by birgitta_hjalmarson_admin | Apr 18, 2019 | Archive
On Writing. This interview was originally published by Lori’s Book Loft at author-spotlight-birgitta-hjalmarson.html. Please tell us a little about growing up in Sweden and your studies? I grew up in a town on the West Coast of Sweden. When not at school, I was...
by birgitta_hjalmarson_admin | Apr 17, 2019 | Archive
When Swedish Farmers Marched. In the years before the First World War, as tension mounted on the continent, the Swedish political parties drew their own internal battle lines. The Conservatives championed a stronger defense, opposed by the Liberals and the...
by birgitta_hjalmarson_admin | Apr 13, 2019 | Archive
The Great Brännvin Row. Before Fylgia (5). Before Fylgia, there was another story, told by the villagers themselves. Many of my readers have asked about it, and so I decided to post it here. This is the fifth installment. Not yet fiction, it occupies a realm of its...
by birgitta_hjalmarson_admin | Apr 5, 2019 | Archive
Emir. The Swedish Ardennes. A shorter version of this post was first published by Women Writers, Women Books at http://www.booksbywomen.org.They named him Emir, after those powerful Arab rulers. He was an Ardennes draft horse, a roan gelding in a village in southwest...
by birgitta_hjalmarson_admin | Apr 5, 2019 | Archive
Reading Tomas Tranströmer. Tomas Tranströmer’s poems won’t leave you alone. They’re dark, infused with dread, but also shot through with light, as when, nearby, a string quartet plays Schubert.So much we have to trust to be able to live our daily day without sinking...
by birgitta_hjalmarson_admin | Feb 25, 2019 | Archive
Horse Meat in Sweden. Its Troubled Past. Dead horses hang from a giant tree. Blood drips from their lacerated flesh. Below, hooded figures tend to cauldrons, the air putrid from boiling meat. Did I dream it? Or did I hear about it as a child in Sweden? Perhaps I read...
