Sandel, Cora

(1880-1974)

   A Norwegian novelist and short story writer, Sandel was born Sara Fabricius and was one of Norway s most significant writers during the middle decades of the 20th century. Next to Sigrid Undset, she is arguably Norway's most important woman writer. Traditionally regarded as a neorealist, she has come to be viewed as one of the most interesting representatives of modernism in Norwegian literature; this holds true both for her five novels and her numerous short stories.

   Sandel began her career as a writer of short stories, which she published pseudonomously in various magazines while she was studying painting. Encouraged to write a novel by the head of Gyldendal, Norway's most prestigeous publishing house, she wrote Alberte og Jakob (1926; tr. Alberta and Jacob, 1962) about her own experiences growing up in the family of a civil servant in Tromsø, in northern Norway. Sandel has placed a profoundly alienated and thus typically modernist character within the framework of a realistic narrative as she describes a claustrophobic milieu where young women are expected to renounce any kind of personal ambition as they prepare to be married.

   Conceived as the first volume in a trilogy, Alberte og Jakob was followed by Alberte og friheten (1931; tr. Alberta and Freedom, 1963) and Bare Alberte (1939; tr. Alberta Alone, 1965). The action in Alberte og friheten takes place in Paris, where the lonely Alberte is studying painting while eking out a living as a model and occasional correspondent of Norwegian newspapers. She also falls in love, but the relationship goes nowhere and she ends up pregnant by a fellow artist, Sivert. Bare Alberte tells about the experience of World War I. Alberte is not comfortable in her role as the mother of a five-year-old boy, and her relationship with Sivert is deteriorating. At the end of the book Alberte has finished the manuscript of her first novel and sets out on her own, leaving her son with Sivert.

   Sandel took a long time to finish each of the volumes of the Alberte trilogy, and she continued to write short stories in order to generate some income. These stories vary considerably in theme, setting, and quality, but the best of them are among the very best short stories in Norwegian literature. Most of her stories were collected or first published in the following volumes: En blaå sofa og andre noveller (1927; A Blue Sofa and Other Stories), Carmen og Maja og andre noveller (1932; Carmen and Maja and Other Stories), Mange takk, doktor (1935; Many Thanks, Doctor), Figurer pa mørk bunn (1949; Figures on a Dark Background), and Vaårt vanskelige liv (1960; Our Difficult Life). Among her best stories are "Amors veie" (Amor's Ways), which shows that there is no significant relationship between physical beauty and success in love; "Lort-Katrine" (Crap-Katrine), a portrait of an aging prostitute in a Norwegian port city; and "Kunsten a myrde" (The Art of Murder), a tale of greed and heartlessness in France during the years after the end of World War I.

   Two novels combine dramatic features with narrative. The action of Kranes konditori (1945; tr. Krane's Cafe, 1968) takes place in one day s time and concerns a small-town seamstress who leaves her work behind and spends the day sitting in a local cafe, much to the consternation of her waiting customers. Kjøp ikke Dondi (1958; tr. The Leech, 1960) features a protagonist who, in her self-centeredness and egotism, is difficult for readers to identify with. Sandel also wrote a volume of autobiographical stories about animals, Dyr jeg har kjent (1945; Animals I Have Known).