I just finished this and I am full of mixed feelings about the book. I am always appreciative of gorgeous prose and of character development, and the book has plenty of those-- almost too much at times. I felt so refreshed by the word pictures of the Italian Campagna and the sketches of weather, but the heroine is at once so vulnerable and influenceable, and yet so cloyingly self-absorbed I found her frustrating. Several times she comes close to the insights that could have saved her: that life isn't all about her, that love is an action verb and not something you sit around hoping will just happen, and that we are all broken beings and none of us capable of perfection...but she never quite gets there, with terrible consequences for her and people who actually care about her. Her somewhat privileged and decadent life was, in the end, so much lost potential.

I knew going in that this was going to be very different from the Kristin Lavransdatter trilogy (which I adore) or The Master of Hestviken, but it still carried intriguing glimpses into the lives of turn-of-the-last-century European youth and the art community. In several passages I felt my own thoughts expressed clearly. But I haven't lost hope, and have been rewarded although life is never ideal... so I feel a little frustrated with Jenny as a protagonist.

Still, the book is worth reading if you are a Sigrid Undset fan as a part of her oeuvre if you are interested in this remarkable author's development. If you only want to read her best, pass Go and go straight for Kristin Lavransdatter.

herregud

It could have been written by Edith Wharton with tragedy of centeral woman characters, well controlled prose and social-psychological insight. It might lack a bit in beautiful phrases but that might be just translation, otherwise fans of Edith Wharton will enjoy seeing Sigrid Undset do to European art class of her time but wharton does to American luxurious class of hers.

This novel made me feel miserable, but I loved every minute of it. It felt so modern that I kept flipping back to the publication information to confirm that it really was written in 1911.

Sigrid Undset writes beautifully about human freedom and choices, competing desires, the impossibility of complete fulfillment from human relationships, and the tension between creative work and family life. Like other things I've read by Undset, this book is almost ridiculously dramatic, but Undset's writing is so gorgeous that once I just let myself enter the story and the minds of the characters (and abandoned all hope of a happy ending) I found it startling realistic and very moving. This is definitely one of the best books I've read this year.

The writing was beautiful but the ending was soooo predictable

This is a heartbreaking story set in the distant past about a young Norwegian woman artist who is torn between her desire for self-development and her longing for true love. However, the values and principles behind the actions of the protagonist could well reflect the moral dilemma of many decent women of today with an educated mind. Is love or work more important?

Born to an unwholesome family where fatherly love is lacking, Jenny has always had to fend for herself while growing up. Her greatest attributes – independence, sense of responsibility, moral fortitude, diligence, compassion for the weak – could be her invincible armor against any adversity in life.

Just as she is set to go out and conquer the world, armed with artistic talent and an optimistic outlook on life, she trips up by making one small mistake – letting herself grow weak and be pampered by a short moment of tender love that she’s been long thirsting for Jenny falls in love first with Helge Gram but later realizes he is wrong for her. Then in a moment of weakness she falls for Helge’s father, who happens to want to embrace her with a consuming love, but whom she knows she can never truly love – and she loses all control over her own fate. She gets pregnant by Helge’s father, then leaves him to give birth to the baby, intending to raise it by herself. But unfortunately the baby dies six weeks after birth, which devastates her. She then reunites with one of her artist friends Gunnar Heggen, who declares his love for her. She wants to accept his love but at this time Helge reappears. Helge makes love to her.

During her fateful love affair and in the aftermath, her independence, sense of responsibility and moral principles drown her in an emotional ebb of guilt, remorse and shame and abandon her to carrying all blame on her shoulders. Her disinclination to hurt others sends her into a downward spiral, from which she never recovers. Her greatest attributes become her greatest curse. Her life is ironically ruined by her longing for true love.

Jenny said this to Gunnar, which sums up her life: “One day, I made a slight change in course. It seemed to me so difficult and harsh, living the life I thought was the most worthy – it was lonely, you know. So I veered away for a moment, wanting to be young and to play a little. And then I was caught in an undertow that carried me off, and I ended up in circumstances that I never for an instant imagined it would be possible for me to be anywhere near.”

The novel makes one wonder: can the female soul ever overcome the longing for true love? Are women in truth just like what Gunnar describes: “so strong and erect in her striving, and yet so frail and brittle.”?

This was a WILD book... Very engaging. Don't be put-off by Undset's conservative religiosity, she could write one hell of a story, (or several).

this book was first published in 1911. in 1928, undset won the nobel prize for literature. her earlier works, like jenny, trace the lives of young scandinavian women in a world that is still wrought with the responsibility for upholding traditional norms. jenny is about a starving artist, but not in the sense that the cliche brings to mind: she has a meager inheritance which she uses to survive. she is starving in the sense that she has yet to discover love. when she leaves her teaching position and family in norway, she travels to italy to paint. her talent is tremendous and she finds fellow country-men and -women who have also come to pursue their artistry. she works with full-hearted intensity in this community, but discovers that she desires to find true love. this impairs her vision of what she would like her life to be. she finds herself in a relationship with a fellow norwegian in sprintime. she tells herself that she is in love and they become engaged. but, when they return to norway from their italian paradise, their bond becomes strained and jenny realizes that she is not following a path that is true to her heart and her art becomes neglected. after an argument where jenny reveals that she is intending to go away for a short time, her fiance instead leaves her and she suffers from conflicted emotions: happiness to be free again and also sorrow for not having discovered love and the loss of helge. the story continues in a complicated set of events where she has an affair of sorts with her ex-fiance's father and becomes pregnant, then flees to berlin. undset was described as portraying women "sympathetically but with merciless truthfulness." jenny fits this description well and undet is able to clearly illustrate the confusion her protagonist feels with desiring an independant persona. in the end, jenny takes the pocketknife she bought in paris and slashes her wrist in her studio. she was held back by her past and couldn't let the feelings of hope and dreams of her earlier times in italy lead her through her sorrow.

Jenny, c'est le récit d'une femme tiraillée entre sa soif de liberté et d'indépendance, la volonté de vivre de son art et l'envie de vivre une histoire d'amour et de se conformer à ce que la société attend d'elle.

J'ai trouvé ce roman très bien écrit, fluide, je me suis laissée happée par les sentiments ambivalents de Jenny. Après la lecture de la 4ème j'en attendais peut-être encore plus, on nous vend une histoire d'émancipation féminine et finalement sa vie tourne énormément autour des hommes. Mais on comprend aussi que, publié en 1911, ce roman a fait scandale en mettant en scène une femme qui tente de penser pour elle-même, qui ose faire ses propres choix et privilégier ce dont elle a vraiment envie : un scandale !

Sigrid Undset a reçu le prix Nobel de littérature.
J'ai hâte d'en découvrir plus sur son œuvre.

It was a good book. Good-enough. Not the best book I’ve read and I had a few problems with it but otherwise it was still a cute and heartwarming read. Me and my mom chose for me to read it for school (I’m homeschooled) and I kind of skimmed a bit, even though it only took me two days to read the book, because I was ready to get onto something else but overall, I liked this book.

I read this just after my schipperke died because I knew there was a schip in the book. It was very sweet. I loved the eclectic professor mother, and my favorite part was the scene where they painted the walls.

I did love how they visited potential dogs they had no interest in, and then the perfect description of all schipperkes. If you know, you know!

Imponerende slutten!!

"De er så rare, sånne småbarns øyne-mystiske, hadde jeg nær sagt."

"Jeg har tid til å vente, for det er vidunderlig å elske slik."

"En kvinne iallfall-jeg synes en kvinnes liv er meningløst, når hun ikke er noens glede."

"Hun selv, hun levde i ham nu-hennes sjel og hennes billede stod speilet i ham, så klar og fast som i stille vann. Hun var død, hennes sorg var ikke mere i henne, men den var i ham-som levde den videre og ville ikke dø, før han døde selv. Og fordi den var levende, ville den vokse og forandres-han kunne ikke vite hvordan hans sorg ville se ut om ti år-men den kunne vokse til noe stort og deilig."