Kjartan Fløgstad

Kjartan Fløgstad debuted with the poetry collection Valfart in 1968. He originally studied architecture at the Norwegian Institute of Technology in Trondheim, but soon switched to literature and linguistics at the University of Bergen. For a while Fløgstad was a blue-collar worker in his hometown, then became a ‘greaser‘ on a Norwegian cargo ship on international freight routes. He travelled to different parts of the world during his time as a sailor, especially to Latin America, and his experiences from that enormous continent would come to have a vital impact on his work as a writer. Fløgstad has written sixteen novels and a long series of essay collections, poems, plays and biographies. He has been awarded the Aschehoug Prize, the Nordic Council Literature Prize, the Norwegian Critics Prize for Literature, the Noregs Mållag Prize, the Brage Prize and the Gyldendal Prize. In 2008 he received Brage’s honorary award. Fløgstad was born in 1944 in Sauda and currently lives in Oslo.

Selected Bibliography:  Fyr og flamme (Fire and Flames) 1980, U3 1983, Det syvende klima (The Seventh Climate) 1986, Kron og mynt. Eit veddemål (Heads or Tails. A Wager) 1998, Grand Manila 2006, Grense Jakobselv (Crossing the River Jacob) 2009 belong to his most important novels, whereas Sudamericana 2000 represents his excellency in travelogue writing.

Selected Prizes:
2008: Brage Prize honorary prize
2006: Norwegian Critics Prize for Literature
2006: P2 Listeners Novel Award 
2003: TONO’s EDVARD Prize 
1998: Gyldendal Prize 
1998: Brage Prize
1991: Gyldendal Grant
1988: Pegasus Prize (USA)
1984: Stavanger Aftenblad Culture Prize
1984: Noregs Mållag Prize 
1980: Norwegian Literature Critics Prize
1977: Nordic Council Literature Prize
1975: Aschehoug Prize

Foreign Sales:  Fløgstad’s writing is translated into 11 languages:  Albanian, American English, Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Finnish, French, German, Russian, Spanish, Swedish  

Credits: Foto: Julie Pike