The White Bear and The Rearguard

Comprising two novellas from Nobel winner Pontoppidan (Lucky Per), who died in 1943, this volume offers a vivid and comedic view of late 19th-century Denmark. In “The White Bear,” Lutheran priest Thorkild Müller embarks on a mission to Christianize the Indigenous people of Greenland, where he quickly becomes more interested in learning to hunt caribou than evangelizing and is adopted into the fabric of Inuit society. He marries Seqineq, an Inuit woman, but after she dies, he impulsively requests to be transferred back to Denmark, where he’s now at odds with the church. His popularity with his new parish sets off a battle of wills between him and the local bishop who wants to drive him out. “The Rearguard” likewise depicts a conflict of belief: it begins with firebrand Socialist realist painter Jørgen Hallager marrying Ursula Branth, the daughter of a conservative politician. On their honeymoon in Rome, they attempt—with little success—to reconcile their diverging views on propriety, poverty, and family ties. Pontoppidan’s humanism and belief in the value of compromise permeate his portrayal of the couple’s doomed marriage and Hallager’s tragically unwavering views. These tales of universal struggles teem with keen insights. (June)