Konsten som kraftkälla eller livsförnekelse

Abstract

Art as Vitalizing Source or Denial of Life: On Inger Edelfeldt’s Künstlerinromane This article examines the role of art in the work of Swedish author Inger Edelfeldt. Based on an analysis of the short story “Skapelsen” (“The Creation,” 1995), the article argues that Edelfeldt’s literary works present two opposing views of art: art as an imitation of life and art as a source of life, which in turn are aligned with Nietzsche’s distinction between the Apollonian and the Dionysian. Furthermore, the article investigates how this distinction relates to Edelfeldt’s stories of the artist as heroine. The article argues that these stories fall into two major categories: the comic and utopian Künsterlinroman – exemplified by Hustru (Wife, 1978) and Det hemliga namnet (The Secret Name, 1999) – and the tragic and critical Künstlerinroman – exemplified by Konsten att dö (The Art of Dying, 2014). The analysis shows that these novels, while antithetical in tendency and structure, are organized by the same dialectic between the Apollonian and Dionysian and between art as an imitation of life and art as a source of life. While one side offers a naïvely utopian and individualistic picture of the woman artist in contemporary society, the other gives a realistic and critical perspective on the same subject. And the interconnection between the two views of art reveals a deeper complexity in the author’s portrayal of the contemporary woman artist than can be achieved through isolated analyses of her individual works.