Into the Woods
This is the type of writing that relies heavily upon metaphor and imagery to put across its meaning. As a result, the writing is often dense, but since the imagery is usually quite accessible, it does not make for difficult reading:
“Terror is a witch. She sits in the dimness of the forest, sings magic songs to people, and fills their hearts with frightful thoughts. From her comes that deadly fear which weighs down life and darkens the beauty of smiling landscapes. Nature is malignant, treacherous as a sleeping snake; one can believe nothing.”
Gosta Berling
Gosta Berling is the protagonist, as the title strongly indicates. He is introduced on the opening page and the opening paragraphs reach for metaphor to put across a description combining the tangible with the abstract:
“He had a poet’s deep eyes, and a general’s firm, rounded chin; everything about him was beautiful, noble, full of feeling, glowing with genius and spiritual life.”
Dialogue
So rich with metaphorical imagery is the novel that even character dialogue is steeped in similes. What in a modern-day story might seem artificial comes across as comfortably realistic:
“`You left me as a thief,” she cried, `and come home as a vagabond.’”
A Kind of Loki
The character of Sintram is kind of like Loki. A trickster with a bent toward the darkness looked upon by others as little better than the devil himself. He is not a happy person at all times, especially summer:
“It was the season when Sintram, the wicked ironmaster at Fors, fretted and grieved. He resented the sun’s triumphal march through the hours of the day, and the overthrow of darkness. He raged at the leafy dress which clothed the trees, and at the many-colored carpet which covered the ground.”
Agency of God’s Will
How to explain one’s place in the world where God’s will is the agency of determination? One must look inward only to get to a place where one is forced to look outward and beyond the agency of the self. Captain Lennart expresses this epiphany in thought:
“Where wilt thou lead me? I am a feather, driven by thy breath. I am thy plaything. Whither wilt thou send me? Why dost thou shut the doors of my home to me?”
