AGRICULTURE

More agriculture in Norway. But not agriculture with state subsidies. These are theories of lawyers who live off politics. Agriculture with personal work and personal ambition in this work – that is what is needed. ("Letter to Klassekampen", 1916)

Hamsun's focus on agriculture goes back a long way. Hamsun wrote several newspaper articles in which he praised the farmer, including "Farmer Culture" (1908) and "The Farmer" (1918).

The clearest literary expression of Hamsun's positive view of farmers and agriculture is found in Markens grøde (1917), but the depiction of the settlers Ezra and Hosea in Landstrykere (1927) is also clearly positively marked.

Hamsun, who himself came from a farming family, moved back to Hamarøy and the Skogheim farm in 1911. In 1918 he bought Nørholm outside Grimstad, which he attempted to turn into a model farm, while at the same time pursuing his writing career. But the farm was difficult to run. In October 1924 Hamsun wrote to his son Arild: "It is expensive to have a farm, I have recently become doubtful whether you should be tied to this misery. And if when the time comes you feel like doing something else, you should not be pressured into this."