Pagten: Mit venskab med Karen Blixen

by Thorkild Bjørnvig, Frans Lasson (Afterword)

Digteren Thorkild Bjørnvigs opsigtsvækkende erindringsbog der beskriver hans tætte og foruroligende venskab med Karen Blixen. En forbindelse, der efter fire år endte med et brud og fik personlige omkostninger for dem begge. PAGTEN fortæller om et utroligt venskab, en platonisk kærlighedshistorie mellem den karismatiske forfatterinde og den begavede lyriker.

Genres: Nonfiction, Literature, Danish

179 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1974

About the author

Thorkild Strange Bjørnvig was a Danish author and poet.

Reviews

[Carol]

Thorkild Bjørnvig's memoir of his time as Karen Blixen's special protegee reveals as much about his character as it does about hers -- and frankly, neither of them seems like someone you'd look up to. I had read Bjørnvig's book (in Danish) soon after it was written, and got to meet him when he came to Madison, WI to talk about it. At the time I was a bit starstruck, and was impressed by the role he played in the life of one of Denmark's most famous writers. But in re-reading the book decades later, it seems a bit...sad. Blixen had great talent and a very complicated life, and she found in the young Bjørnvig a disciple willing to ignore his wife and child in order to bask in her glow. I look forward to talking about the book with my Danish book group, although I'll have to be frank about the fact that this time I gave up and re-read the second half in English.

Please note that I don't use the star rating system, so this review should not be viewed as a zero.

[HM · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty well written and more importantly pretty well translated.

This is a story from the later life of Karen Blixen aka Isak Dinesen [Out of Africa:]. It is about a pact of friendship between Blixen in her mid 60s and a young poet and scholar, Thor Bjornvig. Evidently, the naive, star-struck young protegee didn't realize that he was signing his soul away to the older writer and drama-queen who offered to mentor him. Her efforts at mentoring were something of the puppet-master and contrarian. And this poor guy just could not read her moods or thoughts at all. Through the last half of the book, I just kept rooting for him to "man-up'.

[Anna Rosenkrands · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ret intens roman, men også lidt langhåret - jeg vil ikke anbefale at lytte den. Jeg glæder mig til at se filmen i morgen!

[Peter Dedek · Rating 3 out of 5]

I first read The Pact years ago when I was in my twenties. Back then I was as entranced by Dinesen as Bjornvig. She was indeed an extraordinary writer and a fascinating character. Bjornvig, a lyric poet, looked to Dinesen not only for literary inspiration but saw her as a spiritual guide and as a presumably Platonic lover. When I first read the book I saw it in nearly religious terms: the pilgrim meeting his prophet.

When I reread the book I saw a different story, one of a man looking for external validation from a demanding and manipulative narcissist. Dinesen convinces Bjornvig that she can help him achieve his mystical fate as a great poet and as a kind of Nietzscheian superman if he follows her instructions on how to conduct his life. This process leads him to ignore his wife and son, have a heart breaking abortive extramarital affair and spend a lot of time at Rungstedlund, Dinesen’s ancestral home arguing with her. Dinesen was charismatic, wise, and brilliant. She was also overbearing, arbitrary, and vindictive. After a blissful interlude, Dinesen begins a years long process of luring Bjornvig in with good conversation, wine, and praise and then rejecting him over and over, in a pattern of encouraging and then insulting. It’s painful to read as he endures her cycles of praise and ridicule not realizing the behavior suggested that Dinesen had serious attachment issues. My second reading of the book shed a different light on Dinesen’s Out of Africa story and her relationship with her husband and also with her lover in Africa, Denys Finch Hatton. Perhaps Finch kept his distance from her not only because he was a free spirit loner type, but because she had played extensive emotional games with him as well.

I always have and will always continue to admire Dinesen and her work, but The Pact describes many disturbing and sad aspects of her personality and her life.

[Heidi Sun · Rating 4 out of 5]

Et andet blik på Karen Blixen. Kort bog men ufattelig rig på indhold

[Helle Vind Schultz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jeg må sige at den på mig, virkede som en slags ophøjet og pompøs navlepilleri.
Jeg forstår godt hvilket slags forhold de havde, at han havde hende på en piedestal og at hun prøvede at genskabe en fordums storhedstid, hvor hun havde nået geniets og kærlighedens højder.
Jeg tænker også, at hun sikkert havde flere skavanker, som var nået til hjernen, som det ofte sker med ældre mennesker, hvor filtreret ikke er der længere og alt hvad de føler og tænker bliver udtrykt uden hensyn til andres følelser. Nøjagtigt som Githa Nørby og en tante jeg havde engang. Hvis man kombinerer det med besiddertrang, hersketrang og grandiositet, så har man selvfølgelig en farlig cocktail.
Men jeg forstår ikke hvorfor Bjørnvig syntes at det skulle ud til Gud og hvermand?
Jeg sidder tilbage med en følelse af, at det burde han have holdt for sig selv, talt med sine nærmeste om det, eller en psykolog.
Jeg elsker Karen Blixen og synes lidt at bogen er for selvsmagende og unødvendig. Jeg behøver ikke at vide at hun tabte sutten til sidst.