We lie like longing beside the footpaths.
We lie like fear above the hurrying highway where life goes to waste, where man hurries and hurries after emptiness. We are beside the houses in which they shut themselves away: the fortresses they have built in order to shut themselves in with their brief joys.
We are the thin, complaining wind that brushes past, searching for what cannot be present.
We are the wind behind the wind—that searches in defiance, in case something is to be found all the same.
We are where everyone is, and where no one was. We search night after night.
Whispering: ‘Can you see it?�They agree not to tell anyone what they’re found—Aud is the driving forced there: “I do know that we’re not going to involve more people just yet. Someone needs all the miserable help we can give”—and return the next day to bury the baby only to be met by a girl ages with them, Valborg, who they learn was the child’s mother and whom they end up arranging to meet up with every few days over the next couple of weeks to talk and try to support but none of them really get anywhere; their conversations are strained and no one really opens up. The only significant thing that happens is, with the introduction of another girl (and a sexually active one at that), the bond between Aud and Torvil is put to the test.
Torvil nodded. He felt numbed.
Yes, he could see it, dimly in the half-light. Something that could only be a new-born, naked, lifeless child. It was lying under a few blackening twigs that had been awkwardly scraped together, ready to darken along with them.
It was a frightening sight when you had never imagined anything like it. The light fading around it made it seem even harder to bear.
Quick glances at each other.
‘Did you see it?�
‘Yes.�
[H]is work is characterized by simple, terse, and symbolic prose. His stories are often about simple rural people that undergo a severe psychological drama and who according to critics are described with immense psychological insight. Commonly dealing with themes such as death, guilt, angst, and other deep and intractable human emotions, the Norwegian natural landscape is a prevalent feature in his works.It’s a pretty decent description of how this novel plays out. There’s more than a touch of the Pinteresque here too. Never has the open countryside felt so enclosed and foreboding; it doesn’t help that much of the action takes place around dusk. There’s one scene, for example, where the three shelter under a tree:
They leant against the trunk. First stand and simply be aware of being together. But it was not possible. There was something about Valborg that prevented it; she was not open, but stiff and distant. On the other hand, the radiance over which she had no control was alive and active. Aud and Torvil were scared. They must make progress—bܳ how was it going to turn out?It’s oppressive. The dialogue too, as with Pinter, is sometimes clumsy and unnatural by today’s standards. describes it “like � two men sawing wood.�
The two of them stood trying to guess what was the matter with Valborg.
The tree was not so very thick after all: each of them had to face in a slightly different direction. […] Valborg in particular positioned herself so that she was looking at nothing besides the wet woods.
Paralleling the story, the form of the book as well moves out beyond narrative. Interpolated chapters are sunk, like vertical shafts, into the depths of life, into the blind, instinctual forces of nature, a Roethke‐like world of minute, creeping things and flowing waters and nightmare images of horror. These passages are often obscure and, one suspects, at times escape the writer's control; but they contain some of the most impressive language in the book.The quote of the cover from Literary Review calls the book a “masterpiece� but I didn’t feel like I’d read one when I was finished. It actually felt more like an experience rather than a straightforward story. I read The Birds a couple of years back which some regard as Vesaas’s best work—although The Ice Palace may be better known—bܳ I had much the same problem with it as I had with The Bridges. In my review I wrote:
I have to be honest here. I can see why people love this book but I failed to connect with it... So I don’t know. This book ticks so many boxes, things that I look for in an ideal read, but for some reason failed to hold my interest.The thing about both books is I feel I’m missing something. Vesaas is hugely popular in his home country so there must be something there. I have to say I did find Catherine Wilson’s essay helpful so maybe I’ll give him one more go.
