Sign-In
Cart
A Fortunate Man
Paperback
Classic FictionGeneral Fiction
Publisher Price: $29.95
Please select the version of book you would like to purchase.
ISBN10: 1681379279
ISBN13: 9781681379272
Publisher: New York Review of Books
Published: Jun 10 2025
Pages: 880
Weight: 1.88
Height: 1.60 Width: 5.15 Depth: 7.94
Language: English
ISBN13: 9781681379272
Publisher: New York Review of Books
Published: Jun 10 2025
Pages: 880
Weight: 1.88
Height: 1.60 Width: 5.15 Depth: 7.94
Language: English
A Nobel Prize-winner's unforgettable novel about a man who sheds the stifling country life of his childhood for the excitement of Copenhagen. This masterpiece of Danish literature, admired by the likes of Georg Lukács and Ernst Bloch, is now available in a new English translation.
A Fortunate Man tells the story of Per Sidenius, a Lutheran pastor's son who revolts against his family and flees the backwaters of Jutland for Copenhagen. Per is handsome, ambitious, and hungry for the technological future of the twentieth century. He studies engineering and draws up plans for a new port and new canals, for harnessing wind and wave energy to transform Denmark into a commercial giant. Fully persuaded of his own genius, Per first repels and then attracts Jakobe Salomon, a young Jewish woman whose family is eager to underwrite his plans. They fall in love and get engaged; gradually Jakobe opens Per's eyes to the wider world. Meanwhile, he also falls under the spell of Dr. Nathan, a popular philosopher who rails against the conservative powers that be. But ultimately these powers win out, Per's relationship with Jakobe founders, and he goes home to Jutland and marries a pastor's daughter. Though fortunate, he is never happy. One of the last great nineteenth-century novels and Henrik Pontoppidan's masterpiece, A Fortunate Man anatomizes and skewers Danish society, from the small towns to the metropolis. Paul Larkin's dazzling translation brings out the wide range and full force of a novel admired by Georg Lukács and praised by Ernst Bloch as one of the foundational texts of world literature. This translation was funded in part by a grant from the Danish Arts Foundation.
A Fortunate Man tells the story of Per Sidenius, a Lutheran pastor's son who revolts against his family and flees the backwaters of Jutland for Copenhagen. Per is handsome, ambitious, and hungry for the technological future of the twentieth century. He studies engineering and draws up plans for a new port and new canals, for harnessing wind and wave energy to transform Denmark into a commercial giant. Fully persuaded of his own genius, Per first repels and then attracts Jakobe Salomon, a young Jewish woman whose family is eager to underwrite his plans. They fall in love and get engaged; gradually Jakobe opens Per's eyes to the wider world. Meanwhile, he also falls under the spell of Dr. Nathan, a popular philosopher who rails against the conservative powers that be. But ultimately these powers win out, Per's relationship with Jakobe founders, and he goes home to Jutland and marries a pastor's daughter. Though fortunate, he is never happy. One of the last great nineteenth-century novels and Henrik Pontoppidan's masterpiece, A Fortunate Man anatomizes and skewers Danish society, from the small towns to the metropolis. Paul Larkin's dazzling translation brings out the wide range and full force of a novel admired by Georg Lukács and praised by Ernst Bloch as one of the foundational texts of world literature. This translation was funded in part by a grant from the Danish Arts Foundation.
Also from
Pontoppidan, Henrik
The Apothecary's Daughters [Mimoser] Translated from the Danish by G. Nielsen.
Pontoppidan, Henrik
Nielsen, Gordius
Paperback
$28.44
Emanuel; Or, Children of the Soil. [A Novel.] from the Danish ... by Mrs. E. Lucas. Illustrated [And with a Preface] by N. Erichsen.
Lucas, Edgar
Pontoppidan, Henrik
Erichsen, Nelly Alice
Paperback
$39.69
Also in
General Fiction
Elizabeth Spencer: Novels & Stories (Loa #344): The Voice at the Back Door / The Light in the Piazza / Knights and Dragons / Stories
Spencer, Elizabeth
Hardcover
$38.00
Anniversaries, Volume 2: From a Year in the Life of Gesine Cresspahl, April 1968-August 1968
Johnson, Uwe
Paperback
From $14.99
Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams: Short Stories, Prose, and Diary Excerpts
Plath, Sylvia
Paperback
$9.50
Selected Writings: Robert Musil: Young Torless, Three Women, the Perfecting of a Love, and Other Writings
Musil, Robert
Agee, Joel
Paperback
$79.43
Before Gatsby: The First Twenty-Six Stories
Fitzgerald, F. Scott
Bruccoli, Matthew J.
Baughman, Judith
Paperback
$50.74