Bryllupsreisen: En kjærlighetsroman

by Knut Faldbakken

Forlaget skriver om denne boka:

Vidar Wenge er riktig yr der han sitter i bilen sammen med Johanna - på vei til Breidablikk Høyfjellshotell. Syv dager alene med kona. Ingen barn. Ikke noe stress. Riktignok skal hun være med på et norsklærerkurs, og han må lese korrektur på sin siste bok "Snøprinsen", en dokumentarbok om mannens situasjon. Men likevel... Idyllen var ikke lenge. Vidar Wenge oppdager sjokkerende ting om sin Johanna, sitt ekteskap - og seg selv. Snart er hotelloppholdet blitt et drama om sex og kjærlighet og ekteskap og den middelaldrende mann som så fryktelig gjerne vil være vellykket.

253 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1982

About the author

Faldbakken studied psychology at Oslo University, and then worked as a journalist. He visited a number of countries, working variously as a bookkeeper, sailor, and factory worker, and began writing books in 1967 while living in Paris.

Reviews

[Ebenmaessiger]

this is the book those genre-only readers are imagining when they disparage literary fiction as “middle-aged dudes deciding whether or not to cheat on their wives for 200 pages.” and with some extraneous, lazy freudianism thrown in for good measure.

starts bad — gets worse. not the best sign that the first thought reading a book about a decades-long married couple is “have these two people ever met?” …

some nauseating flights of meaningless lyrical fancy, as seen in our main character's description of his burgeoning crush on a Croatian lounge singer:

“Her deep night eyes and southern accent bring the crickets back to my blood. Her melancholy smile expresses the darkly robed Mediterranean woman’s knowledge of destiny and continuity, a life governed by wisdom collected over centuries, stored in customs, tales, myths, and rituals the same way that the sun is stored in Dubrovnik’s stone blocks bleached white by centuries of scorching sun, the weight of knowledge of everything that has been, of the limits of hope. The ethics of necessity.”

rough.

allow me to grant, for a second, the foreign context of the thing. perhaps something was lost in the translation? perhaps something in the narrative spoke to a particularly resonant early 80s moment in norway, otherwise invisible to anglophone ears? maybe. i doubt it, but maybe.

[Lora]

The quotes I noted at the time can give you an impression of the writing:
- Vidar compares his father to the mountains where his father once worked. "I remember him: unchangeable, silent and distant, a piece of bedrock with just a thin layer of warming vegetation. If you go looking for flowers here you need great patience and good eyes. But when you find them, they are often surpassingly lovely, colorful even if small, and they keep a long time." (page 33).
- Vidar is out walking trying to find someone (don't want to spoil the plot): "I've got the sun at my back and my shadow ahead of me, a stately shadow with long legs and a bulky torso protecting a small and vulnerable heart." (page 192)

[Sanna ☆]

Att läsa nåt från en mans perspektiv som inte enbart är självskryt var intressant.

[Linda]

With their 13-year long marriage in trouble, a couple decides to take a second honeymoon.