Inger Christensen’s Followers (148)

Inger Christensen

Born

in Vejle, Denmark

January 16, 1935

Died

January 02, 2009

Genre

Poetry, Literature & Fiction

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Inger Christensen was born in Vejle, Denmark, in 1935. Initially she studied medicine, but then trained as a teacher and worked at the College of Art in Holbæk from 1963–64. Although she has also written a novel, stories, essays, radio plays, a drama and an opera libretto, Christensen is primarily known for her linguistically skilled and powerful poetry.

Christensen first became known to a wider audience with the volumes "Lys" (1962; Light) and "Græs" (1963; Grass), which are much influenced by the modernistic imagery of the 60s, and in which she is concerned with the location of the lyric "I" in relation to natural and culturally created reality. The flat, regular landscape of Denmark, its plants and animals, the beach, the sea, the snow-f Inger Christensen was born in Vejle, Denmark, in 1935. Initially she studied medicine, but then trained as a teacher and worked at the College of Art in Holbæk from 1963–64. Although she has also written a novel, stories, essays, radio plays, a drama and an opera libretto, Christensen is primarily known for her linguistically skilled and powerful poetry.

Christensen first became known to a wider audience with the volumes "Lys" (1962; Light) and "Græs" (1963; Grass), which are much influenced by the modernistic imagery of the 60s, and in which she is concerned with the location of the lyric "I" in relation to natural and culturally created reality. The flat, regular landscape of Denmark, its plants and animals, the beach, the sea, the snow-filled winters have determined the topography of many of her poems. Christensen has also been known internationally since the appearance of the long poem "Det" (1969; "it" 2006), a form of creative report on the merger of language and the world, which centres around the single word "it" and covers more than two hundred pages. The book clearly reveals the influence on Christensen's poetic work of such a range of authors as Lars Gustafsson, Noam Chomsky, Viggo Brøndal, R.D. Laing and Søren Kierkegaard. The analogy between the development of poetic language and the growth of life is, as in "Det", also the basic motif of the volume of poetry "Alfabet" (1981; Alphabet). In addition to the alphabet itself – which gives the book its title and provides a logical arrangement for its fourteen sections –, the structure is generated by the so-called Fibonacci series, in which every number consists of the sum of the preceding two. The composition reflects the theme exactly: while "Det" points to the story of creation and its "In the beginning was the Word", here the alphabet is a pointer to the "A and O" of the apocalypse.

The story of her life and work offers access to a poetry that is difficult and enigmatic, but simultaneously simple and elementary. Inger Christensen is one of the most reflecting, form-conscious poets of the present day, and her history of ideas also provides information on the paradox of lyric art; making legible through poetic means what must necessary remain illegible, and in this way wrestling a specific order from the universal labyrinth. Here the transitions between the poet and the essayist Christensen are fluid: just as lyrical figures and motifs give her essays a density of their own, figures of thought and configurations of ideas return as an organic component of the poems. ...more

Combine Editions
Inger Christensen’s books

Average rating: 4.26 · 6,067 ratings · 676 reviews · 73 distinct works • Similar authors

	alphabet by Inger Christensen, Susanna Nied (Translator) 4.35 avg rating — 2,439 ratings — published 1981 — 27 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Butterfly Valley: A Requiem by Inger Christensen, Susanna Nied (Translator) 4.33 avg rating — 1,409 ratings — published 1991 — 19 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	it by Inger Christensen, Susanna Nied (Translator), Anne Carson (Introduction) 4.46 avg rating — 620 ratings — published 1969 — 19 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Condition of Secrecy by Inger Christensen, Susanna Nied (Translator) 4.14 avg rating — 234 ratings — published 2000 — 5 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Azorno 4.05 avg rating — 207 ratings — published 1967 — 9 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Brev i april 4.05 avg rating — 125 ratings — published 1979 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Light, Grass, and Letter in April (New Directions Paperbook) by Inger Christensen, Susanna Nied, Johanne Fosse 4.02 avg rating — 113 ratings — published 1989 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Lys 3.68 avg rating — 110 ratings — published 1962 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Samlede digte 4.63 avg rating — 87 ratings — published 1999 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Painted Room: A Tale of Mantua by Inger Christensen, Denise Newman (Translator) 3.58 avg rating — 110 ratings — published 1976 — 13 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

More books by Inger Christensen…

Quotes by Inger Christensen (?)

“doves exist, dreamers, and dolls;
killers exist, and doves, and doves;
haze, dioxin, and days; days
exist, days and death; and poems
exist; poems, days, death”
― Inger Christensen, alphabet

tags: existence, poetry

15 likes

“Happiness is the change that comes over me
when I describe the world
It comes over the world
Happiness is the change that comes over me
when I'm afraid
It comes over the world
For instance I can be afraid of and for the world
afraid because the world consists among other things
of me so swiftly dying”
― Inger Christensen, it

11 likes

“There's something specific
about the doves' way
of living my life
as a natural result

of today since it's raining”
― Inger Christensen, alphabet

tags: doves, life, peace, rain, today

5 likes

See all Inger Christensen's quotes »

Polls

June 2024 Short Story/Novella Poll

The Overcoat by Nikolai Gogol

59 votes, 25.1%

Philomel Cottage: A Short Story by Agatha Christie

46 votes, 19.6%

Cousin Phillis by Elizabeth Gaskell

39 votes, 16.6%

Diary of a Superfluous Man by Ivan Turgenev

27 votes, 11.5%

The Wonderful O by James Thurber

26 votes, 11.1%

A Wagner Matinee by Willa Cather

20 votes, 8.5%

Butterfly Valley: A Requiem by Inger Christensen

18 votes, 7.7%

235 total votes

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