A final example of the challenges of establishing a transnational journal, and thereby formalising regional co-operation and understanding across cultural and linguistic domains, is the Copenhagen-based monthly
Det nittende Aarhundrede. Tidsskrift for Litteratur og Kritik [The nineteenth century. Journal for literature and criticism], edited by the brothers Georg and Edvard Brandes throughout its relatively long life, 1874–7. This was before the remarkable European breakthrough of Scandinavian literature and what Tore Rem and Narve Fulsås have called ‘the Scandinavian Moment in World Literature’.
1 N. Fulsås and T. Rem, Ibsen, Scandinavia and the Making of a World Drama (Cambridge, 2018), p. x. Or, to be more concrete, before Henrik Ibsen’s remarkable success with
Pillars of Society in Germany 1877 and before the more prolific of the two Brandes brothers, Georg, moved to Berlin the same year to establish himself as a European journalist and critic. The journal is from the early days of the so-called ‘Modern Breakthrough’ in Scandinavia, a term later invented by Georg Brandes denoting a social and literary movement or current which reacted against cultural and political conservatism. On these grounds rather than the earlier idealistic notions of Scandinavianism, the journal was founded as a Nordic enterprise.
The biographical backdrop to the journal project was that in 1871 Brandes had been denied a vacant professorship in aesthetics at the University of Copenhagen, for which he was the obvious candidate, as well as access to the press, which was dominated by conservative newspapers. His first idea for a strike-back was to start a liberal newspaper, but he soon gave that up and instead came up with the idea of a regional journal. A subscription plan was printed in the only Brandes-friendly national newspaper of the time, Morgenbladet. According to this, the aim was:
to disseminate the knowledge of the most prominent personalities and schools of thought of our time within the realms of literature, art, and science, which by nature demands the participation of all educated members of society. Particularly the journal will be preoccupied with everything of special interest to Denmark and the North [Norden]. This aim will be pursued by the publication of comprehensible theses, critical reviews, and poetical contributions by renowned authors and scholars.
2 ‘Det nittende Aarhundrede. Subskriptions-Indbydelse’, Morgenbladet, 21 October 1874. Danish orig.: ‘at udbrede Kundskaben til de Personligheder og Aandsretninger, der i vor Tid fremtræde paa Literaturens, Kunstens og Videnskabens Omraade, og som efter deres Natur have Krav paa alle dannedes Deltagelse. Særligt vil Tidsskriftet beskjæftige sig med alt, hvad der fortrinsvis kan interessere Danmark og Norden. Sit Maal vil det søge naaet ved meddelelse af almenfattelige Afhandlinger, kritiske Artikler og poetiske Frembringelser, og Udgiverne have dertil sikret sig Hjælp af ansete Forfattere og Videnskabsmænd.’Looking at the contents of the journal over the six volumes, totalling more than 2,900 pages, it is safe to say that the transnational ambitions were poorly executed: there were almost no contributions from Swedes, and the few that were indeed included were in Danish translation. A review of the first issue in a liberal Stockholm newspaper includes some interesting reflections on the Swedish dimension of the journal:
a Danish journal, for which Sweden is not, regarding literature, a
terra incognita, a Danish journal, which has finally discovered, that even the mainland of the North owns a literature, that blossoms in many fields […] this will truly be both rare and welcome, something, which Scandinavianism, to its own harm, failed to accomplish. […].
3 C.V.B. [= Carl von Bergen], ‘Det nittende Aarhundrede’, [review] Stockholms Dagblad, 18 November 1874. Swedish orig.: ‘en dansk tidsskrift, för hvilken Sverige ej i literärt hänseende är och förbliver en terra incognita – en dansk tidsskrift, som omsider upptäckt, att äfven Nordens huvudland äger en på de flesta områden blomstrande och iderik literatur […] detta bliver i sanning någonting lika sällsynt som välkommet, något som skandinavismen, till dens egen skada, hitills ej lyckats åvägabringa.’In a historical perspective the reviewer denounced the value and effects of the old romanticist Scandinavianism. And at the same time, in an efficient rhetorical way, he wanted to take Brandes by the word while also keeping an eye on him to see whether he delivered on his promise: ‘We will follow this with great interest’, he continued. In the context of the review this should be read as a threat. Involve Sweden more, or we will lose interest in the journal. The ‘Danish journal’ did not deliver, hence the threat was effectuated. At least seemingly only the first issue was noticed by Swedish newspapers.
Whereas the Swedish reaction to
Det nittende Aarhundrede took the form of a contestation between the two major languages and literatures of Scandinavia, the Norwegian feedback, as testified by Georg Brandes’s correspondence with Norwegian authors regarding a possible co-operation, was addressing issues of transnationality more on matter of principle. Brandes tried to convince them to contribute, which some did, but the most prominent and promising were highly critical. Like Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Jonas Lie did not agree to co-operate. Unlike Bjørnson,
4 Letter from Bjørnson to Brandes, 16 June 1879, in M. Borup et al. (eds), Brdr. Brandes Brevveksling med nordiske Forfattere, vol. IV (Copenhagen, 1940), p. 70. this was not due to ideological reasons but rather a difference of perspective between him and Brandes. Lie feared that the regional co-operation would not be firmly grounded in the Scandinavian cultures but would instead be preoccupied with broader European debates: ‘I am to Norwegian simplicity, what Brandes is to the manifoldness of European criticism. We two cannot work together,’ as he explained in a letter to the publisher of the journal, F. V. Hegel at Gyldendal, quoted in Brandes’s autobiography.
5 G. Brandes, Levned, vol. 3 (Copenhagen, 1908), p. 126. Hegel was also the publisher of both his and Brandes’ books.
Similarly, Henrik Ibsen addressed the asymmetry and arrogance of Brandes’s proposed journal, but more directly and with an eye for the sociology and demography of the project. He translated Brandes’s Europeanism into Copenhagen parochialism and accused him of ignoring the 4 million Swedes, the 2 million Norwegians, the 1 million Finns, and the almost equally large Scandinavian population in America. 10 million people all together. ‘Abandon all Copenhagen particularism; write for them all, then I will join you.’
6 Letter from Ibsen to Brandes, 20 April 1874, N. Fulsås et al. (eds), Henrik Ibsens Skrifter: Brev, <www.ibsen.uio.no/BREV_1871-1879ht%7CB18740420GB.xhtml>. Norwegian orig.: ‘opgiv al københavnsk partikularisme; skriv for dem allesammen, så skal jeg være med.’ To begin with, Ibsen’s dynamic mapping of the ideal readership of the journal is remarkable by including the Scandinavian diaspora in America and the Finns. Hereby he is teasingly challenging Brandes’ internationalist ideology by taking him at his word. In the subscription plan the concept of the ‘North’ was used to designate the journal’s area of interest. Now Ibsen is relating Brandes to a static and outdated conception of Scandinavia, just as the Swedish reviewer did. With Ibsen’s critical proposal, Brandes was put in a ‘catch-22’ situation. The chosen model was not satisfying, but on the other hand the idea to include the Finns was extremely difficult to apply, at least without translation, and it was the translation of Swedish texts in the journal that had triggered Ibsen’s critique. Actually, Brandes himself was very keen to establish connections to Finland, and in an interesting review article from 1877 on Scandinavian journals – published in his own journal – he would stress the similarities between Denmark and Finland: even though Finland is far away from Denmark in space, the Finnish national spirit resembles the Danish, ‘more familiar to us than the Swedish’.
7 G. Brandes, ‘Nye skandinaviske Tidsskrifter’, Det nittende Aarhundrede (April 1877), p. 73. So, unsurprisingly Brandes’s Scandinavianism was undermined by himself. ‘Scandinavia’ was not really a meaningful concept to him, which was of course problematic when proposing and editing a Scandinavian journal.
The basic rhetorical question Ibsen was posing to Brandes in an attempt to convince him to rethink things was what kind of journal he was projecting, ‘Danish or a Scandinavian?’, claiming that ‘Danish
literati want subscribers and readerships in all of the Nordic countries, while only living and breathing and feeling in the air of Copenhagen’.
8 Letter from Ibsen to Brandes, 20 April 1874. Norwegian orig.: ‘De danske literater vil nok have abonnenter og læsekreds i alle de nordiske lande; men de lever og ånder og føler kun i den københavnske luft.’ The Ibsen scholars Narve Fulsås and Tore Rem have convincingly interpreted the dispute over the journal as an example of the contestation between an avant-garde of successful Norwegian authors having risen above ‘the provincialism of the old centres, particularly what they perceived as Copenhagen’s hegemonic pretentions’.
9 N. Fulsås and T. Rem, ‘From Periphery to Center: The Origins and Worlding of Ibsen’s Drama’, in M. Jalava et al. (eds), Decentering European Intellectual Space (Leiden, Boston, 2018), p. 50.While Fulsås and Rem do not go into bibliographical details about the journal, Ibsen himself did, and in this he might have missed a point when suggesting that the projected journal was not viable and profitable. The scarce Norwegian and Swedish mentions of the journal seem to indicate a modest number of non-Danish Scandinavian subscribers, and the Danish-biased pan-Scandinavian journal would reach more than 1,500 subscribers, which was apparently enough for Gyldendal and Hegel to let it run for six volumes before it closed in 1877, when Brandes moved to Berlin.
10 M. Zerlang, ‘Det moderne gennembrud 1870-1900: Presse og magasiner’, The Royal Library (Copenhagen, 2010). http://www2.kb.dk/elib/mss/dmg/presse/index.htm In his autobiography there are no details about the journal’s commercial success. Interestingly however, all specificity concerning the precarious question of the transnational ambitions and intended audience is missing as well.
Det nittende Aarhundrede is mentioned as a monthly with the ambition of ‘getting closer
to the reading public in a more intimate way than books allowed for’, nothing more, nothing less.
11 G. Brandes, Levned, vol. 2 (Copenhagen, 1907), p. 163.