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Out of the Darkness: Classic Short Fiction from Sweden
Not yet published
Expected 26 May 26A treasure chest of stories by Swedish authors from the 1880s to the 1950s, many appearing for the first time in English
In the late nineteenth century, Swedish romanticism gave way to vibrant new literary styles that flourished through the 1950s. Out of the Darkness is the first anthology to bring the short fiction of this golden age of Swedish literature to English readers, celebrating the country’s rich literary tradition and several of its most renowned authors. The stories in this volume (many in entirely new translations, and most never before published in English) reflect the arc of the short story in Sweden, from realism to symbolism to modernist experimentation, and stand as lyrical exemplars of the creativity and depth of Swedish literature.
Some stories explore themes of crime and refuge, others ask what makes life meaningful, and some challenge sexual and social constructs of their time. All are fueled by shadows—of evil, madness, or fate, eerie fantasy or grim reality. Including internationally famous authors like August Strindberg, Stig Dagerman, and Nobel laureate Selma Lagerlöf, Out of the Darkness also features writing by influential women such as Victoria Benedictsson and Agnes von Krusenstjerna, who are less familiar to English readers. A showcase of stylistic virtuosity and incisive social commentary, Out of the Darkness at last brings this remarkable period of Swedish prose into the light.
Contributors: Victoria Benedictsson, Hjalmar Bergman, Karin Boye, Stig Dagerman, Thorsten Jonsson, Agnes von Krusenstjerna, Selma Lagerlöf, August Strindberg, Hjalmar Söderberg.
In the late nineteenth century, Swedish romanticism gave way to vibrant new literary styles that flourished through the 1950s. Out of the Darkness is the first anthology to bring the short fiction of this golden age of Swedish literature to English readers, celebrating the country’s rich literary tradition and several of its most renowned authors. The stories in this volume (many in entirely new translations, and most never before published in English) reflect the arc of the short story in Sweden, from realism to symbolism to modernist experimentation, and stand as lyrical exemplars of the creativity and depth of Swedish literature.
Some stories explore themes of crime and refuge, others ask what makes life meaningful, and some challenge sexual and social constructs of their time. All are fueled by shadows—of evil, madness, or fate, eerie fantasy or grim reality. Including internationally famous authors like August Strindberg, Stig Dagerman, and Nobel laureate Selma Lagerlöf, Out of the Darkness also features writing by influential women such as Victoria Benedictsson and Agnes von Krusenstjerna, who are less familiar to English readers. A showcase of stylistic virtuosity and incisive social commentary, Out of the Darkness at last brings this remarkable period of Swedish prose into the light.
Contributors: Victoria Benedictsson, Hjalmar Bergman, Karin Boye, Stig Dagerman, Thorsten Jonsson, Agnes von Krusenstjerna, Selma Lagerlöf, August Strindberg, Hjalmar Söderberg.
184 pages, Hardcover
Expected publication May 26, 2026
About the author
Vendela Vida
110 books503 followersVendela Vida is the award-winning author of four books, including Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name and The Lovers, and a founding editor of The Believer magazine. She is also the co-editor of Always Apprentices, a collection of interviews with writers, and Confidence, or the Appearance of Confidence, a collection of interviews with musicians. As a fellow at the Sundance Labs, she developed Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name into a script, which received the Sundance Institute/Mahindra Global Filmmaking Award. Two of Vida’s novels have been New York Times Notable Books of the year, and she is the winner of the Kate Chopin Award, given to a writer whose female protagonist chooses an unconventional path. She lives in Northern California with her husband and two children, and since 2002 has served on the board of 826 Valencia, a nonprofit writing and tutoring lab for youth.
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January 15, 2026Most of the stories were short and made sense but some were quite wild such as with "A Thousand Years with God" which makes no sense at all having the sailmaker go into the water in the U.K. and end up in Bergen Norway. It was not enjoyable to me.
April 9, 2026
"Didn't even the purest and strongest of people ultimately also need a little imagination to live on? A little myth and superstition?"
I really wanted to like those stories but many of them simply weren’t to my taste—too abstract, too long, too confusing for me to grasp the full meaning. Still, I’m grateful to the editors and translators for bringing a bit of Swedish literature from the late 19th to the mid-20th centuries to readers of the English language. Besides, I would definitely like to read more of Agnes von Krusenstjerna, Victoria Benedictsson, and Karin Boye’s works in the future. Thanks to University of Minnesota Press via NetGalley for the ARC!
I really wanted to like those stories but many of them simply weren’t to my taste—too abstract, too long, too confusing for me to grasp the full meaning. Still, I’m grateful to the editors and translators for bringing a bit of Swedish literature from the late 19th to the mid-20th centuries to readers of the English language. Besides, I would definitely like to read more of Agnes von Krusenstjerna, Victoria Benedictsson, and Karin Boye’s works in the future. Thanks to University of Minnesota Press via NetGalley for the ARC!
March 24, 2026
Out of the Darkness is a wonderful collection. Like all collections, it has ups and downs, and at times seems to drag on, while at other seems to fly by. I think as a reader you must anticipate this as be prepared for a book which is a mixed-bag of enjoyment. Ultimately, there is more good than bad, and it’s a collection that makes for a great read over several weeks or months in the midst of other works.
In the interest of leaving a complete and fair review, I’ve reviewed each short story individually. While I had more to say on some than others, I hope the below captures the collection and my thoughts on it and compels you to read these wonderful translations.
***
***
The Gates
We follow a patient coming home from an asylum. Von Krusenstjerna captures the uncertainty of that moment quite brilliantly. There’s a rigidity in the writing itself that allows the reader to hold the same distance from the world as the main character and feel the otherness she perceives compared to the people in her life. She was taken out of society and now has been just as suddenly dropped into it, and we follow along in her fragility. Holding the same foreboding at the possibility she might shatter.
***
Out of the Darkness
This is a clearly and beautifully portrayed exposition on misogyny and the ways in which womanhood can be something both experienced and foreign to an individual. Interesting in the context of genderqueerness but isn’t necessarily about that although she describes how her lack of affinity with her gender makes her feel at times “neutral”. Perhaps not the most riveting of plots, but there a lot packed into a little and it’s overall a very successful vignette.
***
Stories
The sketch in India ink
Honestly this is sometimes how it felt to be in art class and have to critique other peoples drawings…. #relatable
***
The Fur Coat
I fear Dr. Henck had a very bad day…. There’s something so perfectly captured when he greets his wife. The language used reflects the moment his heart cracks down the middle in such a marvelous way. The fur coat as a symbol of the ways in which we attribute to things meanings which they don’t hold and so on.
***
The Wages of Sin
This one was good. It captured the betrayal and disappointment and subsequent devastation quite nicely.
***
Drizzle
Love love love some allegory and allusions. And the last sentence of this is perfect. No notes.
***
A Dog Without a Master
This is such a moving snippet of grief. It captures the uncertainty of how to feel, the moments that slip away, and those flashes of remembrance that bring back the pain anew.
***
The Kiss
Not my favorite of the collection, but there’s some nice portrayals of the fickleness of affection and infatuation in this one.
***
The Shadow
I can’t say I really understood this one
***
Prelude
This captured something so specific about childhood. Those adventures and misadventures which form fragments of our memories so often lack any kind of cause or resolution. Instead, it is the fleeting sensations, the overall haze of the experience that stays and forms the core of the memory in our minds.
You remember the dinner table but not the dinner, nor whether you finally ate the food. You remember being lost, but not how you were found, remember that there was a dress-up party, but not who it was for.
They’re just impressions of years that at one time felt so all-encompassing and now have been reduced into a sliver of a thought.
***
What the Tree Swallow Sang in the Buckthorn Tree
The flow of the prose in this one was quite nice. I enjoyed the dream imagery and its parallel to its fulfillment. An interesting take on compassion and mercy not as the elimination of suffering and injustice but rather the ability for the labor born of injustice to grow into something that fulfills what once seemed an impossible kindness.
***
The Outlaws
I loved this one. It’s first and foremost a beautiful exposition on friendship and love, but there’s part that makes it so special is the way in which it speaks to the ways that religion often over emphasizes justice at the cost of mercy and forgiveness. What does it look like to repent? What is a just penalty for sin? Is it love to exact penance for a crime on earth rather than allowing judgment to be served in eternity?
***
Fleeing to Water and Morning
Very unfortunate vampire moment for that man.
***
To Kill a Child
A devastating topic written so well. You feel the dread the moment and the despairing hopelessness so vividly, and like the man in the car, there is nothing you can do.
***
The General’s Ring
The classic story of - the more you think about not doing something, the more likely you become to do it.
***
The Silver Lake
Although a bit confusing in places, this one had a lot that was wonderful. A play almost on the Cassandra curse with a mix of self-fulfilling prophesy and foresight too soon.
***
A Clown’s Catechism
Unfortunately, this was both one of (if not) the longest works in this collection and was also my least favorite. It just kept going and the story itself had too little movement to hook me. It dragged on and on and then when I thought it was finally over, there was a part two that was almost worse.
***
Streetcar and Paradise
It is such an at times distressing realization that in almost every instance, progress does result in the lifeless replacing the living. And while, as the man whose thoughts we follow notes, this does result in a reduction in servitude and enforced degradation, it also results in a colder future. It results in a future more removed from humanity and from flesh. There is a delicate balance between ease and comfort and emptiness. Humanity perhaps has yet to find the point at which they meet. We teeter back and forth between them in a ship that with waves of destitution and deprivation on all sides.
***
A Thousand Years with God
“Eternity makes him gag” - a banger…. But also the concept that miracles are a crime against the laws of the universe and are thus distressing and chaos-causing to humanity is an interesting one. In some ways, it makes sense - the almost divinity we assign to those who seem to be able to do or to have experienced the impossible, the lawlessness that so often accompanies the miraculous. I liked this one, although it had a few weak moments.
***
Half a Sheet of Paper
This one captures so so much in so little. It’s almost like the famous “baby shoes for sale, never worn” in its simplicity and impact. Truly a wonderful story that likely would all fit onto half a sheet of paper.
***
***
Thank you to University of Minnesota Press for providing this ARC for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
In the interest of leaving a complete and fair review, I’ve reviewed each short story individually. While I had more to say on some than others, I hope the below captures the collection and my thoughts on it and compels you to read these wonderful translations.
***
***
The Gates
We follow a patient coming home from an asylum. Von Krusenstjerna captures the uncertainty of that moment quite brilliantly. There’s a rigidity in the writing itself that allows the reader to hold the same distance from the world as the main character and feel the otherness she perceives compared to the people in her life. She was taken out of society and now has been just as suddenly dropped into it, and we follow along in her fragility. Holding the same foreboding at the possibility she might shatter.
***
Out of the Darkness
This is a clearly and beautifully portrayed exposition on misogyny and the ways in which womanhood can be something both experienced and foreign to an individual. Interesting in the context of genderqueerness but isn’t necessarily about that although she describes how her lack of affinity with her gender makes her feel at times “neutral”. Perhaps not the most riveting of plots, but there a lot packed into a little and it’s overall a very successful vignette.
***
Stories
The sketch in India ink
Honestly this is sometimes how it felt to be in art class and have to critique other peoples drawings…. #relatable
***
The Fur Coat
I fear Dr. Henck had a very bad day…. There’s something so perfectly captured when he greets his wife. The language used reflects the moment his heart cracks down the middle in such a marvelous way. The fur coat as a symbol of the ways in which we attribute to things meanings which they don’t hold and so on.
***
The Wages of Sin
This one was good. It captured the betrayal and disappointment and subsequent devastation quite nicely.
***
Drizzle
Love love love some allegory and allusions. And the last sentence of this is perfect. No notes.
***
A Dog Without a Master
This is such a moving snippet of grief. It captures the uncertainty of how to feel, the moments that slip away, and those flashes of remembrance that bring back the pain anew.
***
The Kiss
Not my favorite of the collection, but there’s some nice portrayals of the fickleness of affection and infatuation in this one.
***
The Shadow
I can’t say I really understood this one
***
Prelude
This captured something so specific about childhood. Those adventures and misadventures which form fragments of our memories so often lack any kind of cause or resolution. Instead, it is the fleeting sensations, the overall haze of the experience that stays and forms the core of the memory in our minds.
You remember the dinner table but not the dinner, nor whether you finally ate the food. You remember being lost, but not how you were found, remember that there was a dress-up party, but not who it was for.
They’re just impressions of years that at one time felt so all-encompassing and now have been reduced into a sliver of a thought.
***
What the Tree Swallow Sang in the Buckthorn Tree
The flow of the prose in this one was quite nice. I enjoyed the dream imagery and its parallel to its fulfillment. An interesting take on compassion and mercy not as the elimination of suffering and injustice but rather the ability for the labor born of injustice to grow into something that fulfills what once seemed an impossible kindness.
***
The Outlaws
I loved this one. It’s first and foremost a beautiful exposition on friendship and love, but there’s part that makes it so special is the way in which it speaks to the ways that religion often over emphasizes justice at the cost of mercy and forgiveness. What does it look like to repent? What is a just penalty for sin? Is it love to exact penance for a crime on earth rather than allowing judgment to be served in eternity?
***
Fleeing to Water and Morning
Very unfortunate vampire moment for that man.
***
To Kill a Child
A devastating topic written so well. You feel the dread the moment and the despairing hopelessness so vividly, and like the man in the car, there is nothing you can do.
***
The General’s Ring
The classic story of - the more you think about not doing something, the more likely you become to do it.
***
The Silver Lake
Although a bit confusing in places, this one had a lot that was wonderful. A play almost on the Cassandra curse with a mix of self-fulfilling prophesy and foresight too soon.
***
A Clown’s Catechism
Unfortunately, this was both one of (if not) the longest works in this collection and was also my least favorite. It just kept going and the story itself had too little movement to hook me. It dragged on and on and then when I thought it was finally over, there was a part two that was almost worse.
***
Streetcar and Paradise
It is such an at times distressing realization that in almost every instance, progress does result in the lifeless replacing the living. And while, as the man whose thoughts we follow notes, this does result in a reduction in servitude and enforced degradation, it also results in a colder future. It results in a future more removed from humanity and from flesh. There is a delicate balance between ease and comfort and emptiness. Humanity perhaps has yet to find the point at which they meet. We teeter back and forth between them in a ship that with waves of destitution and deprivation on all sides.
***
A Thousand Years with God
“Eternity makes him gag” - a banger…. But also the concept that miracles are a crime against the laws of the universe and are thus distressing and chaos-causing to humanity is an interesting one. In some ways, it makes sense - the almost divinity we assign to those who seem to be able to do or to have experienced the impossible, the lawlessness that so often accompanies the miraculous. I liked this one, although it had a few weak moments.
***
Half a Sheet of Paper
This one captures so so much in so little. It’s almost like the famous “baby shoes for sale, never worn” in its simplicity and impact. Truly a wonderful story that likely would all fit onto half a sheet of paper.
***
***
Thank you to University of Minnesota Press for providing this ARC for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
3.75 stars (I always find it harder to rate short story collections because there are so many different elements to consider outside of a traditional novel). This is a moving collection of newly translated Swedish short stories. Some were very short (only around a single page), while others were around 20 or so pages, and I really appreciated the varying lengths. I also felt it was very intentional how they ordered the stories and did not put all the stories by one author together, but spaced them out so you could experience new styles with each work.
I love the light existentialism and introspectiveness that felt threaded through several of these stories. There was some beautiful prose, and I also love that the translator for each work was named on the page with the story.
There were a few stories that felt a little long-winded or less inspired, but I truly enjoyed most of them.
Some standouts for me included:
Out of the Darkness - the titular story explores the meaning of womanhood from a woman raised by a misogynist.
The Shadow: short and poetic
Drizzle - a musing on human moral corruption in gloom (potentially my overall favorite from the collection!)
The Kiss - a more humorous take on a young couple navigating their first kiss and the fears and uncertainties of new beginnings
To Kill a Child and Half a Sheet of Paper were both heartbreaking and poignant. What a way to end this collection!
I have never read from any of these authors before, so it was great to get a small taste of their works, and there were several that I will be looking to return to in the future.
Thank you so much to the University of Minnesota Press and Netgalley for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
I love the light existentialism and introspectiveness that felt threaded through several of these stories. There was some beautiful prose, and I also love that the translator for each work was named on the page with the story.
There were a few stories that felt a little long-winded or less inspired, but I truly enjoyed most of them.
Some standouts for me included:
Out of the Darkness - the titular story explores the meaning of womanhood from a woman raised by a misogynist.
The Shadow: short and poetic
Drizzle - a musing on human moral corruption in gloom (potentially my overall favorite from the collection!)
The Kiss - a more humorous take on a young couple navigating their first kiss and the fears and uncertainties of new beginnings
To Kill a Child and Half a Sheet of Paper were both heartbreaking and poignant. What a way to end this collection!
I have never read from any of these authors before, so it was great to get a small taste of their works, and there were several that I will be looking to return to in the future.
Thank you so much to the University of Minnesota Press and Netgalley for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
This wonderful collection again proves that Scandinavian literature is so much more than noir crime. Although that seems to be a popular import, this carefully curated book of short fiction proves otherwise, including works by well known authors as well as those new to the average reader. There is a fair number of women writers too, and their works provide an astonishing modernity imbued with a healthy dose of feminism: "To be a woman is to be a pariah that can never rise out of her caste." Many contain that universal disquietude experienced at dusk: "Dusk is the hour of expectation. It makes your chest hurt." "...duskair that smells of pine needles and dew and evening and delinquent enigma." The stories are highly atmospheric, with a haunting quality that makes me long for more. I'll keep looking for further examples.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
These short stories were very much a book of two halves. I was really enjoying the stories in the first half of the collection including The Gates by Agnes von Krusenstjerna, The Fur Coat by Hjalmar Söderberg, Fleeing to Water and Morning by Thorsten Jonsson, To Kill A Child by Stig Dagerman and The General's Ring by Selma Lagerlöf.
However after the halfway mark the stories became much longer and more philosophical in nature and I was, frankly, baffled by all of them.
Thankyou to Netgalley and University of Minnesota Press for the digital review copy.
However after the halfway mark the stories became much longer and more philosophical in nature and I was, frankly, baffled by all of them.
Thankyou to Netgalley and University of Minnesota Press for the digital review copy.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Solid enough. The first third was really riveting, but then it felt like the momentum was lost in the rest. The prose in this however is very beautiful which is the great thing about works in translation.
Thank you to NetGalley and University of Minnesota Press for the ARC.
Thank you to NetGalley and University of Minnesota Press for the ARC.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Review of advanced copy received from NetGalley
I got bored so fast :( and couldn't get through it.
maybe I wasn't in the right mood and I'll give it another try in the future.
Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher and the author for the ARC in exchange for an honest opinion.
I got bored so fast :( and couldn't get through it.
maybe I wasn't in the right mood and I'll give it another try in the future.
Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher and the author for the ARC in exchange for an honest opinion.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Fantastic set of short fiction with a great plotting and impeccable vibes from the start to the end. However, some of them had a bit weak internal consistency. 4 stars. tysm for the E-ARC.
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