Every poet knows that poetry is created under a stronger or weaker pressure of mood. A sound hums within you, colors come to your eyes, you feel something ripple within you. ("Letter to a German Translator", 1908)

Suddenly a shot was heard, two shots. A panic struck the crowd, who rushed into the side streets amid immense screams; at the same time the police used the apartment to ride after the package in different directions, trampling it down, slashing with their sabres. At that moment there was a feeling of war. ("A Street Revolution", Krattskog, 1903)

Fredrik came into the living room a little paler than usual, a little tired after the hard work of recent times on the political articles. This work had cost him far more effort than all his scientific dissertations. He was not a politician, he had never been much interested in politics.

In our country a new and different spirit has come, it is not only the farmer who is working more than before with his hands in his pockets, it is everyone, the entire population. The craftsman, the day laborer, the maidservant have settled down to a rude indifference to promises, to agreements, to duties, which was unknown and unheard of in earlier times. ("A Word to Us", 1910)

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)