Sigrid Undset

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Sigrid Undset (May 20, 1882 – June 10, 1949) was a Norwegian novelist who won the Nobel Prize in Literature for 1928.

Undset was born in Kalundborg, Denmark, but her family moved to Norway when she was two years old. In 1924, she converted to Catholicism. She fled Norway for the United States in 1940 because of her opposition to Nazi Germany and the German occupation, but returned after the World War II ended in 1945.

Her best-known work is Kristin Lavransdatter, a modernist trilogy about life in Scandinavia in the Middle Ages. The book was set in medieval Norway and was published from 1920 to 1922 in three volumes. Kristin Lavransdatter portrays the life of woman from birth until death. Undset was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for this trilogy as well as her two books about Olav Audunssøn, published in 1925 and 1927.

Undset experimented with modernist tropes such as stream of consciousness in her novel, although the original English translation by Charles Archer excised many of these passages. In 1997, the first volume of Tiina Nunnally's new translation of the work won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction in the category of translation. The names of each volume were translated by Archer as The Bridal Wreath, The Mistress of Husaby, and The Cross, and by Nunally as The Wreath, The Wife, and The Cross.

Undset died at the age of 67 in Lillehammer, Norway, where she had lived from 1919 through 1940.

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Most Popular works

-The Master of Hestviken Series is of four volumes, which are listed in order below. Depending on the version, each volume could be of itself, or two volumes may be combined into one book. The latter tends to result from older printings.

The Axe : The Master of Hestviken ISBN 0679752730
The Snake Pit : The Master of Hestviken ISBN 0679755543
In the Wilderness : The Master of Hestviken ISBN 0679755535
The Son Avenger : The Master of Hestviken ISBN 0679755527

-Kristin Lavransdatter is a trilogy of three volumes. These are listed in order as well. Written during 1920-22, it won her Nobel Prize in Literature in 1928.