Karen Blixen - Isak Dinesen home

Question 54: Isak Dinesen's style and form?

Q. I'm giving a report to my book club and I was wondering if you could explain some things about the style & form of Karen Blixen.

A. Isak Dinesen was influenced by the great writers of the nineteenth century, including Goethe, Heinrich Heine, Kierkegaard, George Brandes, and the Romantic poets. There are some good short introductions to Romanticism. It is essential to understand this philosophy in order to understand Karen Blixen's work.

Contributing to the Gothic nature of Karen Blixen's fiction is the fact that the characters are a projection of various phases of the writer's personality. None of the characters is therefore well-defined or well-described. You will notice that Isak Dinesen offers no official interpretations or conclusions in her stories. The Romantic view is that the reader is pulled into the story when forced to help tell the story.

The use of stories within stories gives the impression of endless interpretations (characteristic of the Romantic approach to philosophy).

Isak Dinesen held an existential view of life derived from many influences, including Kierkegaard (Man is alone in relation to God.) and Nietzsche (You must create yourself as a "Super" figure, or memorable personality in order to achieve immortality.) In the Scandinavian sagas bravery and a tragic death allowed you to be remembered via legends about you.

Almost all the Dinesen stories are about identity, or about how you can make the most of the fate dealt to you. Every event in life is essential in creating the life story that is uniquely yours. This idea derives from the Norns in the sagas, the witches of fate that weave the events of a life (and also from the Fates in Greek mythology). In the sagas and myths tragic events are known by witches years in advance. It is not what happens to you but how you perform (life as a performance was very important to both Nietzsche and Dinesen) that creates your reputation (immortality).

Copyright © 2002 by Linda Donelson. All rights reserved