LitHouse podcast

Avsnitt

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  The Craft of Writing: Elizabeth Strout and Kristina Leganger Iversen 14.09.2026 1h 5min

  “I knew that I was a writer, but I had to stop writing like other writers. I had to write like myself.”Elizabeth Strout published her first novel at the age of 43, after years of writing, rewriting, and searching for a voice of her own. Today, she is among the most read contemporary writers in American letters, known for her empathetic, profound portraits of people and small-town worlds that stay with the reader and won’t let go. Olive Kitteridge and Lucy Barton are characters embraced by readers and critics across the world. This year saw the publication of Strout’s new novel, The Things We Never Say, about yet another everyday hero: the middle-aged history teacher Artie Dam.“Every single word matters,” Strout said when she last visited the House of Literature. How does she find the right words, in the voice that is so unmistakably her own? What writers have shaped her along the way, and where does she look for inspiration?Returning to the House of Literature for an evening about her writing life, Strout will talk about how she creates her memorable characters, the importance of observation, and how she works to bring out the extraordinary in ordinary people’s lives.On stage, Strout was joined by writer and literary scholar Kristina Leganger Iversen for a conversation about reading, writing and literary courage. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  Everyday Heroes: Elizabeth Strout and Marie Aubert 07.09.2026 57min

  Ever since her debut in 1998, American Elizabeth Strout’s literary characters have charmed readers and critics across the world. The headstrong, unpredictable Olive Kitteridge gave Strout the Pulitzer Prize, and was adapted into an award-winning TV series, and the novels about the writer Lucy Barton, who grew up in poor and dysfunctional surroundings on the Illinois countryside, have been embraced by readers. All her books are translated into Norwegian by Hilde Rød-Larsen.In Strout’s new novel, The Things We Never Say, we meet Artie Dam – a middle-aged and respected history teacher in Massachusetts, a very ordinary man. He is the kind of person that keeps the community together, always with a kind word to the students who need it the most. But Artie feels a growing sense of loneliness and alienation, and a secret revealed makes him question even those closest to him, and what he really knows about the people in his life.This is a novel about our ability to speak truthfully to each other, and about the things we never talk about. The story is set in 2024, when Donald Trump is reelected, and Strout shows how the country’s growing polarization is lodged into the local communities, into people’s bodies, marriages, families, friendships, and into conversations in which so many things no longer can be said.It is in the quiet, everyday life that the big dramas play out in Strout’s universe. With warmth, precision and depth, she portrays the inner landscapes of ordinary people’s lives, always with a keen eye for how class conflicts and political unrest seep in and take root in them.Strout ass joined by writer Marie Aubert for a conversation at Det Norske Teatret’s main stage, about the big dramas in everyday life, about truth, solidarity, and the things we never say. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  A Homecoming: Douglas Stuart and Janne Stigen Drangsholt 24.08.2026 53min

  For Cal, it is a defeat to be forced to leave the big city of Edinburgh for his childhood home in the tiny island Isle of Harris. Not only has he failed to get a job despite his expensive education, even worse is having to leave the freedom of the city, where he could live out his attraction to men, something that is unthinkable at home, a place where everybody knows everybody, and his father is leading the psalms in the strict, puritan congregation.In Scottish Douglas Stuart’s new novel John of John, we meet a father and a son, and a windswept and depopulated island community. Here, the men are in charge, of the sheep farming, of the congregation and of keeping the traditional tweed weaving alive. Cal doesn’t fit into the tight mold, but is toon becomes clear that his father too, has his own secrets, about why his wife left him when Call was little, and about the real owner of their farm. Stuart’s story illuminates the islanders’ community and bigotry, their vast elbow room and their confinement.In just a few years, Douglas Stuart has established himself as one of our time’s leading chroniclers of poverty, marginalization, and queer experience. His debut novel Shuggie Bain won the prestigious Booker Prize, and his second book Young Mungo was also embraced by critics and readers alike.At the House of Literature, Stuart was joined by writer and Professor of literature Janne Stigen Drangsholt for a conversation about love and loneliness, shame and small-town moral guardians. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  Dilemmas of Diplomacy. Geert Mak and Espen Barth Eide 10.08.2026 59min

  In conversation with Tove Gravdal about Roosevelt’s right hand, history’s middlemen and the role of diplomacy today.From Epstein files to the US and Israel’s bombing of Iran: The events of the last few months have highlighted the importance – and shortcomings – of international cooperation and diplomacy.Norway’s foreign secretary, Espen Barth Eide, is one of many who suddenly have to navigate uncharted waters. Through his many years in the service of Norwegian foreign policy, he has worked to increase dialogue and alliances between countries and people. Now, it seems someone has tossed the rule book, making small states like Norway all the more vulnerable in the face of brazen superpowers.Our current situation was far from the mind of internationally acclaimed Dutch historian Geert Mak when he set out to write about the role of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s now all but forgotten right hand. But in the process, the many parallels between the time he wrote about – the prelude to the second world war, the Spanish civil war and the rise of fascism – and our own times became increasingly apparent.In The Switchman, Mak show how the social worker Harry Hopkins, who became Roosevelt’s right hand, laid the foundation for the modern welfare state and forged a crucial alliance between the US and Europe in a time when fascism was on the rise. What can Hopkins’s story tell us about the value of middlemen, mediators and diplomats – in a time when the transatlantic alliance is threatened both from the outside and within, and when many of us have lost faith in the world of diplomacy?With titles such as The Lives of Jan Six and In Europe. Travels through the Twentieth Century, Mak has established himself as a central chronicler of modern European and American history. Barth Eide spent time as a researcher in the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, and in central positions within the UN and the World Economic Forum besides his many years in Norwegian politics.In June 2026, Barth Eide joined Mak for a conversation about Hopkins and the role of diplomacy today, moderated by writer and journalist Tove Gravdal. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  Andrey Kurkov: Ukraine — Memories for the future 15.05.2026 54min

  The Wergeland Lecture 2026Andrey Kurkov is one of Ukraine’s most central cultural and literary ambassadors. With titles such as Death and the Penguin and Grey Bees, he has gained readers across the world. But when Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, he was no longer able to write fiction. Instead, he has travelled widely to talk about the reality and brutality of the war, writing essays and a journal from his daily life in the war. Already in 2022, he published Diary Of An Invasion.Growing up during the Soviet era, Kurkov discovered writers such as George Orwell and Aleksandr Solzjenitsyn through illegal copies. He has experienced first hand what a society without freedom of speech really entails, as well as the role of language and culture in establishing a national identity. Kurkov himself writes in Russian, Ukrainian and English. Part of what Putin is out do destroy is Ukraina as an independent nation, with a culture and a language of its own.In what ways is Putin appropriating history and culture in his narrative about the invasion? And how has the war – ironically – fortified both Ukraine’s and the rest of the world’s view of Ukrainian language and culture?The Wergeland lecture is an annual event. Each year, The House of Literature will invite an international voice who embodies Henrik Wergeland’s spirit in their work and writings. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  Feminism in Ukrainian: Oksana Zabuzhko and Lotta Elstad 04.05.2026 1h 1min

  Oksana Zabuzhko is one of the central writers of Ukraine’s post-Soviet generation. In 1996, she caused great controversy with her debut novel, Field Work in Ukrainian Sex, in which she challenged the current view won women’s role in society and in the relationship, where she was expected to be subordinate to the man.The novel has become a work of reference for Eastern European feminism, and with its exploration of female experience, language and power, it has been compared to writers such as Jamaica Kincaid and Angela Carter.The novel portrays the destructive relationship between the writer Oksana and the sculptor Mykola, as well as the many challenges Oksana faces as a young female, Ukrainian poet. In an immediate and colloquial language, partly addressed to the reader, partly the narrator’s own stream of conciousness, Zabuzhko navigates what it means to be Ukrainian and what it means to be a woman, at a moment in time when both identities were being negotiated.Zabuzhko has published a number of award winning novels, essay collections and books of poetry, including The Museum of Abandoned Secrets and The Longest Journey. She has a PhD in philosophy, and she has taught Ukrainian literature at Harvard and the University of Pittsburgh.Author and historian Lotta Elstad has also explored history and female experience in novels such as Jeg nekter å tenke [«I refuse to think»] and the critically acclaimed Xiania series. She joined Zabuzhko for a conversation about sex, love and the view of women in Ukraine.The conversation was held in English. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  The Tsar Dynasty and the Mad Monk: Anthony Beevor and Erika Fatland 27.04.2026 1h 6min

  Few historians can match the position of British Anthony Beevor. With his 13 historical book son recent European history, he has become one of the most respected and read writers of history. Especially his books about the Second World War, including Stalingrad and The Second World War have become modern classics.In his latest book, Beevor delves into the final days of one of history’s largest empire, the Russian Romanov dynasty. Rasputin and the Downfall of the Romanovs provides a portrait of the «mad monk» Rasputin, and explores how one man seemingly toppled an entire dynasty. Through detailed portraits of the tsar couple, their advisors and the growing revolutionary hunger of the masses, Beevor shows how a combination of political incompetence, religious fanatism and social unrest brought about the catastrophic fall of the dynasty.The Norwegian author Erika Fatland has travelled all across the former Russian empire. In award winning books like Sovietistan and The Border – A Journey Around Russia, she shows how history affects the region today. She joined Beevor for a conversation about Rasputin, the Romanovs and the fall of an empire. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  A Love Story: Siri Hustvedt and Marte Spurkland 13.04.2026 1h 2min

  After 43 years together, author Siri Hustvedt loses her husband, the author Paul Auster, to an aggressive form of cancer. Now there is only Siri left, in a time in which memories, smells and words from the time before seep in. Eventually, she starts writing; about Auster's illness and his last days, about their early days together and their all-consuming love, about decades of a shared life filled with joy and laughter, with books and stories, worries and sorrow. Hustvedt's writing eventually becomes the book Ghost Stories: A Memoir.Ghost Stories is a personal account of the life of a popular and critically acclaimed author-couple, as well as an exploration of how grief and loss affect us, physiologically and mentally, in dialogue with philosophy, literary history and neuroscience. The grief from losing her husband mingles with the grief and anger over what kind of country the United States is becoming, what is lost, and what is worth fighting for.Siri Hustvedt is among the most central writers and thinkers in the US. She has written a number of critically acclaimed novels and essay collections, including The Summer without Men, The Blazing World, The Shaking Woman or A History of My Nerves, and A Woman Looking at Men Looking at Women.Writer and journalist Marte Spurkland has also written a personal account of losing her father to cancer, in the critically acclaimed Pappas runer («Dad’s Runes»). She met Hustvedt for a conversation about grief, memory and shared life. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  A Country Falling Apart: Siri Hustvedt and Karin Haugen 13.04.2026 1h 6min

  No, reading novels is not a solution to our political miseries. For that organization, active resistance, and harder rhetoric is required. But we need stories.Author Siri Hustvedt said these words during a lecture at the House of Literature in 2017, in Donald Trump’s first term as president.Hustvedt is one of those writers who turns to literature as well as organized resistance faced with a harsh political reality. Together with her late husband, the author Paul Auster, she founded Writers Against Trump (today Writers For Democratic Action), a coalition that organizes town hall meetings, protests and political theatre. Hustvedt writes about the beginning of the movement in her latest book, Ghost Stories: A Memoir.Faced with Trump’s curbing of rights, and ICE’s conduct in a number of American cities, Hustvedt has been a staunch critic. Raised in Minnesota by Norwegian parents, she soon learned of her mother’s resistance to the Nazi occupation of Norway during the second world war. In a much-shared Facebook post, Hustvedt points to a parallel between the Norwegians’ resistance and today’s protests in the US: «the moral choice between accepting fascism and opposing it is the same,» she writes.What is the current situation in the US like for someone like Hustvedt, seeing ICE patrol her hometown? How are Americans responding to the continuous dismantling of their democracy and constitutional state? What is the role of the writer in critical times, and how may literature confront the material and interpersonal challenges that we are currently facing?Siri Hustvedt is among the most central writers and thinkers in the US. She has written a number of critically acclaimed novels and essay collections, including The Summer without Men, The Blazing World, The Shaking Woman or A History of My Nerves, and A Woman Looking at Men Looking at Women.At the House of Literature, she was joined by writer and journalist Karin Haugen for a conversation about a US unraveling, and about the resistance in art and community. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  A Women's History. Annabelle Hirsch and Susanne Kaluza 02.03.2026 1h

  In A History of Women in 101 Objects, author Annabelle Hirsch shows us how the things around us aren’t just objects, but testimonies to a common cultural history and set of values. Hirsch shows how something as simple as a hair clip can betray power structures and how kitchen appliances have defined women’s role in society. With a playful tone and a political sharpness, A History of Women is a manifesto for women’s common history that also defies general perceptions of history’s progress and universal improvements.Annabelle Hirsch is a German-French journalist, author and translator. A History of Women is her first book and has garnered wide recognition since its publication in German in 2022.Now, she visits the House of Literature for a lecture on reading cultural histories out of the objects that surrounds us, where everyday objects can be symbols of liberation as well as subjection.After the lecture, there will be a short conversation led by author, women’s rights advocate and Director of the House of Literature, Susanne Kaluza. Kaluza has written two additional chapters for A History’s Norwegian publication and will meet Hirsch on stage for a short conversation. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  A Secret Family History: Lea Ypi 23.02.2026 57min

  Albanian Lea Ypi has a talent for combining the personal and the political in history, exploring how we are all shaped by the societies and ideologies surrounding us. In her memoir Free. A Child and a Country at the End of History, she skillfully portrays her own childhood during the socialist regime of Enver Hoxha in the latter half of the 20th century, followed by the state’s collapse and civil war.Ordinary humans in the midst of history is also the focus in her new book, Indignity: A Life Reimagined. An unknown photopgrah of her grandmother honeymooning in Mussolini’s Italy pops up on social media, making Ypi question everything she thought she knew about her family. Was her grandmother a Nazi collaborator? Or perhaps a Communist spy?This is the beginning of a thorough examination of her grandmothers life, one that takes Ypi back to the Ottoman empire, to Greece and then Albania through alternating regimes and occupants.Lea Ypi is a professor of political theory and philosophy at the London School of Economics. Her book Free was warmly received by both critics and readers, and is so far translated into 30 languages.Writer and journalist Simen Ekern has published several books about European and Italian politics and history. He joins Ypi for a conversation about ordinary humans in the midst of history. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  Reading the Vikings. Eleanor Barraclough and Tore Skeie 12.01.2026 48min

  The history of the Vikings is usually told from the top down, through powerful characters such as chiefs, commanders and royalty, with raids, looting and war at the centre of the narrative. But what about all the others? What was it like to live a normal life as farmer, a merchant, wife or child?This is the central question in a recent book by British Eleanor Barraclough, Embers of the Hands. Taking her starting point from archaeological finds in order to tell the story of ordinary people’s lives in the Viking Age, she reveals how, beneath the surface, we find stories equally dramatic to the great heroic tales of those on the top.On stage, she will be joined by her Norwegian colleague Tore Skeie. With books such as his award winning The Wolf Age: The Vikings, the Anglo-Saxons, and the battle for the North Sea Empire, Skeie depicts a both vivid and brutal Viking Age rife with decisive events. Skeie’s approach to history is mainly through the upper class, such as through Saint Olaf or the nobleman Alv Erlingsson.Skeie and Barraclough write the history of the Viking Age from two different perspectives; from the bottom up and from the top down. What can these two ways of reading history learn from each other?The conversation was moderated by Carline Tromp, writer, critic and old norse philologist.The event was part of the Festival of Non-Fiction 2025. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  My African Reading List: Arinze Ifeakandu 22.12.2025 16min

  Arinze Ifeakandu is a literary shooting star from Nigeria, with a characteristic, lyrical prose, who has been advocated by authors such as Damon Galgut og Colm Tóibín. God’s Children Are Little Broken Things from 2022 is his literary debut, winning him several literary prizes, including the prestigious Dylan Thomas Prize. In addition to the short story collection, Ifeakandu has published several shorter pieces of both fiction and non-fiction, and is currently working on his first novel. This is Ifeakandu's reading list:* Chinua Achebe* Peter Abrahams, Mine Boy* Imbolo Mbue, Behold the Dreamers* NoViolet Bulawayo, We Need New Names* Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Half of a Yellow Sun * Toni Morrison* James Baldwin* Maya Angelou * Gbenga Adesina * I.S. Jones* Ebenezer Agu* Logan February, Painted Blue with Salt Water* Gbenga Adeoba* Esther Ifesinachi Okonkwo, The Tiny Things Are Heaviest* Eloghosa Osunde, Vagabonds!* Chukwuebuka Ibeh, Blessings* Gbolahan Adeola* Otosirieze Obi-Young from Open country magazine   The host in this episode is Madeleine Gedde MetzEditing and production by the House of LiteratureMusic by Ibou Cissokho The House of Literature’s project to promote African literature is supported by NORAD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  When Everything Is Political: Anton Jäger and Torbjørn Røe Isaksen 08.12.2025 49min

  «Everything» has become political – what you eat, what you wear, where you work, what you dream of. Political engagement permeates society, and movements like Occupy Wall Street, the Yellow Vests, and Fridays for Future emerge and create headlines, before disappearing just as quickly. Yet this politicization does not lead to real social change, only to disillusionment and frustration.This is how Belgian historian Anton Jäger defines our times in his book Hyperpolitics: Extreme Politicization without Political Consequences. Jäger describes how we are caught between continuous politicization and political apathy, where the focus has shifted from institutions to short lived movements and social media.Torbjørn Røe Isaksen is the political editor in the business newspaper E24, and he has read Jäger’s book with great interest. In addition to his long experience as an MP and from various ministerial positions in government for the Norwegian conservative party Høyre, he is the author of several books, including Ingen tror på nåtiden (No one believes in the present) from 2023. He joined Jäger during the Festival of Non-Fiction 2025 for a conversation about our hyperpolitical present, and what to do about it.The event is part of the Festival of Non-Fiction 2025. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  My African Reading List: Koleka Putuma 01.12.2025 27min

  South African Koleka Putuma is an author, a playwright, an editor, amentor, and she has become a cult figure in the activist poetry community. In a direct style that pulls no punches, she writes about homophobia and transphobia, gender and racism, while each line pulses with compassion and love. Putuma entered the literary world with a bang in 2017, with her debut collection Collective Amnesia, which explores South Africa’s historic racism and its consequences, both institutionally and within the culture. Since then, she has published two more critically acclaimed poetry collections.This is Putuma's reading list:* Vuyelwa Maluleke* Maneo Mohale, Everything Is a Deathly Flower* Busisiwe Mahlangu, Surviving Loss* Octavia Butler, The Parable of the Sower*Arinze Ifeakandu, God’s Children Are Little Broken Things* D’bi.youngThe host in this episode is Åshild Lappegård LahnEditing and production by the House of LiteratureMusic by Ibou Cissokho The House of Literature’s project to promote African literature is supported by NORAD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  The Dictator and The Nazi. Philippe Sands and Karin Haugen 24.11.2025 49min

  After the second world war, many of the biggest war criminals from Nazi Germany flee to South America in the hope of avoiding penalty. One of them is the SS officer Walter Rauff, who settles in Chile, and ends up with a central role in the bloody regime of Augusto Pinochet. How are these two men, their stories and destinies, connected?In his loose trilogy about European history, lawyer Philippe Sands takes us through the major developments of international law, from the Holocaust up to our time. Beginning with East West Street, the trilogy combines the historical, judicial and personal in a literary masterpiece about one of humanity’s most commendable ambitions: That the people behind history’s biggest crimes are held accountable.Now, Sands concludes his trilogy with 38 Londres Street, about the dictator Augusto Pinochet, the Nazi Walter Rauff and the international legal system’s long effort to catch up with them.Philippe Sands is a French British writer and human rights lawyer specializing in international law. He has written several award-winning books, and as a lawyer, he has argued a number of high-profile cases in international courts, including for Mauritius, the Phillipines and recently for Palestine’s self-determination.Critic and writer Karin Haugen is among those who have followed Sands’s work and writing over the years. Now, she will join him for a conversation about the dictator, the Nazi, and the long arm of the law.This conversation took place during the Festival of Norwegian Non-Fiction 2025. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  Becoming a writer: Arundhati Roy and Athena Farrokhzad 09.11.2025 1h 18min

  Due to issues during the recording, the sound quality is somewhat lower than normal.In the recent memoir of Indian star author and activist Arundhati Roy, Mother Mary Comes to Me, we are given the raw and honest story of Roy’s life and childhood with a many faceted mother who was far from easy to live with.Arundhati Roy’s mother Mary took her two small children and left her alcoholic husband, brought her own family to court in order to abolish the discriminatory inheritance laws in her home state, and built a unique school that made her a beloved and almost mythical figure of her community and beyond. Towards Roy and her brother, however, she was volatile, sharp and cruel. Still, Roy insists that this forced her to see the world from different vantage point, turning her into the writer she is today.The memoir also depicts Roy’s own path, leaving home for a world of film, literature and activism, towards a backdrop of India’s growing Hindu nationalist movement, spearheaded by Modi. We witness Roy’s incessant fights against this movement, on behalf of the environment, of local communities and minorities.As in Roy’s earlier literature, Mother Mary Comes to Me shows us how the personal and political is intimately linked for all of us. Roy portrays her own path as well as those around her with both warmth and bite, in the precise, inventive, and deeply original language that has become one of her distinctive features.Arundhati Roy is the author of the Booker prize winning The God of Small Things, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness and a number of non-fiction books, including My Seditious Heart, Kashmir: The Case for Freedom og Walking with the Comrades.At the House of Literature, Roy was joined by poet and writer Athena Farrokhzad, for a conversation about her mother, her childhood, and becoming the writer and activist she is today. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  Strategies for Survival: Ocean Vuong and Priya Bains 20.10.2025 1h 5min

  Poet and writer Ocean Vuong has in just a few years established himself as a leading literary voice of his generation. With his own life as a point of departure – born in Vietnam and grown up in a working-class family in the US – his raw and crystal-clear writing deals with war and trauma, immigration experiences, class, masculinity, sexuality and alienation.In his latest novel, The Emperor of Gladness, we meet 19-year-old Vietnamese-American Hai, as he is about to end his own life, but he is saved by a chance meeting with an old and senile Lithuanian woman, Grazina, and an eclectic group of co-workers in a run-down fast food restaurant.In Vuong’s America, the idea that the outsiders of society and the working-class poor can escape poverty through hard work is exposed as a lie. The closest they get to a break from their dead end days are drugs, pills or a breather in the restaurant’s freezer. But through the story of Grazina, Hai and his colleagues, he shows how unexpected friendships and care for those around us can be a respite in all the hopelessness.Ocean Vuong is the winner of the American Book Award, the Mark Twain Award, the T. S. Eliot Prize and the Whiting Award, to name a few. He is known for the award-winning and critically acclaimed titles Night Sky With Exit Wounds, Time Is A Mother and On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. His poetry is also clearly visible in his novels, vibrating with lyricism and metaphors that say with you after reading.At the House of Literature, Vuong was joined by the Norwegian poet and editor Priya Bains for a conversation about loss and grief, chosen families and writing about the working-class poor. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  My African Reading List: Soukaina Habiballah 13.10.2025 25min

  Soukaina Habiballah is from Morocco, and the author of four award-winning poetry collections, a short story collection, a novel and a play, Nini Ya Momo. This is Soukaina Habiballah’s reading list:Iman Mersal, Traces of Enayat, (trans. Robin Moger)                              How To Mend: Motherhood and Its Ghosts (trans. Robin Moger)Abdelfattah Kilito, Thou Shalt Not Speak My Language, (trans. Waïl S. Hassan)Laila Lalami, The Moor’s Account The host in this episode is Åshild Lappegård LahnEditing and production by the House of LiteratureMusic by Ibou Cissokho The House of Literature’s project to promote African literature is supported by NORAD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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  Transformation and liberation: Édouard Louis and Erlend Loe 06.10.2025 1h 10min

  With his seventh novel, Collapse, Édouard Louis has now completed his celebrated family saga about his own upbringing and family.Louis writes ruthlessly and skillfully about subjects such as class distinctions, violence, racism, gender, and political power and powerlessness, and his writing has become a point of reference and inspiration for writers across the world. Through the seven novels making up his family saga, he portrays the social structures that are the basis for the violence he experienced as a child, as well as his ambivalence towards his own family and the wider working class. However, he is most ruthless when exposing his own life and flaws.Louis has two new novels out this year: Collapse and Monique Escapes. In Collapse, Louis explores his older brother’s decline, one he both feared and came to for safety, and who died, aged 38, after a life of alcoholism, poverty, neglect and self-inflicted violence.In Monique Escapes, he portrays his mother’s escape from yet another destructive and violent relationship, marked by alcohol and degrading treatment. The novel depicts her struggle to find a way out when she has neither money, an education certificate nor a driver’s license.In both novels, Louis explores how social and economic structures shapes and limits people’s possibilities to create a free life. “The most political thing I do, is portray that which is invisible,” Louis said last time he visited the House of Literature. He returned now to talk about completing his family saga, his literary ruthlessness and the way ahead. He was joined by writer colleague and critic Erlend Loe, who has followed Louis’s body of work closely. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.