The subtitle of the Skilling-Magazin was til utbredelse av almennyttige kunnskaper. This was a translation of the phrase ‘for diffusion of useful knowledge’ found in the society that published the Penny Magazine. But in Norwegian it could have other implications as well. The term almennyttig is today used with reference to companies or causes that are non-profit or for public benefit. At the time it could also denote the intended readership of the magazine. It was primarily aimed at what in Norway during the nineteenth century was called allmuen, the common people.
What Henrik Wergeland called ‘the cultivation of the masses’ was an important project in the period.
1 ‘Massens kultiveren’ in Norwegian. See F. Sejersted, Den vanskelige frihet: 1814–1851 (Oslo, 1978), pp. 317ff. It was argued that the common people, to be able to participate in the new democratic society, needed to raise their levels of knowledge and education. As the future Norwegian prime minister Frederik Stang put it in 1835, ‘the will of the common people, chastened and moderated, should be the driving force of the workings of the state’.
2 The quote is from a tract published in 1835. Here quoted from R. Slagstad, De nasjonale strateger (Oslo, 1998), p. 33. ‘Almeenviljen, lutret og modereret […] skal være den bevægende Kraft i alle Statsorganismens Retninger’. Disseminating knowledge about history, science, technology, the arts, moral and religious texts was seen as key to building the new nation.
The connections between the
Skilling-Magazin and these Enlightenment ideals become evident when we look more closely at the printers of
Skilling-Magazin.
Skilling-Magazin was first printed at a printing house started by Professor of Economics Gregers Fougner Lundh. Lundh was an important figure in public education, and as secretary (from 1822) and later literary director he was one of the driving forces behind
Selskabet for Norges Vel (Society for the Good of Norway), established in 1809.
3 A. Fr. Andresen, ‘Gregers Lundh’, in Norsk biografisk leksikon, 13 February 2009, <http://nbl.snl.no/Gregers_Lundh>; Tveterås, Den norske bokhandel, 1, pp. 241–2. The society was an important agent in the fight for Norwegian rights within the union between Denmark and Norway and one of the most important campaigners for establishing the first Norwegian university, Det Kongelige Frederiks Universitet in Christiania in 1811. In 1810 the society started a publishing house to print and promote its own material, and in the 1820s and 1830s the printing house was used to promote public education. The society also acted as a patent office, and while it was not a part of the Norwegian state, it had an official character.
4 J. P. Collett and E. Bjerke (eds), Vekst gjennom kunnskap: Det kongelige selskap for Norges vel 1809–1814 (Oslo, 2009).In his application to establish a printing house, Lundh justified his reasons for going into the printing trade. He believed printing played an important role in the intellectual and political education of the nation and therefore thought that it would be of the utmost importance to the government that their literary productions were not left to ‘the often one-sided and greedy arbitrariness’ of industry and trade. His printing house, he stated, would combine ‘cheap services’ with an ‘interest in something other than mere monetary gain’.
5 H. Tveterås, Den norske bokhandel, 1, p. 241. By 1835 Guldberg & Dzwonkowski had also applied to the king to start their own printing house. In their application they also stressed the mission of the magazine ‘to diffuse enlightenment to the middle and lower classes’.
6 The application was transcribed for the 100-year anniversary of the Fabritius & Co printing and publishing house and can be found the Fabritius archives: National Archives of Norway, Fabritius og sønner – SAO/PAO-0050 Z-L0011, Forlagskontrakter.Like many enlightenment projects in Norway at the time,
Skilling-Magazin was closely connected to the state. This connection is apparent when we look at the financing of the images. As mentioned above, many of the images in
Skiling-Magazin were stereotyped wood engravings bought from magazines such as the
Penny Magazine, its rival
The Saturday Magazine, the German
Heller Magasin, the French
Magasin Pittoresque or other publications. This made
Skilling Magazin a part of a transnational network of educational illustrated magazines. But Guldberg & Dzwonkowski also made efforts to incorporate more original material in the first years of publication. They promised, when summing up the first five years of publishing in 1839, more Norwegian material for the 1840 volume. They mention a description of Norwegian fisheries, several descriptions of Norwegian towns and places, and portraits of the family of the Crown Prince. These images were not made in Norway, however; the illustrations had already been cut in wood especially for the magazine by the Parisian wood engravers Andrew, Best and Leloir.
7 ‘Til Læseren’, Skilling-Magazin no. 47, 28 December 1839. In addition to the Parisian firm, some of the images in
Skilling-Magazin were cut especially for the magazine in London, and some by the Danish engraver A. C. F. Finch.
8 I. Stensrud, ‘The Magazine and the City’, pp. 101–2.It was expensive to have images cut in wood abroad, and the editors of
Skilling-Magazin received support from the highest levels of the state.
9 Answering complaints in a newspaper article about the lack of Norwegian scenes in the Skilling-Magazin, the editors mentioned that 800 subscribers were needed to pay for a single series of engravings, 1,400 if the cost of paper, printing and office hours were accounted for. ‘Svar fra Skilling-Magazinets Redaction til Indsenderen i Morgenbladet No. 295’, Tillægg til Morgenbladet no. 23, 23 January 1839. Charles John offered in some cases direct help to the
Skilling-Magazin to have images of events or public buildings cut in wood abroad (e.g., Plate 12.3).
10 One was of a new road in Verdal, the so-called Karl Johan Road, which the king contributed 50 speciedaler to have cut in wood. Charles John contributed the same amount for an engraving of the parliament chambers. See: E. H. Edvardsen, ‘Den tidligste ukepresse i Norge’, in E. H. Edvardsen (ed.), Gammelt nytt i våre tidligste ukeblader: aktstykker om folketro og sagn i Illustreret Nyhedsblad og Norsk Folkeblad (Oslo, 1997), p. 10. The man responsible for these royal commissions was probably the chamberlain Christian Holst. In addition to being the royal chamberlain, Holst was secretary of Det Kongelige Frederiks Universitet and took a keen interest in promoting Norwegian culture. Holst continued to fund engravings of Norwegian scenes, illustrations of antiquarian objects and illustrations of national paintings that could be used by the illustrated press with government funds well into the 1870s.
11 Ibid.~
Plate 12.3. King Charles John’s arrival in Christiania 21 December 1838. Wood engraving by ‘one of the best engravers in London’ after drawing by J. Flintoe. Skilling-Magazin 10 August 1839.
The connections between the government and the
Skilling-Magazin are evident in other ways than direct financing.
Skilling-Magazin was granted reduced postage from the beginning, something that was afforded by the king to publications of an especially useful character.
12 F. E. Johannessen, Alltid underveis: Postverkets historie gjennom 350 år, vol. 1, 1647–1920 (Oslo, 1997), pp. 152–6. Postage exemption (portofrihet) was granted to letters from state and public institutions, schools, and the poor relief system. Reduced postage (portomoderasjon) was granted to newspapers and magazines of an especially useful character. The new postage act of 1837 transferred the task to grant reduced postage to newspapers and magazines from the king to parliament and Skilling-Magazin was the first publication to be granted reduced postage by parliament. In addition, the Storting decided that 97 volumes every year should be distributed to particularly gifted students in the common schools at the government’s expense.
13 A. Mortensen, ‘Boktrykkerkunstens repræsentanter i Norge XLIII’, Nordisk trykkeritidende: organ for de grafiske fag og papirindustrien, XVI, no. 5 (May 1907), pp. 47–8.Skilling-Magazin, like the
Penny Magazine, was a part of an enlightenment project. However, unlike in England and many other places in Europe, in Norway this was a project that was closely connected to the state. For
Skilling-Magazin this meant that many of the images printed in the magazine were not only directly financed by the king, but the magazine also received several benefits such as reduced postage and distribution to particularly gifted students. This state-supported enlightenment can be seen as a continuation of the particular character of the Enlightenment movement in Scandinavia. One of the things that characterised the Northern Enlightenment was the movement’s close ties to the state administration, the Church, universities and local governments.
14 E. Krefting et al. (eds), Eighteenth-Century Periodicals as Agents of Change: Perspectives on Northern Enlightenment (Leiden, Boston, 2015). Skilling-Magazin must be seen as a continuation of this project, a part of a state-driven effort to educate the common people. But how successful was this state-driven enlightenment effort? To find out, it will be useful to look more closely at the magazine’s reception and readers.