VERNER VON HEIDENSTAM.
DJUFARS VISA.
1. Tanta, a city in lower Egypt.
17-19. I afton kanske … att han sjunger—the att here interposed has the effect of giving the adverbial kanske its original verbal sense kan ske (as, maybe he will—it may be that he will).
32. en klase druvor, a cluster of grapes. The preposition av or med, sometimes found with such attributives, is generally dispensed with.
34. var, the colloquial form for vore.
39. trummare, regularly, trumslagare.
55. The traditional quietude of Egypt was alluded to by Tegnér in his epic romance, Axel, thus:
"… tysta som Egyptens präster
begynte stjärnorna sitt tåg."
60. utan rodd och segel, i.e., without propulsion by either oars or sails.
77-78. sant blev Djufar spådd, in prose, Djufar blev sannspådd, Djufar told the truth.
Ur ENSAMHETENS TANKAR.
4-5. The poet's mode of expression in these lines has been subjected to much comment and adverse criticism, many characterizing it as too arbitrary a departure from established linguistic usage. The grammatical Swedish of it would be: jag längtar TILL marken, jag längtar TILL stenarna, där SOM barn jag lekt.
PILGRIMENS JULSÅNG.
Headed "Hemkomsten" this poem forms the introduction to Part III of Hans Alienus, which bears the same general title. In Hans Alienus, the chief character, bearing that name, roams about Europe and the Orient in the guise of a friar. There is no unity or sequence in point of time, the pilgrim visiting the pope in the Vatican, Pontius Pilate in Jerusalem, Sardanapalus in ancient Ninive, and so on, then returning to modern Sweden to spend his last days. This oddly fantastical romance serves as the vehicle for Heidenstam's idealistic quest of beauty and his philosophy of life—a somewhat immature and immoderate Epicureanism. The latter part of this story of mingled fact and fiction is symbolical of the poet's return from foreign parts to his native soil. As events have gone in Heidenstam's literary career, it foreshadowed his return from extravagant Oriental dreams to purely Northern ideals.
6. In Sverige, the i is slurred. Cf. the corresponding rhyme.
25-30. A renunciation of the ascetic and religious ideals supposed to go with the friar's garb.
51. kåpans musselskal, reference to the shells with which the cloak of the friar Hans Alienus was ornamented. He is represented as a carver of mother of pearl and other ornaments from shells.
103. ni nå for I nån (ni, second person sg., in polite address; nå, first or third person pl.), a colloquialism peculiar to the most recent writers, here followed shortly (line 107) by the regular form kallen I, where consistency would have required kalla ni.
120. vinkande refers to frukter, hence: fruits that beckon and stir a desire in my blood.
ÅKALLAN OCH LÖFTE.
The title has reference to an ancient Norse custom of invoking the gods when making solemn promise to achieve some great deed. Such promises, usually made at public feasts, were solemnized with the draining of the beaker of Brage (ON bragafull), in honor of the god of poetry and eloquence. It will be noticed that the poem in its entirety is an invocation and an invective, the pledge being a negligible element slightly traceable only in the first stanza. This poem closes a collection of poems under the general title, "Ett folk".
17. Det är bättre (att) av en hämnare nås.