Norvik Press is pleased to announce the forthcoming publication of much-awaited titles. From a stark portrayal of contemporary Greenlandic society to new classics by Lagerlöf and Skram, 2025 is set to be a year of fresh discoveries and exciting reading in the company of Norvik Press!
Sørine Steenholdt: Zombieland
Sørine Steenholdt (b. 1986)
Translated from Greenlandic into Danish by Niviaq Korneliussen
Illustrated by Maja-Lisa Kehlet Hansen
Translated from Danish into English by Charlotte Barslund
Zombieland (Zombiet Nunaat) is cold comfort. Violent events occurring in already vulnerable lives are the turning points for Sørine Steenholdt’s powerful short stories, and it can be hard to distinguish between fantasy and reality. Rape, suicide, drug abuse, fires and car theft … few are spared. It is social criticism that gets under your skin.
Originally published in Greenlandic in 2015, Zombieland was nominated for The Nordic Council Literature Prize in 2016. The book is a collection that combines short stories with short sections of poetry. All texts can be seen as allegories that critique Greenlandic society. Some condemn the older generation of Greenlanders who fell into alcohol abuse and neglected their children. Others express the younger generation’s refusal to be represented as subservient to Denmark. While alcoholism has decreased, and sovereignty has been claimed, the memories of the suffering and betrayal of the older generation remain. All of Steenholdt’s stories emphasise the flaws of contemporary Greenland such as poor journalism, untrustworthy leadership, ineffective social institutions and a dysfunctional legal system making Steenholdt’s Greenland a ‘Zombieland’ – a place where no-one is in control.
Norvik Press are delighted to announce that this translation is the recipient of a Pen Translates award.
Tasiilaq, Greenland (Carl Skou)
Selma Lagerlöf: A Kaleidoscope of Stories
Selma Lagerlöf (1858-1940)
This new addition to our well-established ‘Lagerlöf in English’ series will turn the spotlight on the power of short stories. The volume contains a selection of Lagerlöf’s matchless stories covering a range of themes, genres and periods of her career. Norvik’s prize-winning trio of Lagerlöf translators, Linda Schenck, Peter Graves and Sarah Death, has enjoyed a fruitful collaboration working on this project.
This is a collection of interest to general readers but also a useful teaching tool for Swedish and comparative literature courses around the world. The book includes a comprehensive and accessible introduction by Lagerlöf specialist Bjarne Thorup Thomsen (University of Edinburgh). The nine stories have been arranged into three thematic sections: Women and Writing; Landscapes, Families and ‘Others’; Epochs, Societies and Values.
Key autobiographical pieces, morality tales both dark and light, legends from several lands and folklore-inspired narratives combine to reveal the breadth and stylistic range of Lagerlöf’s storytelling skills.
Norvik Press ‘Lagerlöf in English’ Series
Amalie Skram: Sjur Gabriel and Two Friends
Port of Bergen, late 19th Century (Bergen University Library Collections)
Port of Bergen, late 19th Century (Bergen University Library Collections)
The two short novels Sjur Gabriel and To Venner (Two Friends), both published in 1887, are inspired by Amalie Skram’s early years in the bustling port of Bergen in Western Norway. The eponymous central character of Sjur Gabriel is a subsistence farmer struggling to make a living for himself and his family in the barren countryside, and to stop his wife from drinking to forget her misery. When their son Little-Gabriel is born, life seems brighter for some years – but the fragile hope for the future is threatened when the boy becomes seriously ill.
Two Friends focuses on the story of Sivert, the grandson of Sjur Gabriel. He is an apprentice in Bergen, but haunted by the presence of his grandparents, both of whom wander round the streets of Bergen as grotesque drunks. In order to escape he goes to sea as a cabin boy on the bark Two Friends, where he soon thrives on life at sea on a long voyage to Jamaica. When two Frenchmen come on board with their menagerie of exotic animals to transport back to France, he is befriended by them and becomes indispensable as interpreter and companion; but his inherited flaws of character soon reveal themselves and lead him to gamble away his chance of a better life.
Amalie Skram (1846-1905)
These novels are the first two in a series of four usually referred to as Hellemyrsfolket (The People of Hellemyr). The following two novels, S.G. Myre (1890) and Afkom (Descendants, 1898) follow the story of the family through the next generation in Bergen, as they try to free themselves from the taint of the past and make a better life for themselves and their families.
These two novels are translated from the Norwegian by Janet Garton, who has written a biography of the author and published several volumes of her letters. Also available from Norvik Press are Amalie Skram’s novels Lucie (1888), Fru Inés (1891) and Betrayed (1892), all translated by Katherine Hanson and Judith Messick.