Ola Hansson

Ola Hansson (born November 12, 1860, Hönsinge, Sweden; died September 26, 1925, Büyükdere, Turkey) was a Swedish poet, prose writer, and critic.

Hansson published his first works, Dikter ("Poems") in 1884 and Notturno in 1885, where he gave a celebration of the natural beauty and folk culture of his native province Skåne in southern Sweden. The raffined poetry did not fit the Swedish realism of the 1880s-90s and gained little attention. Then, in Sensitiva Amorosa (1887) he published a collection of morbid, erotic sketches that shocked the Sweden of his day. As a result, he moved abroad to Germant in 1889 and continued to live abroad in countries such as Switzerland, and Turkey.

During the period following Sensitiva Amorosa he became an adherent of the Nietzschean ideas, which he first made evident with Ung Ofegs visor (published 1892). Here he voiced his contempt of the general crowd and belief in the Übermensch.

In Germany, he began to write and publish works in German, Danish and Norwegian, for example Fatalistische geschichten (German, 1890) which also was published in Danish as Skæbnenoveller the same year. Other German language works during this period included Im Huldrebann (1895), Meervögel (1895), Der weg zum Leben (1896; also in Swedish, Vägen till lifvet, 1896), and Der Schutzengel (1896).

Later in the 1890s he came to loath Germany, and further grew a hatred of people into fanatical proportions, manifesting itself in anti-semitism among other things. For a while he was also a support of catholicism. These things further alienated him from contemporary Sweden, although he gained some recognition in Germany thanks to his German wife Laura (1854–1928; pseudonym Laura Marholm).

A productive writer, his writings are uneven. However, he is today considered a pioneer of Swedish poetry, who reshaped nature poetry. Already in the 1910s did Sweden reappraise him; in 1913 he was awarded the first scholarship in memory of Gustaf Fröding, elected by Swedish students.

References

• Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature, p.513
• Tigerstedt, Svensk litteraturhistoria (Solna, 1971)