Monday, 11 July (continued)
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Mårbacka is a manor house near the town of Sunne in the Swedish province of Värmland. The first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature (1909), Selma Lagerlöf (1858-1940) was born and raised at here. Later her family lost the ownership of the estate; but after Selma won the Nobel Prize she was able to buy it all back. And in her last will and testament she ordered that Mårbacka should be preserved as a memorial estate in the condition it was at her death, and shown to the public .
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| Selma Lagerlöf, 1909 (Wikipedia) |
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| Our guide |
We went on a very nice guided tour indoors; but no photography was allowed there.
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| The back of the house seen from the garden |
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| Barns and rural surroundings |
We had lunch at the Mårbacka garden café and chose their local specialty, filled crêpes made from skrädmjöl - a flour consisting exclusively of roasted oats (locally grown).
Souvenir shop
The garden sculpture is from Selma Lagerlöf's famous fictional story The Wonderful Adventures of Nils (or Nils Holgersson's wonderful journey across Sweden). This book was written (1902) on commission from the National Teachers Association as a geography reader for the public schools. As punishment for being cruel to animals, a small tomte (brownie/elf) shrinks Nils to elf size himself, and he ends up going on an adventure with a tame goose who decides to join a flock of wild ones. This takes them both on a journey across every province of Sweden, and learning a lot on the way.
She sounds like quite a lady, shame you couldn't take photos inside but some places have that ruling.
ReplyDeleteAmy, I understand why they didn't allow it here, the rooms were rather cramped and people focusing on taking photos would disturb the guided tour.
DeleteGerman children of my generation are very familiar with Nils Holgersson, as we all watched the anime series when we were young. But I knew the book long before the series, as we alway did a lot of reading in my family. I didn‘t know about the teaching background, though!
ReplyDeleteMeike, I suppose that background fact is less important for readers abroad. ;)
DeleteThe book sounds good. The house and grounds are beautiful. It is an unusual house, especially the roof part with that extra little parapet.
ReplyDeleteGinny, I've been there before in the past, but it was very nice to revisit, and in such lovely weather too.
DeleteHow fun that I received your postcard about this author this morning and now this post of yours with more information. That was sad her family lost the estate, and brilliant that her Nobel prize allowed her to buy it back and it is preserved.
ReplyDeleteTerra, glad the card reached you :) I read an excellent biography about Selma a couple of years ago which I'd be happy to recommend - but alas I can't find that it's been translated to English (yet). (Written by Anna-Karin Palm, 2019.)
DeleteWe had friends who lived in Sunne and stayed with them regularly! On one of our visits, we were taken to the Manor House. Not sure that in more recent years there was a Selma Lagerlöf hotel nearby, where we went for afternoon tea.
ReplyDeleteCG, I tried googling and there seems to be a hotel by that name somewhere between Mårbacka and Sunne, but also an ex hotel by the same name being refurbished for other purposes, so I'm not really sure what's what!
DeleteYes, there were two hotels of the same name. Even back in the early 80's, when we last visited the town, one hotel was closed - I don't think it ever opened. I'm not sure of the actual story but seem to remember something to do with the rivalry between the two consortiums building the hotels.
DeleteI like that Marbaca, beautiful, the house is nice but not all that attractive to me. I missed this because feedly is on the blink and I am finding quite a few I did not see in the past few days, including this one
ReplyDeleteSandra, I didn't post anything on Thursday as I was off on a daytrip with a friend then, so don't think you've missed anything from me. :)
DeleteWell I'm on an adventure across Sweden but not with a tame goose!
ReplyDeleteGraham - more of a wild-goose chase, perhaps? ;-)
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