DITLEVSEN, TOVE.
Barndommens Gade (i.e. English: "The Street of Childhood").
København, Athenæum, 1943.
8vo. Uncut in the original printed wrappers. Illustration on front wrapper by Arne Ungermann. With dedication from the author to front free end-paper: "Niels Høst / Med venlig Hilsen / Tove Ditlevsen / 4-12-43". (i.e. English: "Niels Høst / With kind regards / Tove Ditlevsen / 4-12-43"). Bookseller-label pasted on to verso back-wrapper. Light miscolouring to spine, otherwise very fine and clean.
First edition, with author’s presentation inscription, of Ditlevsen’s magnum opus, perhaps her most read and beloved book. Ditlevsen is considered one of the most important and unique voices in twentieth-century Danish literature and many of the themes she touches upon rings a universal bell. Her works are particularly valuable as they dramatize the consequences of locking women into marriage, into the roles of wife and mother. A main theme in Ditlevsen’s authorship is class, but despite the proletarian milieu, the theme in Barndommens Gade is more that of gender. “The narrator shows solidarity in her account of a working-class childhood, but she nevertheless lets the central character judge the milieu from the perspective of middle-class values. This is especially true of the outspoken and brutal attitude to sexuality – which the narrator calls “unclean” – on the street and in the backyard. “Rough hands grope the body and bare it to the fleeing gaze.” When menstruation sets in, the “uncleanliness” enters the child’s world: “one morning, the mothers’ bloody inheritance comes with shame and harm to the untouched”." (Lise Busk-Jensen, The Labyrinth of Memory) In 2021, The New York Times, The New Yorker and The Guardian elected Tove Ditlevesen's recently translated "The Copenhagen Trilogy” as book of the year and celebrated Ditlevsen as one of the most important authors in 20th century literature.
The book was made into a film in 1986 under title “Early Spring”.
Order-nr.: 60206
DKK 18.500,00