Ditte Everywoman (Girl Alive. Daughter of Man. Toward the Stars.)

From the author of Pelle the Conqueror: Martin Andersen Nexo (1869-1954): Ditte Everywoman is a long rich work in three volumes, full of the kind of poetic detail found only in books like Gorki's and O'Casey's autobiographies; it has been generally unobtainable in this country for a long time now. It is a first-rate novel interpreting a working woman's life. In the first volume of the trilogy, Ditte is truly Girl Alive-alive to all the bittersweet experiences of life in a poor family struggling for survival. The locale is Denmark, peasant country, at the beginning of the 20th century. But it becomes sharply here and now by virtue of Nexo's masterful understanding of social forces. The second and third volumes (Daughter of Man, and Towards The Stars) carry Ditte into maturity from her servant days at the Hill Farm to work in the capital city, Copenhagen. Martin Andersen Nexo's writing is magnificent throughout: the giant simplicity of an enduring folk tale. And without any overt psychologizing, he probes deep into his characters. Ditte, growing up to young womanhood, is revealed in her complexities, her doubts and her rainbow joys. She participates in all experiences, hers is no shallow stream of consciousness, but a plunging into the moving current of life. She becomes truly-Ditte, Everywoman.