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Karl Adolph Gjellerup

カール・アドルフ・イェレルップ

Karl Adolph Gjellerup

Pen Names: Epigonos（Pseudonym occasionally used）

Profile

Gender
Male
Born
1857-06-02 （Roholte vicarage at Præstø, Denmark）
Died
1919-10-11 （Klotzsche, Germany (near Dresden)） age 62
Nationality
Danish
Languages
Danish, German
Religion
Christianity (Lutheran) with later interest in Buddhism
Residence History
Denmark (birth and youth) → Germany (settled 1892 onward)

Career

Occupations
poet, novelist
Active Years
1877-1919
Influenced By
Georg Brandes, Wagnerian romanticism, Buddhism and Oriental thought, German culture and German-language literature

Awards

Nobel Prize in Literature
1917
Organization: Nobel Prize (Nobel Foundation)
Result: 受賞（1917年、ヘンリク・ポントピーダンと分割受賞）

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

Germanernes Lærling (The Germans' Apprentice)

1882 partly autobiographical novel / intellectual novel

A partly autobiographical tale of a young man's development from a conformist theology student to a pro-German atheist and intellectual.

identityreligion and atheismcultural assimilation
Translations
  • German, English, etc.

Minna

1889 love story / psychological study

On the surface a love story but primarily a study in a woman's psychology.

female psychologyromance
Translations
  • German, etc.

Møllen (The Mill)

1896 melodrama / novel

A sinister melodrama of love and jealousy.

lovejealousyinterpersonal conflict
Translations
  • German, etc.

Der Pilger Kamanita (The Pilgrim Kamanita)

1906 religious / spiritual novel

Follows Kamanita, an Indian merchant's son, through prosperity, romance, death and reincarnation toward nirvana; includes a chance meeting with a monk who is actually Gautama Buddha.

reincarnationenlightenmentOriental thought
Translations
  • Thai (used in school textbooks), English, German, etc.

Verdensvandrerne (The World Roamers)

1910 epic novel dealing with reincarnation

Begins with a German female academic's study tour in India and spans chronological levels in which characters re-experience events of former eons, featuring souls roaming through incarnations.

reincarnationlayers of timecross-cultural exchange
Translations
  • German, etc.

Das heiligste Tier (The Holiest Animal)

1919 mythological satire

A peculiar mythological satire in which animals arrive at their own Elysium after death; a late work containing elements of self-parody and humor.

mythsatiredeath and afterlife
Translations
  • German, English, etc.

Bibliography

  • Germanernes Lærling (1882)
  • Minna (1889)
  • Møllen (1896)
  • Der Pilger Kamanita (1906)
  • Verdensvandrerne (1910)
  • Das heiligste Tier (1919)

Adaptations

  • The Thai translation of The Pilgrim Kamanita was formerly used as part of secondary school textbooks in Thailand.

Translations by Author

  • He translated some of his own works into German.

Translations of Works

  • The Pilgrim Kamanita: translated into English, German, Thai and several other languages

Style & Themes

Literary Style
shift from naturalism to romanticisminclination toward Oriental and religious themeslyrical and philosophical prose
Recurring Motifs
reincarnation and rebirthspiritual quest and enlightenmentlove and jealousy

Legacy

His 1917 Nobel Prize met with limited enthusiasm in Denmark due to his identification with German culture; nevertheless literary historians often regard him as an honest seeker after truth. The Pilgrim Kamanita remains his most widely translated and internationally known work.

Archives

  • Royal Danish Library / Archive for Danish Literature (holds materials)

In Popular Culture

  • Partial inclusion of The Pilgrim Kamanita in Thai secondary school textbooks

Quotes

  • The Pilgrim Kamanita has been called 'one of the oddest novels written in Danish.'
    Source: Critical commentary / work introduction (1906)

Trivia

  • Shared the 1917 Nobel Prize in Literature with Henrik Pontoppidan.
  • Moved to Germany in 1892 and lived there thereafter.
  • Used the pseudonym 'Epigonos' occasionally.
  • The Thai translation of The Pilgrim Kamanita was once used in Thai textbooks.