Barbro Lindgren. Award Laureate 2014 1
Barbro Lindgren, born in 1937, is a Swedish autho
r whose innovative and multifaceted body of work includes picture books for young children, children’s poetry, plays, realistic fiction for young adults, and more absurd prose stories. In all, she has published over a hundred titles, translated into more than thirty languages. She has also written a number of books for adults. Barbro Lindgren has a distinguished education in the arts and first envisioned a career as a visual artist. But she was also an early writer of stories. Her first children’s book, Mattias sommar (Mattias’ Summer), appeared in 1965. She illustrated it herself; not until the 1970s did she first work with other illustrators. Mattias sommar, which had two sequels, depicts the everyday life of a five-year-old boy spending the summer in the city and making mischief with his friends. Among his more creative ideas: trying to sell his little sister, and running away to his grandmother’s. Autobiographical works and absurd tales During the 1970s, Barbro Lindgren’s realist narratives reached greater depths with two autobiographical trilogies. The first consisted of three novels in diary form: Jättehemligt (Big Secret), Världshemligt (Top Secret), and Bladen brinner (Pages on fire, 1971–73, ill. Olof Landström/ Barbro Lindgren). It follows a young Barbro from age ten to age fifteen. We see a young girl’s encounters with life and love, whose existential reflections are intermingled with ordinary descriptions of schoolwork and friends. The main character’s long period of depression plays a major role in the first book, and death feels always close at hand. The second autobiographical trilogy is about Sparvel, whom we first meet in Lilla Sparvel (Little Sparvel, 1976) at age four; in the third and final book, Bara Sparvel (Just Sparvel, 1979), she is just starting school. In these books, Barbro Lindgren displays a unique ability to relive and put words to human emotions. Sparvel is frightened by death, but she is not afraid of people who are different. The trilogy’s middle book, Stora Sparvel (Big Sparvel, 1977), centers on her friendship with a man who is a mental patient. The books are illustrated by Barbro Lindgren’s sons, Andreas and Mathias Lindgren. With the publication of Loranga, Masarin och Dartanjang (1969, ill. Barbro Lindgren) and its sequel, Loranga, Loranga (1970), Barbro Lindgren’s writing took a new direction. Fore-most among the eccentric cast of