# History of the Literature of the Scandinavian North/Part 3/Chapter 5

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CHAPTER V.
THE GUSTAVIAN PERIOD (1780-1809).
THE development of Swedish poetry in the direction described in the preceding chapter attained its climax during the reign of Gustav III. Under the restrictions of the rigorously observed æsthetieal rules, the language, applied chiefly to empty forms, acquired a rare suppleness and flexibility, and it only needed great poets to unfold it in all its magnificence. The poets were not long in coming. The grandly gifted king, whose great ambition it was to shine prominently in the world of thought, gathered around him such a galaxy of brilliant talents that his epoch was compared with the age of Augustus. In this circle he was himself one of the leading spirits, and hence it was unavoidable that the king, whose taste had been developed in the French school, and who was absolutely devoted to its tenets, should by his example exercise a decided influence on the character of the literature which was produced under his leadership and patronage. The light, flippant style and the frivolous, playful manner, which essentially characterize the French literature of the eighteenth century, gradually monopolized the literary field, as did also the negative, revolutionary tendency which likewise hailed from France. But at the same time elements of a totally different character asserted their influence. In consequence of the political revolution (coup d'état) of 1772, by which the power was wrested from the nobility and placed in the hands of the king, an act ​which aroused the greatest expectations, there was inaugurated amid great exaltation a new era, in which the national element became more powerful than ever before, and created for itself new and peculiar forms. The struggle between these two currents—on one side the climax of that development which had started with the beginning of Swedish literature, and on the other side the movement, which in other places had produced the new romantic school—gives the Gustavian period its great significance.
Although Gustav III in no way sought to hinder the progress of the national element, which developed itself independently of French models, but on the contrary was fully conscious of its importance and encouraged its representatives and champions, still his sympathies were decidedly on the other side; in the public institutions which he founded for the advancement of literature, the French element was favored as much as possible. Such was particularly the case with the Swedish Academy, which he founded in 1786, using the French Academy as his model. Its main purpose was to encourage and support poetry, eloquence, history, and the study of the Swedish language, in which branches it has not, however, achieved much, since from the very outset to the present, it has been purely a question of etiquette who should become one of the "eighteen" members of the academy. In the days of its founder it contributed much to the establishment of French taste. In the king's inaugural address we discover the characteristic importance which he attached to the newly founded academy, for he declared that the institution was intended to serve "the most noble pastime," and the advancement of eloquence and poetry. Poetry, a pastime! that was indeed the prevailing opinion of the eighteenth century! In 1782 the king founded the national theatre, and here, too, he encouraged French taste with all his might. He wrote several dramas himself, for which he borrowed the materials from Swedish history, and among them are "Gustav Vasa," "Gustav Adolph och Ebbe Brahe," and "Siri Brahe ​och Johan Gyllenstjerna." The king usually wrote his compositions in prose, whereupon the poet Kellgren was ordered to reproduce them in verse, and after that music was arranged for them, and they were played as operas.
The poets of the Gustavian period form two groups according to the prevalence, respectively, of the French and the national element. The first group consisted of the "Gustavians" proper, among whom must be remembered Creutz and Gyllenborg (mentioned in the preceding chapter), in spite of their more rigid form. Gyllenborg was made a member of the academy. Johan Henrik Kellgren (1751-95) is the most eminent member of this group. He was not only one of the most remarkable poets of his age, but he was also regarded as authority in æsthetical matters and enjoyed high reputation as a critic. At the outset of his career he professed the philosophical views which prevailed in his time, the philosophical system promulgated by Locke and interpreted by Voltaire. His scathing, though always light and sparkling criticism was directed chiefly against errors in form. This satisfied the intellectual capacity of the age, which could not comprehend criticisms of a higher order. The periodical "Stockholmsposten," edited by him and his friend Lenngren, was accordingly very popular and was regarded as the highest court of appeal in all æsthetical questions. His great poetical talent was not utterly smothered by the narrow-breasted French system of æsthetic principles to which he was for a long time wedded, but it frequently severed the French fetters of formality, and especially in the last years of his life, when there probably arose in his mind doubts concerning the correctness of the principles which he had so zealously defended; his poems were frequently written in a noble and sublime style. Kellgren was preeminently a lyric poet, and to the king's dramas, which he transversed (changed into verse), he also gave the lyric form. The most of his poems are either satirical or erotic. ​The former have a fine, pithy humor, the latter are full of deep feeling, and all are master-works as far as the form is concerned. When he abandons himself to his poetical inspiration his lyrics are the best to be found in Swedish literature. We would particularly mention "Nya Skapelsen" (the new creation), "Sigvart och Hilma," "Till Kristina," and the satirical poems, "Mina Löjen " (my sports), and "Ljusets fjender" (the enemies of light). He has also written a fine patriotic song, "Cantaten den 1 Jannar, 1789."
Karl Gustav af Leopold (1756-1829) belonged to Kellgren's group, and after the death of the latter he became its leading spirit. He also became the soul of the academy, when, after having been closed by the regency, it was reopened in 1796. When in the beginning of the nineteenth century there appeared a new tendency in literature, Leopold as the most eminent veteran of the Gustavians, was made responsible for all the wrongs of which the old school was guilty in the eyes of the new, nor can it be denied that all the faults of the Gustavian party are to be found in Leopold's poems, while there is no deep feeling nor any brilliant talent to offset these blemishes. He gained his great reputation by his complete mastery of the form, by the ease and fluency of his verses and by the sparkling wit at his command, but not less by his great patriotism, his broad culture and vast knowledge. To this we must add a common sense method of reasoning, which well accorded with the taste of the age, though to modern readers it will seem dry and meaningless. His dramatic works are less attractive, but they were received with the greatest favor by his contemporaries. This particularly applies to his tragedies, written strictly in the traditional, pseudo classical style, "Virginia," and "Oden eller Asarnes invandring," for the latter of which he was rewarded by Gustav III with a laurel wreath from Virgil's ​grave. His didactic poems, odes, and poetical epistles are less valuable, while his satires, which owed their origin to his literary controversies, were on account of their startling pungency hailed with great applause. Far more attractive are his fables, epigrams and poetical narratives. His æsthetical views he has set forth and defended in various prose works. He was for some time a contributor to Kellgren's journal, and in the last years of his life he edited a periodical of his own.
Kellgren and Leopold are the chief and at the same time the only conspicuous representatives of the Gustavian tendency. In addition to these Oxenstjerna and Adlerbeth are the only ones worthy of mention, both of whom belong rather to the preceding period with its dry, serious manner than to the Gustavian, but who still may be said to have been more or less affected by the new stream of literature. Johan Gabriel Oxenstjerna (1750-1818) received the full measure of recognition from his contemporaries by his great poems "Dagens Stunder" and "Skjörderna" (the hours of the day, and the harvest, the latter a rather dry, prosy didactic poem on agriculture), though they contain but little of interest to modern readers. They contain, however, attractive and well drawn pictures of nature. He also produced translations of Milton's "Paradise Lost," and of a portion of Tasso's "Gerusalemme liberata," which had a certain value in their day. Gudmund Göeran Adleebeth (1751-1818) is even less important as an independent poet, and only a few of his dramatic works written in the French style, as for instance the tragedy, "Ingjald Illråda," deserve to be mentioned. On the other hand, he did much excellent work as a translator. His version of Eyvind Skáldaspiller's Hákonarmál was the first of the kind in Swedish, and contributed vastly to drawing the attention to Old Norse poetry. His translations of Virgil, Horace, and Ovid are particularly excellent, and his version of Æneas is a real master-piece. ​To the last he appended an exposition of the rules of Swedish metre, adopting Voss as his model.
Johan David Valerius (1776-1852) belonged in his youth to the academical school, and wrote various things in its style. His numerous songs rank much higher, and among them are found several drinking songs, written according to the taste of that age. In form they are above criticism and they frequently run in a very jovial vein, sometimes betraying excessive rudeness and levity. The Finlander Michael Choräus (1774-1806) interests us chiefly as Franzéns and Runeberg's forerunner, inasmuch as he in a certain way indicated the direction which the productions of those poets would have to take. Among his works, which are as a whole very sentimental, there are a few very fine elegies.
These are the most remarkable representatives of the academical group in the Gustavian period. Its other members are not worthy of mention. But the other group, that is the national one, is on the whole far more interesting, for in it we find the really great poets, who distinguished themselves not only by skilful treatment of the forms, but also by excellence and wealth of thought, and thus are of real value to the literature of their country.
In this circle of poets, whose chief theme was popular life, Karl Michael Bellman is by all odds the greatest. This most original of all Swedish poets, a character almost without a parallel in all Europe, was born in Stockholm February 4, 1740. His father was an official and gave the gifted boy a good education. To his father's house came many men of genius and culture, and among them Dalin who was the hero of the day. His parents were very religious, maintaining daily devotions and singing devotional hymns. The ​impressions which he thus received in his childhood were retained through his whole life and frequently asserted themselves in his poems, especially in the beginning and again toward the close of his poetical career. Already in his seventeenth year he published a translation of the "Evangelical thoughts on death" by Schweidnitz. In the following years he wrote several poems in Dalin's style, mostly religious ones, and also a satire, "Månen " (the moon) which appeared in 1760 and gained him the approval of his master. But suddenly his genius blossomed forth in its peculiar originality. He cast aside the æsthetical system which he had hitherto followed, and spread his wings for a lyric flight which up to that time no one had anticipated. During the years 1765-80 he wrote and composed the music for those songs which have made his name immortal, the most of "Fredmans Epistlar," "Fredmans Sångar" and "Bacchanaliska Ordens-Kapitlets Handlingar."
After studying at Upsala he entered the civil service, but neglected his official duties, for which he had no taste, and abandoned himself to a reckless existence which often brought him into the narrowest straits. When the attention of Gustav III was drawn to Bellman and his genial productions, his circumstances were somewhat mended. In spite of his partiality for French style, the king sympathized deeply with descriptions of popular life, and was strongly drawn toward the genial singer of the people, "The Anacreon of the North," as he used to call Bellman. He often caused him to be summoned to his presence, and helped him to tide over the economic difficulties which continually oppressed him. From 1775, Bellman held a well-paid office, but he drew himself only half of the salary, leaving the other half to an assistant, who performed the necessary duties of the office. He lived exclusively for his songs, and spent the most of his time in circles where suitable subjects for his songs could be found, that is to say, among the lower classes of Stockholm and its suburbs.
​According to the testimony of his contemporaries improvisation played an important part in the creation of his poems, but this must not be taken in an exclusive sense as if they were to be regarded as wholly the production of the moment. There is no doubt that Bellman, though verses flowed from him spontaneously, gave much time and attention to the form of his poems, for none of them bear the unmistakable stamp of improvisation, and the latter was accordingly only the first stage which his productions passed through. Tradition has faithfully handed down how the poet at the merry gatherings of friends would take the zither in hand and sing now a song previously composed, now one inspired by the circumstances of the hour.
There exists a graphic account of his last song, which throws a vivid light on his remarkable talent. Atterbom relates the incident in the following manner: "When he felt that his last moment was approaching, he sent word to his friends that he desired to spend an hour with them as in the good old time. He slipped into the room almost like a shadow, but the old friendly smile was on his lips. He said that he wanted to give them an opportunity 'of hearing Bellman' once more. Mightier now than ever before the spirit of song seized him, and he gathered the vanishing rays of his creative genius into an improvised song of leave-taking. Thus during the whole night, under the afflatus of an uninterrupted stream of inspiration, he sang of his own happy fate and in honor of his liberal king, thanking Providence that his lot had been cast among so noble a people, and that he had been born in the beautiful land of the North. Finally he expressed his thanks and good-bye to each one present in a special stanza and melody, therein describing the individual peculiarity of each one of his friends and his peculiar relation to the poet. At the dawn of day his friends with many tears implored him to cease and to spare his lungs, which were seriously affected, but he replied: 'let us die as we have lived, in music!' ​Then he emptied his glass and again struck up the last strophe of his song."
After that night Bellman sang no more. The contents of his last poem, dictated a short time before his death, which occurred February 11, 1795, are serious and religious, and thus he ended as he had begun, with "evangelical thought on death." During the last years of his life he wrote but little. In 1780 he published a collection of poetical meditations on the Sunday gospels, which, in a later edition, received the title, "Zions Högtid." The "Bacchanaliska Ordens-Kapitlets Handlingar" received a kind of continuation in the collection "Bacchi Tempel" (1783), which, however, are far inferior to his other humorous works. Finally, one year before his death he published a free translation of Gellert's fables, in which it is impossible to recognize the once great poet. His strength was clearly broken, though it seems at times to flash forth for a moment. The death of Gustav III was a severe blow to him, a loss which he felt the more as he henceforth had no one who could relieve him in his financial embarrassments. He sank into the deepest poverty, and was even thrown into prison for debt. He was, however, accidentally released by some people who, probably, were moved to this act of charity by curiosity, being desirious to hear Bellman sing. The poet at first refused to comply with their request, but at length he consented and began in a faint voice one of his most touching songs, in which his incurable disease is graphically depicted, but gradually he seemed to recover the old melodious ring of his voice. The malady, however, of which the poet sang had already taken hold of him with irresistible power.
The humorous pictures from popular life in which his talent shone the brightest were not originally intended for wider circles. He wrote his songs for the sole purpose of pleasing his friends, and he used to deliver them with a consummate mimic-dramatic talent, which brought out into bold relief every characteristic trait. Toward the end of his ​ife when his songs had become widely known by means of written copies, they were collected and published. In this work he was aided by Kellgren, who from the outset had opposed his poetical tendency which was diametrically the opposite of Kellgren's own, but he gradually became one of Bellman's warmest admirers. The other academicians were also compelled to recognize the power of Bellman's genius, and the Academy awarded a prize to the author of "Fredmans Epistlar."
After his death Bellman was almost wholly forgotten until he was again dragged forth from obscurity by the romantic school, and now his songs are known and celebrated throughout the whole North. The old prejudices and misunderstandings according to which Bellman was looked upon as the cynic apostle of a fast life, have yielded to the more correct opinion that as a humorist and author of sparkling dithyrambics he is not himself in the midst of the world which he depicts, but far above it. His "Epistles" are partly burlesque and partly idyllic descriptions from popular life, and the characters in them have been taken from reality. Fredman himself, who died in 1767, was "a well-known watchmaker without watches, workshop or store," and the others, Ulla Winblad Mollberg, Mowitz, etc., were also well-known pot-house characters in Stockholm. But the descriptions of these persons and of their wild Bacchanalian life constitute only one side of Bellman's poetry; and were we to look exclusively at this side of his poems we should completely misunderstand their real character, which owes its fascinating power to the deep, elegiac tone that bursts forth from the midst of all his pictures and sparkles with passionate buoyancy; we would fail to appreciate the fact that Bellman regards all earthly existence as perishable and incomplete and that he continually longs for a higher existence, a longing that glimmers forth even from the merriest freaks of his imagination. In order to appreciate thoroughly this peculiarity of Bellman, the great humorist, to whom life appeared ​simultaneously in its many-hued concrete reality and in its insignificance, we must not only read his poems, but we must also hear them sung; it is only through the melody, or rather through the words and melody combined, that we are able to get a complete impression of what the poems mean to convey. No one else has like Bellman understood how to blend both in an indissoluble unity. Whether he composes the melody himself or, as is frequently the case, adapts his words to some old song, he always attains the highest possible result, a complete harmony between the words and the melody, so that they materially illustrate and enrich each other.
There are a few other poets of this period who were on friendly terms with him and were called "Bellman's cousins," and they have, at all events, the comical element in common with him, but they wholly lack the other feature of his poetry, the earnest and essentially religious tone, which in its fusion with the comical-realistic vein is so striking and effective. Two of these poets Kexél and Hallman were particularly intimate with him, whence they, the three, were called the "clover leaf." Olof Kexél (1748-96) appeared as an author already in his twentieth year and wrote chiefly political pamphlets. This caused him prosecutions which ended in heavy pecuniary fines. In other respects his affairs became so embarrassed that in 1770 he found it necessary to leave the country. But after the coup d'état by Gustav III he returned to Sweden, where his political enemies could no longer harm him. He henceforth led a merry, reckless life and gave the impulse to the foundation of the jovial order still existing, called "Par Bricole," which gathered together all the best talents of the time, and of which Bellman was also was a zealous member. What Kexél wrote from this time on was chiefly a faithful picture of his own life and ​its consequences, a fact sufficiently indicated by the titles of his works. In 1776-77 appeared "Mina Tidsfördrif på Gäldstufvan (my pastime in the debtor's prison); in 1780, "Mina Tidsfördrif på Högvakten," (my pastime at the police station); and in 1784-86 "Bacchi Handbibliothek, eller nya Tidsfördrif på Gäldstufvan." These works are collections of anecdotes, short stories, witty episodes, etc., partly from his own experiences and partly such as he had heard from others. They are mostly of but little value, but they betray wit and humor and at the same time a great deal of levity. His comedies rank much higher, and are even yet the best of which Sweden can boast in this rather poorly represented branch of her literature. Nor is he entirely original in this work either, but he borrows his ideas and materials whereever he finds them, at the same time transforming the foreign elements so skilfully that they acquire a perfectly national Swedish color. The dialogue and the action are bright, and the author's vivacity approaches at times the verge of real humor. His most successful comedies, which sometimes incline to be farcical, are "Kapten Puff eller Storprataren," and "Michel Wingler eller bättra vara brödlös an rådlös." In some of his works he attempted a serious style, in which he was not, however, very successful. In his poems he tried to imitate Bellman and even equalled him in form and in sparkling humor, but he ranks far below him in depth of thought and power of imagination.
Karl Israel Hallman (1732-1800) is chiefly known as a dramatist. He wrote mainly parodies on the operas and tragedies in French style, then in vogue, or bold farces, which, like Kexél's pieces, in spite of, or perhaps on account of, their coarseness, were very successful. In the last one of his comedies (which is also his best one), "Tillfället gör tjufven" (Opportunity makes the thief), in which he has introduced couplets with airs from Bellman, Hallman has successfully freed himself from the burlesque, and ​produced a genuine national comedy, which still like Kexél's "Kapten Puff" belongs to the repertoire of the Swedish stage.
Among Bellman's cousins are also numbered Johan Magnus Lannerstjerna (1758-97) and Karl Envallson (1756-1806). They were both writers of comedies, but not particularly eminent, though their plays were national productions of great importance for the young Swedish theatre. Envallson developed an astounding fertility and produced more than eighty comedies. The best known among them is "Slåtterölet eller Kronofogdarne," which, though it is a free adaptation of a French comedy, has become a truly national drama.
Very different from Bellman was Bengt Lidner (1758-93), a man whose eminent talent unfortunately did not become fully developed. Already in his eighteenth year Lidner's reputation for irregularities was so bad that he was expelled from the University of Lund, where he was studying. He went to Rostock, where he took the master's degree, but at the same time he continued his irregular life, so that it was decided to put him on board a ship bound for the East Indies. He deserted the ship at the Cape of Good Hope, where he spent a year in the greatest misery. Thereupon he returned to Sweden and published a small collection of fables, some of which are very fine. Gustav III, who with a truly royal generosity assisted all poor men of talent, also tried to help him and sent him as secretary of the Swedish embassy to Paris, the embassador being the above mentioned Count Creutz. But here, too, Lidner continued his bad habits and Creutz, who for a long time had shown a great deal of leniency toward him, was at last obliged to send him away. Now the king, too, abandoned him and only now and then sent him small pecuniary contributions, which Lidner soon spent in dissipation. He finally eked out a miserable exist​ence by composing poems on particular occasions. He kept sinking deeper and deeper until he at last died, worn out in soul and body. His first great work was the tragedy "Erik XIV," which, at the instigation of Creutz, he wrote in Paris in the traditional style. This style did not, however, harmonize with the bent of his genius, and consequently the work was on the whole unsuccessful, though it contained many fine passages. His talent was for the first time displayed to advantage in his three chief works, the poems "Året 1783," "Grefvinnan Spastaras död," and the lyric drama "Medea," which appeared in rapid succession and gained him general recognition. "Grefvinnan Spastaras död" became particularly popular. It describes an episode from the earthquake in Messina, 1783, and in it a mother's love is depicted in its most charming aspect. Among his other works we may mention the poem "Yttersta domen" (the last judgment), and the oratorios (short dramas set to music) "Jerusalems Förstöring" and "Messias i Gethsemane." Lidner's excellence consists in his rich and vivid imagination, which imparts a magic splendor to his poetry and makes its faults less apparent. Moreover his feelings were strong and passionate, and his style was in the highest degree original. But the same faults that preyed on his life also cleave to his poetical works, for they are sorely wanting in dignity and moral earnestness. He could not master his physical appetites, nor could he control his creative power, and what he produced were not works of art; they were rather passionate outbursts of a grand but dilapidated intellect. In miniature Lidner reminds us of Byron.
While in Lidner an overstrained, unbridled feeling preponderates and prevents him from producing art in the true sense of the word, so thought overshadows all in the works of Thomas Thorild (1759-1808), who, in a higher degree than any of his contemporaries, paved the way for a new era in the world of intelligence. He is a type of that stir​ring age so full of reformatory and revolutionary tendencies. In his early youth Thorild sympathized with Leopold, and even assisted him in his controversy with Kellgren, but the marked difference between them soon asserted itself in a most decided manner. Leopold and Kellgren were reconciled, and soon united themselves against the violent and reckless opponent of French taste. A warm literary feud was begun, which lasted several years, and continually assumed greater proportions. On both sides the war was carried on with zeal and talent, both parties feeling that important principles were at stake, and when Thorild finally gained the victory and by his well-aimed blows gradually disabled the adherents of the old school, this was not so much owing to his polemical superiority as to his profound appreciation of life and art, as contrasted with the empty formality of the other party. Rousseau had been his master, as Voltaire had been that of his opponents. He was filled with the ideas of Klopstock and Ossian, and leaning on both these authors he managed to introduce romanticism into Sweden. Characteristic of the position of literature in that period was the circumstance which led to the outbreak of the great conflict. Thorild had sent his poem, "Passionerna" (the passions), to the society, "Utile Dulci," where Kellgren reigned supreme, and did not receive the first prize, but only an inferior one. While the society commended the talent displayed in the poem, it found it necessary to blame "the author's dangerous and needless deviation from the old-established rules of versification." Thorild's poem was written in hexameters.
In spite of his love of the art Thorild was no poet, and but few of his compositions make any satisfactory impression. The thinker continually comes to the front, while the absolutely intuitive, creative artist almost wholly disappears. His thoughts are, however, generally lofty, and his expressions occasionally attain a genuine poetic flight, but as a rule he loses himself in abstract reflections and pompous pathos. On this account his own poems were of but little importance ​to the development of Swedish poetry. But of all the greater importance were his polemical works, a part of which he published in 1791 under the title: "Kritik öfver Kritiker med utkast till en lagstiftning i snillets verld." Yet this restless purist, seething and boiling over like a volcano, enthusiastic for all that was noble and good and full of bitter hate against all that was low and common-place, did not confine himself to the department of literature, but attempted to break new ground in various other fields. He declared himself that "his whole life was consecrated to the one supreme idea, that of revealing nature and reforming the whole world." Being convinced that this was not practical in Sweden, he went to England, in 1788, in order to make that country his basis for making humanity noble and perfect. But he found it no less difficult abroad than it had been at home to gather round him a circle of "free men," and so he returned to Sweden in 1790, where he published a series of political works written in a very aggressive spirit. The government of the regency during the minority of Gustav IV became greatly concerned in regard to his diffusion of French revolutionary ideas in one of these works, entitled "Ärligheten" (Honesty), and banished him from the country for four years. He now went to Germany, where he undertook to reform philosophy. Through the publication of several German works he became acquainted with Germany's foremost writers, but here, too, he was unable to solve the problem which he had proposed to himself. On the expiration of two years his sentence of banishment was revoked. He obtained an appointment as professor and librarian in Greifswald, where he spent the last fourteen years of his life, chiefly occupied with scientific investigations.
Anna Maria Lenngren (born Malmstedt, 1754-1817) is one of the most interesting figures that adorn this motley period of Swedish literature. Her father, who was a professor in Upsala, gave her an education which seemed to sug​gest that he wished to make her a scholar, which did not, however, have any detrimental influence on her healthy unsophisticated mind. When twenty-six years old, she was married to Lenngren, and her husband introduced her into a circle of distinguished poets, at the head of which Lenngren figured. In 1777 she published the satire, "Thekonseljen" a work which she later declared to be a failure, though it was in reality of far greater value than the translations and adaptations which she made of French operas at the request of Gustav III. But she owes her prominent place in Swedish literature to her shorter poems, which were published from time to time in the paper which Kellgren and her husband edited, and which after her death were collected and issued in a book called "Skaldeförsök." For a long time she endeavored to conceal her name, probably from an exaggerated fear of being called a "blue stocking," and consequently, as Franzén says, she hid her lamp under her sewing table. For a long time Kellgren was thought to be the author of her poems, and when she finally cast aside her anonymousness, she rose rapidly in favor with the public. And this popularity was well deserved, for her satirical and idyllic poems are splendid in style, and their materials, which are chiefly taken from daily life, are treated in a truly poetical manner. They are still highly appreciated in Sweden on account of their fresh humor and for their fine psychological insight, as well as for the purity and simplicity which they breathe. Another female poet, Ulrika Karolina Vidström (1767-1841) gained her popularity among her contemporaries chiefly by her sentimental erotic songs.
During the Gustavian period and the epoch immediately succeeding it, poetry monopolized all interests to such a degree that comparatively little was achieved in the purely scientific branches. Prose was not wholly neglected, but it was employed almost exclusively in æsthetics and philosophy. Thus the poet Leopold entered the lists as champion of the French ​taste in his works: "Om Smaken och dess allmänna lagar" (On taste and its general laws); "Om den äldre svenska literaturens förhållande till den franska," etc. Karl August Ehrensvärd (1745-1800), the son of the renowned constructor of Sveaborg and founder of the Swedish "Skerry-Fleet," occupies a very peculiar place in Swedish literature. Like his father he belonged to the military profession, and assisted the former in the execution of his great works. From his father he had also inherited his fine taste and rare talent for the fine arts. After a two years' journey in Southern Europe he found application for his profound views of art and its laws in "Resa till Italien," and "De fria konsters filosofi." In both of these truly ingenious works he greatly emphasizes the importance of antique art. They contain many short suggestions, which, by eminent thinkers of later times, have been regarded as new and important discoveries. His works, which have been frequently republished (the last time in 1866), are very obscure on account of the exceedingly condensed style, but his system has at various times been developed by the best Swedish writers, particularly by Atterbom in his "Svenska siare och skalder," and by Nybläus.
The best prose writer of that time was unquestionably Nils von Rosenstein (1752-1824), the tutor of Gustav III. His æsthetical and philosophical views, which he developed in various works, and which his position as secretary of the Swedish Academy enabled him to give a wide circulation, do not differ from the views current in his day, for in æsthetics he agreed with the rules established by the Academy, and in philosophy he adopted Locke's system. Meanwhile the philosophy of Kant had begun to be introduced into Sweden, and this was chiefly owing to the efforts of the Upsala professor, Daniel Boëthius (died 1810). Georg Adlersparre (1760-1835) edited an important organ for the dissemination of the new views introduced at the close of the eighteenth century, namely, the periodical which at first bore the title, "Läsning ​för Landtmän," and later "Läsning i blandade ämnen." It was published from 1795 to 1801, and all of the more important authors contributed to its columns, and thus aided materially in preparing the soil for the new order of things.
* ↑ Gustav III Skrifter I-VI, Stockholm, 1806-12.
* ↑ Kellgrens samlade Skrifter, edited by G. Regnér and C. Lengblom I-III, Stockholm, 1796. Last edition, Örebro, 1860.
* ↑ Leopold's samlade Skrifter, last edition by C. R. Nyblom I-II, 1873.
* ↑ Oxenstjernas arbeten, I-V, Stockholm, 1805-26. G. G. Adlerbeths poetiska arbeten, III, 1818.
* ↑ J. D. Valerius samlade vitterhetsarbeten, edited by B. von Beskow, I-II, 1865.
* ↑ M. Choræus samlade skaldestycken, 1815-1826.
* ↑ K. M. Bellmans samlade Skrifter, edited by J. Gr. Carlén, I-V, Stockholm, 1856-61. Skrifter af Bellman, ny Samling, edited by C. Eichhorn, Stockholm, 1876-77. G. Ljunggren: Bellman och Fredmans Epistlar, Lund. 1867.
* ↑ O. Kexéls samlade Skrifter, edited by P. Hanselli, 1853.
* ↑ K. J. Hallmans samlade Skrifter, edited by P. Hanselli, 1853.
* ↑ J. M. Lannerstjernas Vitterhetsarbeten, edited by Hanselli and Eichhorn, 1861.
* ↑ B. Lidners samlade Skrifter (eighth edition), Stockholm, 1878.
* ↑ J. Thorilds samlade Skrifter; last edition by P. Hanselli, 1873.
* ↑ A. M. Lenngrens samlade Skaldeförsök, ninth ed., Stockholm, 1876.
* ↑ K. A. Ehrensvärds Skrifter, last edition by C. Eichhorn, 1866.
* ↑ N. v. Rosensteins samlade Skrifter, edited by N. Tersmeden, I-III, 1838. G. Adlersparre: Läsning för Landtmän, 1795-96, Läsning i blandade ämnen, 1797-1801.