Newsgroups: bit.listserv.words-l
Date:         Tue, 25 Aug 1992 20:40:00 EDT
From:         Gilbert Smith <N567126@NCSUADM.ACS.NCSU.EDU>
Subject:      The Gospel Truth About Agnes
Comments: To: English Language Discussion Group <words-l@UGA.CC.UGA.EDU>

Torkel reports apologetically:
>   It isn't all that juicy, more a fairly dry slice of Swedish
> literary history.  Agnes von Krusenstjerna was born in 1894 and died
> in 1940; she suffered bouts of insanity or something like it, and
> apparently was in two minds about whether they were a curse or a
> blessing. She's considered one of the foremost Swedish novelists,
> though I don't suppose she's known outside Scandinavia. I haven't read
> any of her books myself - far too serious-minded stuff for me. The
> seven "Misses von Pahlen" novels were published between 1930 and 1935;
> they caused a scandal because of what one commentator calls their
> "grotesquely one-sided preoccupation with sexual psychology".
>
>   Of course somebody who really knew about this could no doubt make
> the story juicy and interesting!

Well, it's a dirty job, but *somebody* has to do it, so here goes:
(according to readily verifiable sources....):
.
Agnes von Krusenstjerna was born in 1894 to an Austrian mother who
had found herself visibly pregnant after a dalliance with a certain
Armenian teenager who was in Stockholm taking the baths and, on the
side, training to be an altar boy in the local parish church.  Agnes
was christened in the church only because the local priest, who
was hesitant to dignify the birth out-of-wedlock of this sweet little
girl, was blackmailed by the Austrian mother, who had just happened
to catch the priest in flagrante in a confession booth with the
Armenian teenager, on his knees, in fact, doing penance with a
vengeance, according to a fairly reliable historical source written
in an almost untranslatable Swedish.
  Some authorities report that the insanity for which Agnes was
well-known in literary circles started at the age of five, though
others document the onset of this mental instability as coinciding
with her Austrian mother's disappearance when Agnes was twelve.
Local newspapers in 1906 reported that the mother had retreated
to the paradise of a local brothel, from which she was then
kidnapped by the ambassador to Sweden from Portugal, who took her
first to Lisbon, and then to his country estate, where she pined
away for her daughter and finally committed suicide by poisoning
herself, after having castrated the ambassador with a finely honed
set of pruning shears.
  The ambassador, now a eunuch, returned to Stockholm after his
convalescence and sought out Agnes, who had by then (at the age of
fifteen) published the first of her seven Misses von Pahlen novels,
(contrary to the erroneous information provided by Mr. Torkel
concerning the publication dates of 1930 to 1935).  Agnes agreed,
after much persuading and not a little promise of financial
reward, to marry the ambassador, who then served as an inspiration
to Agnes in her quest for more and more grotesque examples of
sexual pathology.  The ambassador, no longer equipped for normal
avenues of sexual expression, having lost certain parts of his
congenital equipment to the pruning shears, entertained himself
by inventing prosthetic devices that would allow him to satisfy
both himself and his partners.  The actual scenes of satisfaction
took place in the bedroom which adjoined Madame's boudoir, and
to which it was joined by numerous discreet openings through which
could travel both light and sound.  Literary historians have claimed
not without cause, that these scenes provided the inspiration for
most of the seedier portions of the Misses von Pahlen novels.
  Agnes grew more and more unstable toward the end of the 1930's and
then disappeared, after being seen entering the sewers beneath the
streets of the Swedish capital, dressed in a white wedding dress
similar to the one worn by the character Melissa von Stumpinshump
at her wedding to the Baron von Trupshick in the third of the
novels in question.  Her body was later found in a canal near the
edge of the city.  Rumour had it at the time that her corset was
reinforced with remnants of the prosthetic devices invented and
manufactured by her somewhat perverted, disfigured husband, the
former ambassador from Portugal.
  Agnes was buried in a simple, unmarked grave in the Swedish
countryside.  Although there are various bits of evidence indicating
the location of her grave, it has never actually been found.
The mystery of her death has been explored in several doctoral
dissertations, but most critics and historians dismiss as pure
hypothesis most of the theories that have been put forth.
.
(This is the <gospel> truth.  I have not made this up.)
--ggs
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