STARR LIBRARY

STARR BOOK CLUB

The Copenhagen Trilogy

by Tove Ditlevsen

Tuesday, November 28th, 7pm

Tove Ditlevsen is today celebrated as one of the most important and unique voices in twentieth-century Danish literature, and The Copenhagen Trilogy (1969–71) is her acknowledged masterpiece. Childhood tells the story of a misfit child’s single-minded determination to become a poet; Youth describes her early experiences of sex, work, and independence. Dependency picks up the story as the narrator embarks on the first of her four marriages and goes on to describe her horrible descent into drug addiction, enabled by her sinister, gaslighting doctor-husband. Throughout, she writes about female experience and identity in a way that feels very fresh and pertinent to today’s discussions around feminism.