among domestic animals. He has many adventures and flies to Lapland on the back of a goose. During the journey, he grows up and changes his character.
The writer never got married. She formed a relationship with the famous writer Sophie Elkan, and at the same time with the feminist activist Valborg Olander. Selma corresponded with them for many years. She traveled a lot with Elkana, for example to the East (which resulted in the novel Jerusalem or Italy. In 1919 Svenska Biografteatern bought the rights to film adaptations of her books. Since then, the writer’s works have been screened many times.
The author also worked for women’s rights. In recognition of her services, Selma Lagerlöf’s image was on the 20 kroner banknote (1991-2016). in 2016, she was replaced by another famous Swedish woman I wrote about recently – Astrid Lindgren.
The writer died of a stroke in 1940.