Spring

Årstidsencyklopedien #3

by Karl Ove Knausgård, Karl Ove Knausgaard

"Spring features Knausgaard unbound, writing for the first time without a gimmick or the crutch of extravagant experimentation...Fall in love with the world, he enjoins, stay sensitive to it, stay in it."
-The New York Times

"Poignant and beautiful...Even if you think you won't like Knausgaard, try this one and you'll get him and get why some of us have gone crazy for him."
--Los Angeles Review of Books

You don't know what air is, and yet you breathe. You don't know what sleep is, yet you sleep. You don't know what night is, yet you lie in it. You don't know what a heart is, yet your own heart beats steadily in your chest, day and night, day and night, day and night.

So begins Spring, the recommencement of Knausgaard's fantastic and spellbinding literary project of assembling a personal encyclopedia of the world addressed directly to his newly born daughter. But here Knausgaard must also tell his daughter the story of what happened during the time when her mother was pregnant, and explain why he now has to attend appointments with child services. In order to keep his daughter safe, he must tell a terrible story, one which unfolds with acute psychological suspense over the course of a single day.

Utterly gripping and brilliantly rendered in Knausgaard's famously sensitive, pensive, and honest style, Spring is the account of a shocking and heartbreaking familial trauma and the emotional epicenter of this singular literary series.

Genres: Fiction, Essays, Novels, Contemporary, Literature, Family, Scandinavian Literature

Audiobook

First published January 1, 2016

About the author

Nominated to the 2004 Nordic Council’s Literature Prize & awarded the 2004 Norwegian Critics’ Prize.

Karl Ove Knausgård (b. 1968) made his literary debut in 1998 with the widely acclaimed novel Out of the World, which was a great critical and commercial success and won him, as the first debut novel ever, The Norwegian Critics' Prize. He then went on to write six autobiographical novels, titled My Struggle (Min Kamp), which have become a publication phenomenon in his native Norway as well as the world over.

Reviews

[Adam Dalva · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an absolutely brilliant departure from the first two books of the seasons quartet, and completely re-contextualizes the scope and intent of the project. Don't know if I know of something quite like this. And it's like a tiny sequel to MY STRUGGLE too.

"When someone is going through a difficult time, the difficulties spread out in concentric circles and touch even peripheral situations and relationships. When darkness falls in one person, fire is lit in the other, and thereby all sense of normality vanishes, unless someone struggles to stay within it, without necessarily even realizing what one is doing."

[Paul Bryant · Rating 3 out of 5]

As I entered my kitchen the smell of the cat poo was not wholly unpleasant but not wholly pleasant either, it was one of those things that are not wholly unpleasant or wholly pleasant, like receiving a bill you know you can pay immediately, or a kiss from a relative you don’t really like too much because you’ve noticed she’s not that kind to your children. I cleared up the cat poo and reflected that cats are poo machines, we buy them cat food, they shovel it in at one end, then all the time we are stroking them and admiring their lovely fur and supple frames, they are creating poo, which is not so pleasant really, although not completely unpleasant….

Stop, stop, please don’t carry on with this … I suppose it’s one of your parodies?

Well – his style does lend itself…

Yes, but please, the actual Knausgaard is bad enough! Anyway, a parody version is too easy – it’s like shooting fish in a barrel.

Well, okay… no need to get tetchy. Parodies are fun! You know, Murakami, Sebald….

Ah yes – I’m glad you mentioned him…. I thought this Knausgaard book reminded me of a much less well-read kind of non-intellectual Sebald –

With an admixture of Nicholson Baker’s Room Temperature and some seasoning from Rousseau and Emerson, all that nature nature nature -

Well, that’s his thing….

It’s not my thing. You seen one leaf, you seen them all. Also, what was with this Don’t Give Anyone Any Names business? I am fed up with books with Unnamed Narrators – here we had unnamed everybody. His wife and four children – no names! One time the depressed wife addresses him by HIS name (Karl Ove) so he gets his own name and everybody else is “the siblings” “your younger sister”, “my nearest neighbour”…

I’m getting the idea that this wasn’t your cup of tea either.

Once again I seem to be immune to everybody’s current crush.

Ah don’t look so woebegone, you love it, you old curmudgeon! You can do one of your one star specials!

No, not really…. I can’t deny he’s got…. Soul. His writing is like a spaniel with huge eyes full of love looking at you, defying you not to love it back. It’s all children, and nature, and intimacy, and wife, and wondering about Life Itself, and the aggravations of pettiness (no petrol!) and the wonder of the entire cosmos (look at the ocean! And that castle! And that ant!)

He got on your nerves didn’t he.

Yeah…. Yeah….

So give me an example of all this then…

Okay… here :

The silence reigning there, so specific to sun-filled afternoons in late summer, how the sounds that breach it all seem so far away, almost dream-like, even the sound of the children splashing about in the plastic pool, making a racket, as if the sky is too deep, the world too vast for something as small as a voice to find a foothold in.

It’s like …. “you are getting sleepy…. Your eyes are so heavy…. You are eleven years old…. You will buy my next book…”. There’s one part on page 64 and 65 where he describes being jetlagged as if we need a slow mournful meandering description of what jetlag is because we will never have known such a thing.

Even though I knew I was in Australia, on the other side of the globe, in Sydney, it was as if the sensation of being in Bergen trumped reason… it was almost as if I was sleepwalking.

And I was thinking…No kidding, Karl Ove!

All right, all right. So this three star rating, what – another cop-out?

Ah, the loose and baggy monster that is the three star rating. Some people think it just means “yeah, well, whatever” but it’s more interesting than that. It also means “really excellent but badly flawed” and in this case “I think this guy’s got something, he’s not bad, he’s just…. look, if he rings me again, tell him I’m out. In fact, tell him I’ve emigrated…”.

Does this mean you'll not be reading Min Kamp this year?

Hahaha....hahaha.....

[Lee Klein · Rating 5 out of 5]

KOK enthusiasts expecting more of the same (see Autumn, Winter) will come away with expectations undermined but they won't be disappointed -- like spring itself, this one refreshes the overall project (which by the end of "Winter" had begun to feel, if not cold, than maybe a little rote). This one strips away the structure in the other two installments but maintains the general conceit of a letter to his fourth child, now an infant daughter. It's actually structured more like a thriller, propelled by the literary technique of "withholding." Like the coming of spring, the story emerges from internal frozen stiffness to loose frenzy in the open air -- KOK visits Child Protection Services to discuss a recent incident but he conspicuously fails to reveal what happened. Immediate nondisclosure supercharges everything to come with a sense of oh shit what's going to happen to his three young kids (the eldest about to turn ten) and the newborn? The inevitability of the revelation of an incident that will ultimately require a Child Protection Services visit elevates the prosaic quotidian mundane etc description --- the conventional KOK approach we know and love (as always he also winds up in an uncanny way discussing novels, movies, and bands I consider favorites; in this, it's Turgenev's Fathers and Sons, Bergman's "Scenes from a Marriage," and QOTSA, who a friend from college drums for now) -- and charges life with significance thanks to the threat of endangerment or even death (semi-reminiscent of the section about Noah and the Flood in A Time for Everything).

I won't reveal what happens since, as in the other installments in the series so far, it's more about the interpenetration of this and that, movement between external and internal, between life and death, between freeze and thaw, etc. At one point discussing Jens Bjørneboe's great "History of Bestiality" trilogy (Moment of Freedom, Powderhouse, The Silence), KOK writes: ". . . that catalogue of infamies, atrocities, and abuses is true sentence for sentence, but as a whole it is a deception. Certainly evil exists, but it is insignificant in relation to non-evil. Certainly darkness exists, but merely as pinpricks in the light. Certainly life is painful, but the pain is merely a kind of invisible channel that we follow through what is otherwise neutral or good, and which we sooner or later emerge from."

Whereas the other installments seem almost like exercises in describing dualism ("light and darkness in perpetual round lodge and dislodge by turns" per Ol' Blind Milton), in this the dualism is dramatized. Talking about living where he lives in a somewhat remote area he says "what I was looking for was never the new, but the old truths as expressed by the new." Again, there's that interpenetration of opposites (it's springtime, when the light says summer and the air says winter), which really is what literature is all about -- describing and dramatizing the complexity of existence and thereby elevating life via art, instead of reducing it to opposing forces forever in conflict via lies intended to manipulate (e.g., @realDonaldTrump -- ah, see how a Proponent of Complexity just proposed an oppositional system and reduced the world to THIS versus THAT but then recognized what he'd done and, instead of holding opposing forces apart and deeming one unequal to the other, he decided to parenthetically highlight how his dimwittedness dramatizes interpenetrative dualism?).

Anyway, an unexpectedly refreshing installment that you might want to start with if you've been hesitant to try the other seasons so far.

[Darwin8u · Rating 5 out of 5]

"You see, the beauty of this world means nothing if you stand alone in it."
- Karl Ove Knausgaard, Spring



The first two books in Knausgaard's Årstidsencyklopedien (Seasonal Encyclopedia) Series were Autumn and Winter. The structure of these books was relatively (and seductively) simple. Knausgård wrote every day for three months on a variety of subjects that relate to the season and month he is writing about. He is addressing these books to his unborn/recently born daughter. I got it. I liked it. It now was familiar.

So, when I picked up this book and figured out rather quickly that the structure had dramatically changed, I was a bit upset. I had to reorder things. I questioned. I protested. I kept reading. It was the shortest of the series so far, so it didn't take too much reading to understand (or begin to understand) why. Once I did, the change was, from a literary perspective, amazing. It perfectly reflected life. We start off thinking we've got things organized. We have a plan and a method. It works. And suddenly, life happens. By abandoning the simple structure Knausgaard, for me, took a series that would be a minor work (think a Mozart Concerto, not Symphony), and turned it into something BIG. He didn't set out to do this, but he allowed (like he always does) the momentum of LIFE, both the banal and the heavenly, both the dark and the light, to dictate his art. And it worked by god.

[Marc Lamot · Rating 3 out of 5]

This third part of the Seasons series is very different from the two previous ones; in fact, it fits perfectly with the very long My Struggle I-VI series with which Knausgaard broke through. In this small book too we find that same alternation of self-denigrating introspection, of extremely detailed scenes on daily life and of very profound considerations on the wonder of existence.

In other words, Knausgard makes another attempt to put his individual reality on paper, with its big and its small sides, and to mirror it to what could be 'the' reality. And again it is a very shocking experiment, perhaps even more than in "My Struggle". Because Knausgard writes about the period that his wife was pregnant with their fourth child (this book is actually a long letter to that child), and again fell into the manic depression that had previously plagued her. At the beginning of this book her absence (she is admitted to the hospital) hangs like a heavy shadow over the family life that Knausgard is trying to keep running as well and as badly as it goes. Things get really bitter when he describes how his wife gradually becomes more and more locked into herself, and at a certain moment does a suicide attempt. From time to time you have the impression that the aim of this book is apologetic, Knausgard justifying his sometimes harsh attitude towards her, but a few pages later he describes his own stupidities with the same aplomb.

So this is a dark, wry and shocking book that only bears the title "Spring" because apparently after the birth of the child, light appears again in the family, coinciding with the spring festival in the Swedish village in which they live. I notice that Knausgard's books continue to attract and repel me at the same time, because he knows how to express the ugly and the painful as well as the sublime side of life like no other. Thus a (cowardly) mixed rating of 2.5 stars.

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The passing of time, I loved every trace of it."
▫️▫️

Knausgaard's third volume of the Four Seasons Series, Spring, is a stand-alone memoir that departs from the short essay mosaic structure of the previous two volumes, Autumn, and Winter.

The book opens in the bucolic Swedish landscape, describing the change of season, etc. but the reader sees the small fractures in the personal landscape over the first few pages. This is a book about love and devotion, mishaps and words said and left unsaid.

Undoubtedly one of the best I will read this year, and one I will gladly revisit - I've dog-eared pages to go back to for rereading and pondering. Knausgaard's words, and Ingvild Burkey's thoughtful translation from the Norwegian, are a special treat.

Many thanks for Penguin Press for the ARC. I felt like it was my birthday when it arrived in the mailbox!

Discussed this at length with Jenny on Episode 123 of Reading Envy podcast - check it out!

[Pavle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ovo je prva Knausgorova knjiga koju čitam, i, iako je ova prilično kratka, potpuno mi je jasno kako ovaj čovek napiše sve te hiljade strana Moje Borbe. On nikad ne uđe u sobu, on umesto toga spusti šaku na kvaku, polako je pritisne dlanom i pogura vrata, istovremeno pomerajući desnu nogu kako bi prešao prag itd itd.

Taj stil mi je, dosta neočekivano, jako prijao. Na momente je gotovo meditativan, čujemo svaku misao koja mu prođe kroz glavu, i tu ima nekih u kojima se vrlo možemo prepoznati. Generalno, vrlo dobro prenosi tok misli koji ljudi imaju dok nešto rade, pojavljivanje i nestajanje digresija, mini ljutnje i načine na koje shvata iz naizgled nevezanih situacija da jeste ili da nije u pravu. Digresije i opservacije u koje povremeno upada su mu često duhovite i pametne.

U srcu ove priče je njegov odnos sa ženom i decom, i tu vidimo koliko taj odnos vrvi od ljubavi. Oni imaju problema i ovde ima i svađa i inaćenja i zanemarivanja, neke rečenice čak zvuče hladno izvan konteksta, ali svaki potez je iz ljubavi i divno je to čitati i želeti im dobro.

Radujem se ostatku Kvarteta.

[Biljana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Formom drugačiji od prethodna dva dijela tetralogije Četiri godišnja doba, napisanih u formi kratkih eseja, U proleće Karla Uvea Knausgora, pretposlednji je dio, napisan u formi tri veće cjeline - dnevničkog zapisa, koji je po svojoj sadržini mnogo intimniji, ogoljeniji i iskreniji.

''April stoji između velikog snevanja i velikog skoka. April je čežnja za nečim drugim kada to drugo još nije poznato.''

Opisujući događaje iz porodice Knausgor jednog proljeća, a pri tome se prisjećajući trenutaka kada su saznali da će doći još jedna beba, ona kojoj je i posvećeno ovo djelo, i teškog perioda depresije autorove supruge, on na predivan, deskriptivan način piše o prirodi njihovog dvorišta, okoline i Švedske, u koju su utkani i doživljaji njihove svakodnevnice.

Knausgor jednostavnim, ali duboko iskrenim rečenicama, ostavlja ovaj dnevnik  napisan u trenucima velike ranjivosti, u periodu kada se skoro sam brine o porodici, i istovremeno otkriva sve ljepote života u malom mjestu, sve boje i mirise tog proljeća, svu ljubav i brigu prema svojoj djeci, i osjećaj mira koji pružaju zraci sunca, presijavanje rose na travi i cvijeću.

Iskoristiviši ove zapise za introspekciju, usko povezanu sa porodicom, očinstvom i podobnosti da bude dobar muž i roditelj, Knausgor sve svoje sumnje i strahove stavlja pred čitaoca, otkrivajući njegovu ranjivost, koja ispod površine krije iskrenu ljubav  - prema bližnjima i prema svijetu u kojem postoji.

''Ali možda su sve to samo bila opravdanja, nešto što sam sebi govorio utehe radi. Jer takvi smo, prikrivamo svoje mane i nedostatke, ispredamo priče koje ih okreću u našu korist. Možda nema ničeg ljudskijeg od samoobmane.''  

[marko · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kada je pisac u stanju da se ovako ogoli pred svetom, na ovakav bolan i ranjiv način, i to ne samo sebe, već i živote onih koje najviše voli i do kojih mu je najviše stalo, književnost prevazilazi neku uobičajenu liniju koja je karakteriše kao književnost. Ovo je uvid u ljudsku dušu, njen mrak i njenu svetlost. Ovo je nešto više od reči napisanih na listovima papira. Možda je najbolje da se poslužim Karlovim rečima i za kraj ostavim sledeće:

“Čega je književnost izraz ako ne inače nedostupne i u stvarnosti nepostojeće prisnosti.”

Srećan sam što živim u vremenu u kome mi je na dar data mogućnost da pročitam Karlove knjige.

[Mads]

Som det engang så fint blev beskrevet i en artikel i Dagbladet Information: "[Knausgårds bøger] virker på samme måde på læsere, som cigaretter gør på teenagere: Det tager tid at vænne sig til smagen, men når man først er hooked, kan man ikke stoppe igen."

[Gretchen Rubin]

Another author I love. You're either on this train, or off this train. I'm on it, all the way.

[Antonio Luis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Qué contento estoy de haber seguido leyendo este cuarteto estacional, Spring no tiene nada que ver con los dos anteriores, abandona este formato episódico y propone una narrativa continua, en forma de un relato autobiográfico que se despliega a modo de Mi Lucha en versión corta, en el curso de un solo día de abril, en torno a la experiencia de un padre y su hija recién nacida, con flashbacks que le dan profundidad emocional.

Ha sido una lectura muy bonita, de estilo más íntimo, con un fuerte énfasis en las tensiones familiares, como la lucha contra la depresión de la esposa, el peso de la paternidad y la rutina doméstica.

"I still found It incredible. And a little frightening, the blind force of growth"

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

A-suh-puh-ring is here!

The third book in Karl Ove Knausgård’s seasons cycle was the best one for me so far. It’s very unlike the previous two volumes. Where the latter two contain many short and shorter vignettes about a variety of topics, Om våren presents a continuous narrative. The story is centered around one day in April on which Knausgård and his youngest daughter Anna (three months old) are going to visit the wife/mother Linda in the hospital. Those of you who know about the family will probably know the reason why Linda has to stay there.

The father is in a continuous dialog with the infant. Although ‘dialog’ is probably not the right word, because the daughter has no way of responding properly other than staring, laughing and sometimes crying. There are some flashbacks, and flashbacks within flashbacks, and it might be a little confusing, but it’s the usual way Knausgård is telling his stories and which I learned to love while reading his epic series of novels called Min Kamp. In fact the whole thing here reads like an addendum or an epilogue of sorts to Min Kamp.

Strangely no names of family members get mentioned. Instead of Vanja, Heidi, John, and Linda he speaks to Anna about “your older sister”, “your younger sister”, “your brother”, and “your mother”. I have no idea whether this has legal reasons, or if this is a stylistic decision.

In any case it’s a excellent addition to the Knausgård oeuvre and highly recommended; and for readers of Min Kamp this is a must-read.



This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

[M. Sarki · Rating 5 out of 5]

https://msarki.tumblr.com/post/173761...

On the heels of the first two installations titled Autumn and and then Winter, Spring departs from the initial format and Knausgård rules again with his bitingly honest and beautiful prose. I lamented this book to end. On every level I felt connected to Karl Ove.

…This was so because the beautiful and good gain meaning through connection, through exchange, through what stands open between ourselves and the world. In themselves, objects and events don’t mean anything, they become meaningful through resonance they evoke…

The Knausgård’s family life is anything but easy. It would be a disservice to divulge any information about what transpires throughout this extremely personal journey. Needless to say I was quite surprised by the direction this book took. But the rewards provided daily in my reading of even every small thing were worth my multiple sit-down sessions.

…the easy life is nothing to aspire to, the easy choice is never the worthiest solution, only the difficult life is a life worth living…

Hard to reconcile the above quotation to one’s own life after crashing into the basement. But it does seem to be true. At least for me. There isn’t much that comes easy in life if totally engaged in living it. Knausgård details many personal examples in this wonderful book centered around the seasons.

I walked along the stone path to the house on the other side of the garden. The air was sharp and cold in the shade, as so often in spring when the light and the air express opposite things. Summer, says the light, winter, says the air.

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Where Autumn and Winter were brief essays on things around the house while he anticipated his daughter's birth, this reads more like a letter to his newborn daughter. While he writes it, he is caring for the children while his wife is absent, for reasons which are somewhat revealed by the end. Aside from that content is his brilliant nature writing, musings on aging, family, and place. I've marked the best bits in my review so I won't recreate them here. The primary reason I read Karl is the writing; I tolerate the bodily fluids bits to get to read the nature bits.

It's interesting to me that so many people remark on the author not having any empathy, and it makes me think they must not know many Scandinavians. He talks about how he has never heard "I love you" from family members, yet he feels a grounding in the familiar landscape of home and a comfort in shared moments with his children. He has perceived that he can't fix his wife's mental illness, and I have read that his struggle books go into more detail on this part of the story, so I'm missing that backing to this book. (I also read that he and his wife split in 2016, which is when this particular volume was published in its original language, so read into it what you will... but she is a poet and writer too, and seems happier these days.) As a writer, he is very contemplative and you can feel his brain constantly noticing and processing, and this doesn't leave a lot of space for external emoting.

[Ivan Jovanovic (Valahiru) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Treći tom Knausgorovog kvarteta o godišnjim dobima razlikuje se od prethodna dva u puno toga. Prva i osnovna razlika jeste što je njegova ćerka sada uveliko rodjena. Dete sada ima tri meseca i Knausgor joj pripoveda o dogadjajima oko nje. Nema više kratke forme u vidu eseja, kao ranije. Naprotiv, ovde je cela knjiga podeljena u tri dela.
Knausgor svojoj ćerki prepričava dogadjaje iz jednog dana, kog se ona nikada neće sećati. Povremeno se osvrće na dalju prošlost, što takodje bude vrlo zanimljivo. Dok ponovo prolazi kroz sve detalje toga dana, celokupna slika oživljava pred čitaocima. Iskusio sam sve što je pisac iskusio, video sve njegovim očima. Toliko sam se povezao sa njim, da sam mogao da osetim ono o čemu piše. Mogao sam da ga razumem, da shvatim i da razumem njegove razloge. Nedostaje mi forma prethodne dve knjige, ali mi i ovaj način pripovedanja odgovara.


Kroz ovu knjigu, autor nam je ogolio svoju dušu. Pred nama je sa svim vrlinama, svim manama i onim što čini njega. Knausgor nam daje intimni prikaz sebe i njegove porodice. Ono o čemu priča u ovoj knjizi možda ne bi rekao nikome, da nije knjige. Svojim čitaocima priznaje dosta toga, a čak i stvari koje bi drugi krili. Ne može svako to da uradi i za to treba hrabrosti. Ne piše svako o službi za zaštitu dece koja se umeša u njihov život, obično to ljudi kriju. Ne priznaje svako milionima ljudi širom sveta da je imao probleme sa kontrolom besa. Ne priznaje svako da mu supruga ima probleme sa depresijom. Nema svako snagu za to. Knausgore, kapa dole!

Kada piše o najprostijim dnevnim rutinama njega i njegove dece, čini to tako da uživate u tim rutinama. Ja uživam dok čitam kako on pije kafu, zapali cigaretu ili dok plaća račune. Čudno je to drugima, ali nama koji smo čitali ove knjige je potpuno razumljivo. Zato i vama preporučujem da proverite šta se to nama dopalo. Ko je taj Knausgor koji piše o pčelama, gumenim čizmama, o plaćanju računa, doručku, deci i celom životu uopšte? Saznajte i vi.

[cypt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bandau įšokti į pačią pavasario pabaigą su Knausgårdo "Pavasariu". Jį perskaičiau jau seniau, bet vis galvodavau, kur "padėti" galvoj.

Tai trečioji metų laikų tetralogijos dalis; visos knygos rašomos kaip laiškai dukteriai: "Rudenyje" jie dar negimusi, "Žiemoje" - per vidurį gimsta. "Ruduo" ir "Žiema" buvo rašomi kaip enciklopedijos: kiekvienam ar kas antram puslapy aprašinėjamas kažkoks pasaulio dalykas ir Knausgårdo pamąstymai apie jį. Tai buvo gera, kokybiška eseistika, o vietomis net ir labai stipri - ta prasme kad stipraus poveikio.

Nesitikėjau, kad "Pavasaris" bus kitoks, bet buvo. Visų pirma, tai nebe paskiros esė, o vientisas tekstas - visai kaip "Mano kova", ypač antrasis tomas. Čia nebekataloguoja pasaulio, nebando primesti savo enciklopedinio žinojimo / patirties, nes tai tarsi beprasmiška: knygą jis pradeda kalbėdamas, kaip dukra nežino, kas yra miegas, bet vis tiek miega, jai nebūtinas faktinis žinojimas - ir tokiu atveju nebaisiai reikalingos paties Knausgårdo "Rudenyje" ir "Žiemoje" dėtos pastangos. Ji vis tiek pati patiria ir išmoksta pasaulį. Vietoj to čia fiksuojami pirmieji metao su dukra, pasakojama tai, ko ji pati tikrai nebeprisimins. Tam tikra prasme dukra tampa jo enciklopedijos objektu.

Sykiu ji tampa Knausgårdo žvilgsnio objektu ir visų vidinių monologų adresate. Visos eseistinės mintys ir visi prisiminimai čia adresuojami dukrai, ir staiga moralai, sulyginimai ir sugretinimai staiga įgyja visai kitokią reikšmę nei keisti kone ekshibiciostiniai pasažai "Mano kovoje" ar besserwisseriška pozicija ankstesnėse tetralogijos dalyse. Ankstesni jo autobiografiniai rašymai per kreipinį į dukrą susijungia su naratyvu, asmeninė patirtis tampa kažkuo, ką norisi perduoti, kas yra verta dalintis. Ir taip šita knyga man atrodo prasmingesnė nei kol kas skaityti 2 "Mano kovos" tomai ir 2 tetralogijos dalys.

Gražu ir pavasariška, ir supratau, kad šitoks Knausgårdas man patinka labiau - ne tiek susitelkęs į save, kiek amžinai ieškantis pokalbio adresato. Suprantu, kad tai turbūt nėra tipinis Knausgårdas, gal tai nėra tas garsusis ir savo literatūriniu egocentriškumu išskirtinasis rašytojas. Bet jis čia kitoks, ir jau vien tai gražu; išjudina monolitinį, net piktoką kalbėjimą.

[Ken · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hilarious, in its way. Karl Ove, famous for his massive (and I do mean massive) navel-gazers about his childhood and specifically his abusive, alcoholic father (called My Struggle), switched gears in the "Seasons" quartet (make way, Vivaldi), to write mini-essays about this simple topic or that. The conceit? The essayettes were for his daughter-to-be, still in utero.

Karl Ove stayed disciplined through Autumn and Winter, but alas, his new daughter was born, and he fell off the wagon. For Spring, he went back to the bottle (read: NARRATIVE XXX), 150 proof, and started to write like My Struggle only now about life with a young family, specifically his clinically depressed wife. If there's one advantage for the reader, it's that the story goes only 180 pages instead of 879. There you go.

So. If you like Karl Ove, you'll love Spring, perhaps better than the falling-leaf essays of Autumn or the blowing-snow essays of Winter. Can Karl Ove lose? Apparently not!

[Bojana · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Život je ponekad bolan, ali uvek ima za šta da se živi. Hoćeš li upamtiti?"

[Hulyacln · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Hava nedir bilmesen de soluk alıyorsun.Uyku nedir bilmesen de uyuyorsun.Gece nedir bilmesen de içinde yatıyorsun.Kalp nedir bilmesen de göğsünde düzenli çarpıyor kalbin,gündüz gece,gündüz gece,gündüz gece.”
Üç aylık kızına yazıyor bunu Knausgaard.Ardından büyüyoruz.
Hava nedir öğreniyoruz.
Uyku nedir,gece nedir,kalp nasıl çarpar öğreniyoruz.
Ve artık o kadar da huzurlu olmuyor uykularımız.
Devam ediyor, diyor ki:
“Karanlıktan korkarsan ışığa gidersin.Peki ya aydınlık bile dehşetle doluysa ne yaparsın?”
Düşünüyoruz cevabı. Bazen cevaplar sorulardan daha değersiz olsa da.
.
Knausgaard İlkbahar’ı midesinde kelebeklerle karşılamıyor. Dördüncü çocuğu doğuyor, eşi yatağından çıkmıyor gün boyu, yazmaya çalışıyor, faturaları unutmamaya gayret ediyor..Parçalarından bir bütün yaratıp dik durması gerekiyor,yoruluyor, yoruldukça yazıyor.
İşte bu noktada daha da açık oluyor yazdıkları.
Çırılçıplak gerçekliğini sunuyor..
Sonbahar’dan daha acı, Kış’tan daha sahici..
Pek çok cümlenin altını çizdirip aklımızda enkazlar oluşturacak kadar..
Yaz tüm endişeleri silecek mi sıcaklığıyla? Sırada onu beklemek var dört gözle..
.
Haydar Şahin çevirisi üçüncü kitap da bizimle..Anna Bjerger çizgileri ise kitabın ruhuna yine sadık kalıyor: Daha belirsiz çizgiler,birbirine geçen renkler,çarpıcı yüzler..

[Mind the Book · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ca 10 år sedan. Efter otaliga, andäktiga sensommartimmar (i mitt minne var det sensommar...) med de norska inläsningarna av MK1-6 trodde jag nog som KOK själv att det var över; att han "inte längre var författare" och att det liksom var slutet på litteraturen, på flera plan.

Den här årstidssviten kände jag vagt till, men hade inte insett att åtminstone Våren är som "Min Kamp 7". Full av kärlek och desperation, omsorg och logistik blandat med tvivel, diskbänksrealism och anhörigs depression där i Skånelängan. Bra gjort förresten att samtidigt ha gäster, umgås med en form av intellektuell elit där på landet samt kommunicera globalt med olika litteraturfestivaler OCH SKRIVA.

Åh, t.ex. den där totala clusterfuckdagen där på motorvägen vid Landskrona. Vi har ju alla sådana dagar då man känner sig helt livsoduglig. "Ett enkelt och okomplicerat liv är inte eftersträvansvärt" , hävdar författaren. Ändå börjar han fundera på var gränsen går för det personliga ansvaret vid psykisk ohälsa.

Under hela bokens gång var jag medveten om att den aktuella tillvaron ett par år senare skulle monteras ner, att familjen skulle splittras, och det bidrog med en vag melankoli. Samtidigt innebär uppbrott ofta att ta en riktning mot "det viktiga, det stora, det nya och det öppna". En längtan som han här tänkte generellt upphör i 20-årsåldern. Och här är vi nu.

Fann av en slump Radioföljetongen och Ludvig Josephsons introduktion till avsnitten fick mig att lyssna på ett efter ett under lockdownpromenader här i Londonvåren. https://sverigesradio.se/grupp/34613

[Jelena Ranđelović · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kad završim knjigu i onda blenem u jednu tačku i samo trepćem, onda znam da je ta knjiga nešto posebno. Prvi put se susrećem sa Knausgorom. I definitivno neće biti poslednji.
Naizgled jednostavna, a tako sve samo ne jednostavna. Priča o običnom čoveku, o ljubavi, o porodici, o bolu.
Knjiga koja može da pomogne.
Eto toliko.

[Amina Hujdur · Rating 4 out of 5]

Treći dio tetralogije naziva Proljeće govori o rođenju Knausgorove treće kćerke, kao i o mentalnom stanju njegove supruge. Dominiraju opisi svakodnevne borbe oca sa troje maloljetne djece, a fascinantan mi je njegov pristup djeci, odgojne metode i održavanje domaćinstva.

[Synne Sylibris · Rating 4 out of 5]

(Ble visst ferdig med PROSAs maibok før mai, jeg. Opsi😅🥰)

4.5⭐️
This book was lovely🌼
Knausgård wrote this to his newborn child, to tell her about the family and the world she's been born into. He writes about all this with touching honesty and tenderness. It made me feel soft and hopeful and thoughtful😊

More thoughts, but in Norwegian: 😁
Om våren, du liksom – denne boka ga meg en intens lengsel etter SOMMER. Det var nemlig både sol, bading og iskrem involvert. Men under bokas svenske sommeridyll var imidlertid ikke alt bare fryd og gammen hele tiden da. I'll say no more.

Jeg har aldri lest en hel Knausgård-bok før – bare tjuvlest litt i mammas Min kamp-bøker på ferie i Hellas, og lest noen av essayene i de samme bøkene i skolesammenheng.
Dette var kanskje grunnen til at jeg hadde en veldig sterk følelse av at jeg hadde lest noe av det som skjedde i boka fra før...?
Kanskje skriver han om enkelte ting flere ganger i alle de selvbiografiske bøkene sine? Eller kanskje denne følelsen skyldes at Om våren i stor grad opplevdes som en forlengelse av Min kamp-bøkene?

Uansett, denne boka var nydelig.
Mamma har alltid sagt at Knausgård er god på det nære, og, ja, hun har virkelig rett.

[Cody · Rating 5 out of 5]

With only one book in the quarter left, Spring rises to Knausgård’s highest levels. It’s deeply affecting stuff, presuming you’ve read My Struggle in its entirety and the previous two entries in this tetralogy. I say this only because I don’t know how much context one needs to find all of the admissions and revelations Karl Ove drops within shattering and, naturally, periodically funny. I don’t know because that is how I came to this; by no means take the preceding as required syllabus on my part.

Because, well…then you can get shit like this:

“Perhaps in a novel it is that simple, for novels are written to elucidate some aspect of human life, so that something which exists but perhaps lacks form is given a form and becomes visible.
Life has no such form.”

Or:

“…I had no wish to meet him, I never have when it comes to artists or writers, since the appeal in their works is always so much more direct and personal than in reality and feels much closer there than it can ever be face to face.”

Of course, Knausgård would be baffled down to his immaculate hair that anyone should ever want to as much as meet his eyes in passing.

A beautiful slice off of Karl Ove’s ongoing project popularly called ‘living.’

[Nazife · Rating 4 out of 5]

Karl Ove yine bilinen tarzıyla inanılmaz gözlemci, detaycı ve şeffaf. Kendisi ve ailesi ile ilgili o kadar özele giriyor ki bazen inanamıyorum. Çevresindekiler için çok zor olmalı. Ama bu açıklığı ve farkındalığı okumak çok zevkli oluyor, insan bazı duygu ve düşüncelerde yalnız olmadığını görüyor.

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read Knausgaard’s seasonal quartet out of order (also reviewed: Autumn, Winter, Summer), finishing with the one that was published third. The project was conceived as a way to welcome his fourth child, Anna, into the world. Whereas the other books prioritize didactic essays on seasonal experiences, this is closer in format to Knausgaard’s granular autofiction: the throughline is a journey through an average day with his baby girl, from when she wakes him before 6 a.m. to a Walpurgis night celebration (“the evening when spring is welcomed in with song in Sweden”). They see the other kids off to school, then make a disastrous visit to a mental hospital – he forgets his bank card and ID, the baby’s bottle, everything, and has to beg cash from his bank to buy petrol to get home.

Looming over the circadian narrative is his wife’s mental health crisis the summer before (his ex-wife Linda Boström Knausgård, a writer in her own right, has bipolar disorder), while she was pregnant with Anna, and the repercussions it has had for their family. Other elements echo those of the previous books: the formation of memories, to what extent his personality is fixed, whether he’s fated to turn into his father, minor health concerns, and so on. Although this volume is less aphoristic than the previous books, there are still moments when he muses on life and gives general advice:

Self-deception is perhaps the most human thing of all. … And perhaps the following is nothing but self-deception: the easy life is nothing to aspire to, the easy choice is never the worthiest solution, only the difficult life is a life worth living. I don’t know. But I think that’s how it is. What would seem to contradict this, is that I wish you and your siblings simple, easy, long and happy lives. … The advantage of having siblings is that it is a lifelong attachment, and that nothing can break it.

All in all, this was the highlight of the series for me. Each of the four is illustrated by a different contemporary artist. Bjerger is less abstract than some of the others, which I count as a plus.

[A favourite random moment: A creeper coming through the tile roof of his office pushes a book off the shelf. It’s American Psycho. “I still found it incredible. And a little frightening, the blind force of growth”.

Ironic timing: He records a conversation with his neighbour, mansplaining about Russian aggression and the place of Ukraine: “Kiev was the first great city in what became the Russian empire. … The Ukraine and Russia are like twins. … They belong together. At least the Russians see it that way. … The very idea of Russia is imperialistic.”]

Originally published on my blog, Bookish Beck.

[Campbell · Rating 5 out of 5]

After the somewhat fractured, mosaic-like quality of 'Autumn' and 'Winter', this book finds Karl Ove Knausgaard resurgent once more, blooming and budding with the advent of 'Spring'.

Gone are the short, carefully-measured essays describing a single subject, replaced as they are by what Knausgaard does best. Namely intensely personal and deeply insightful observation on the minutiae of daily life and the human experience.

Given some of the events described, there's real darkness here. But there's also life. There's also hope.

[Derek · Rating 5 out of 5]

A perfect book. After my first three pages I loved it already. I especially appreciate how Knausgaard blends the banal incidents of everyday family life with deep and almost philosophical ruminations. There is poetry here too. And so very much about childhood and parenthood… The most wonderful thing is that I can almost imagine Heidegger lurking around in the background, spying on the protagonist’s family picnics and trips to waterparks. Or I can imagine Heidegger as a sort of domestic sportscaster, commenting on the meaning of every single family event, ice cream run, or sibling quarrel. I’m now (illogically) on to Knausgaard’s very different but equally brilliant book, Autumn.

[Michael Bohli · Rating 5 out of 5]

Zuerst hatte ich gewisse Bedenken, ob die kurze Zeitspanne zwischen "Kämpfen" und "Im Frühling" den Lesegenuss schmälern könnte - doch ich lag zum Glück falsch. Denn mit diesem dritten Buch seines Jahreszeitenzyklus hat Karl Ove Knausgård nicht nur die Essayform dieser Reihe verabschiedet, sondern auch gleich eine Erzählung geliefert, die sein autobiografisches Projekt noch leicht verlängert.

Wir begleiten Knausgård und seine frisch geborene Tochter durch einen schönen Frühlingstag, erfahren mehr über die Gesundheit seiner Frau, über die Umgebung, die Nachbarn und den Alltag in der Familie. Dazu wird "Im Frühling" mithilfe von Rückblenden eine grössere Tiefe verliehen und man erfährt auf typische Weise des Autors viele spannende Gedanken zum Leben, dem spezifischen und allgemeinen. Einzelne Momente bleiben wie Leuchtfeuer im Kopf hängen, andere lassen die Melancholie wie ein Berg anwachsen. Doch am Ende wendet sich alles zum Guten, denn schön ist das Leben immer.