Young Ofeg's Ditties/Introductory Note

It has been urged upon me by many that translation is an unworthy form of literature; and with this view I entirely agree, if the translator be not in such sympathy with the writer he endeavours to give in his own tongue, as to make translation a labour of love, and not merely a branch of literary trade. In offering this necessarily poor version of these beautiful prose poems, which are an exposition of Friedrich Nietzche's triumphant doctrine of the Ego, I am not ​alone actuated by my individual admiration of Ola Hansson's writings, but also by a desire to make known to others one of the most remarkable writers of our day.

Ola Hansson is the youngest and most striking personality amongst Scandinavian writers. He was born on the 12th of November 1860, in Skåne (Skania), the most southern province in Sweden. His family is one of the oldest in the province, and have held the same estate for many centuries as freehold proprietors. Herr Ola's father was the first to marry an outsider, and his eldest brother the first to enter a University—for the dis​tinguishing characteristic of such families in Sweden is jealousy of innovation, tenacity in the preservation of family tradition, and intermarriage. He joined the University at Lund, and passed a brilliant examination in philosophy as one year's student, but the expectation that he would be a shining light as lecturer was not fulfilled, as he devoted himself to letters.

After his return to Skania he issued his first book, "Sensitiva Amorosa" in which he broke new ground in literature: that of physiological mysticism, with which he plumbed greater depths in the mysteries of human life than even the Ibsen, Björnson, or Strindberg ​problem-plays had led one to believe possible. As the niceties of his psychology and the peculiar depths of his analysis met, not alone with little understanding, but called down a storm of opprobrium and scurrilous personal attacks from the press, he left his native land and settled finally in Germany; and here he gained in a few years a leading position as poet and critic in the newer school of letters.

His fame spread from Germany to France, where attention was first drawn to him by the publication of "Young Ofeg's Ditties." His numerous lyrical and critical works have been translated into most European languages, and every ​new issue of his pen is hailed with eagerness. Most of his work is in striking affinity with the atmosphere of erotic mysticism that pervades the paintings of Mr Burne Jones, so much so that Amor and Psyche, King Cophetua, and Chant d'Amour might serve as illustrations of some of Ola Hansson's moods, save that they are lacking a little in the sensuous intensity of the latter's work.

Something of the Skanian atmosphere has crept into his nature: the flat land, the ever-varying delicate nuances of the seasons, the shifting lights, the wayward moods peculiar to each time of the year, all find echo in his impressionable soul.

​As poet, psychological novelist, masterly essayist, and individual critic, he is one of the most striking literary phenomena of the age—he is the incarnation of the nervous life of to-day. He is a specialist in psychology, a pathological hunter in the terra incognita of the human soul; laying bare hidden places with the sure, deft touch of a skilled surgeon. He writes by the light of some inner illumination; feels with delicate intellectual antennæ uncommon to ordinary humanity. He is a master in the diagnosis of the elusive emotions that flit like shadows across the hearts and minds of men. His writings are distinguished by ​melancholy sentiment, delicate, dainty joy, and sympathetic sorrow with the fruitless struggle of man with adverse circumstances, and the enigmatical forces in his own being. The peculiar rhythm of his prose adapts itself to his moods, fixes the fleeting expressions, the changeful colours, and the scarcely audible undertones of life.

He is an aristocrat in letters, for the few, not the many. "Sensitiva Amorosa" and "Parais" (Pariahs), are the most individual of his many novels; they give the psycho-physiological key to all his subsequent work.

As critic he aims to grip the characteristic, the individual, in a ​writer's nature, to probe to the man behind the work—to interpret both. "Interpreters and Seers,"^[1] "Young Scandinavia," "Friedrich Nietzche, His Personality and His System," with a pamphlet on "Materialism in Belles Lettres," have placed him in the foremost rank as a critic.

As writer he has worked against the heaviest odds. He published most of his earliest works without the slightest pecuniary return—and he has been absolutely true to the principles of his art.

As a man who has seen all, staked all, lost faith, and is yet not embittered, his personality is interesting.

​He watches the game of life with a ('tis true) somewhat weary interest, but his heart is full of pity, and his noble sensitive soul answers to every chord in the existence of humanity. His keenness of vision pertains almost to second sight, he reads men, with the complexity of their motives and the duality of their being, with appalling ease. He is a poet—who is likewise a seer.