Institute of Advanced Studies Book Launch Series

The publication of the last volume of the Löwensköld trilogy and of the first volume of the Mårbacka trilogy by Swedish Nobel Prize Winner Selma Lagerlöf coincides with the thirtieth anniversary of Norvik Press Ltd, a small and intrepid independent publishing house specialising in Nordic literature, based at University College London. Set up in 1986 by Professor Janet Garton and Professor James McFarlane (two leading scholars in the field of Scandinavian Studies), Norvik Press took on the task of making Nordic classics and scholarship on Nordic literature and culture available to English-speaking readers.

This event will feature a panel discussion about the work of the publishing house and speculate on reasons for its staying power and for that of its ground-breaking ‘Lagerlöf in English’ series. Linda Schenck (translator of the Löwensköld trilogy), Dr Sarah Death (translator of Mårbacka) and Professor Janet Garton will present the new additions to the Lagerlöf series, discuss various aspects of Lagerlöf’s writing and consider Norvik’s track record in publishing women authors in translation, currently way above the national average.

About the speakers:

Sarah Death has translated works by many Swedish writers including Victoria Benedictsson, Fredrika Bremer, Kerstin Ekman and Selma Lagerlöf. She is one of the directors of Norvik Press and took over the editorship of its ‘Lagerlöf in English’ on the death of its prime mover, Helena Forsås-Scott. She was the editor of Swedish Book Review from 2003 to 2015. She has twice won the triennial George Bernard Shaw Prize for translation from Swedish, and was awarded the Swedish Academy’s Translation Prize in 2008. In 2014 she received the Royal Order of the Polar Star for services to Swedish literature.

Janet Garton is Emeritus Professor of European Literature at the University of East Anglia, Norwich. She has published a number of books on Scandinavian literature, including Norwegian Women’s Writing (1993), the edited letters of Amalie and Erik Skram (3 vols, 2002) and a biography of Amalie Skram, Amalie – et forfatterliv (2011). She is a director of Norvik Press, and has translated several works of Norwegian and Danish literature, including Knut Faldbakken: The Sleeping Prince (1988), Bjørg Vik: An Aquarium of Women (1987), Kirsten Thorup: The God of Chance (2013) and Johan Borgen: Little Lord (2016).

Linda Schenck grew up in the United States and has lived in Sweden since 1972. After a fulfilling career as a simultaneous interpreter and translator, she has now retired and devotes her working time to translation of literature. Linda’s first translation for Norvik Press was published in 1997.

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