Failed Seductions: Crises of Masculinity in Knut Hamsun's Pan and Knut Faldbakken's Glahn
2001; University of Illinois Press; Volume: 73; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2163-8195
Autores Tópico(s)Literature, Film, and Journalism Analysis
ResumoO, I shall furnish a book this time, unexpected, unknown. Punktum. Knut Hamsun (Naess 418) HAD KNUT HAMSUN known the current meaning of the word he would probably have chosen a different expression to point out the unique and innovative character of his novel Pan to his German publisher Albert Langen. Nevertheless, the term seems appropriate in an ironic way. It evokes the questions of sexual identity and sexual deviation that are crucial for an understanding of the ways in which masculinity is perceived in this novel, which has correctly been labeled panerotic This article is partially an attempt to show how and why Pan lends itself to a reading that in modern terms could indeed be called a queer reading. In 1985, Knut Faldbakken published in his novel Glahn a rewriting of Pan that transports the setting and the events to contemporary Oslo. His declared intention was to show the predicaments of contemporary masculinity and to deconstruct the dangerously romantic ideals of masculinity in Knut Hamsun's work. This article will discuss what roles sexuality and sexual perversion play in the two novels and how they relate to each other. After a brief presentation of the two novels, I will discuss the ways in which masculinity and sexuality are treated in both texts and the ways that they are connected to different discursive contexts. I will next proceed to the relation between masculinity and writing in the texts and finally draw conclusions concerning the relationship between the two male authors Faldbakken and Hamsun. The main narrative of Hamsun's novel Pan consists of Lieutenant Glahn's idyllic yet melancholic memories of a summer that he spent in northern Norway two years before. He lives in a cabin in a small fishing community, hunts his own food, and configures himself as a true child of nature. He is approached by and falls in love with Edvarda, the daughter of the powerful tradesman Mack. After a few passionate weeks, their relationship changes to a constant dance between the poles of attraction and repulsion. Glahn becomes entangled in his jealousy toward the doctor whom he suspects is his rival and toward a Finnish baron, a scientist, who later marries Edvarda. Glahn then turns to a relationship with the loving and submissive Eva, the blacksmith's wife who is also Mack's lover. Consequently, Mack gradually withdraws the privileges that he had granted Glahn. After Eva is killed in an accident caused by Mack and Glahn, Glahn leaves Nordland. The second part takes place two years later in India, where Glahn lives with a fellow hunter, who narrates the second part. He finally shoots Glahn in a scene of jealousy and rivalry. Faldbakken's Glahn relates to Hamsun's novel on two levels. First, it takes up the love stories involving Glahn and Edvarda and Glahn and Eva and the rivalry between Mack and Glahn. It transports these events to Oslo of the 1980s. Secondly, the narrator Glahn at the time of the writing is a patient in a mental hospital where he reads Hamsun's novel, which his Edvarda has sent him. Aside from these changes in place and time, Faldbakken modifies the relationships between the persons in Hamsun's novel in characteristic ways. In the following remarks, I will discuss two of these changes which are especially important for questions on masculinity and sexuality in both texts. A GAME ALL BOYS PLAY -- DENIED HOMOSEXUALITY, VIOLENCE, AND DEATH The first modification concerns the relationship between Mack and Glahn. Faldbakken not only amalgamates certain traits of Mack and the doctor from Hamsun's novel into the figure of Mack, he also gives the relationship between the two men overtly homosexual overtones. Their sexual relationship goes back to the time when they both served in the military. Glahn remembers the following scene: Jeg har et orend inne hos Mack. Jeg vil lane penger av ham. Han ligger pa koya og studerer et fotografi. …
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