author
Kristian Elster
1841–1881
A Norwegian writer and forester whose promising career was cut short at just 40, he wrote novels, stories, and criticism that helped secure his place in 19th-century Norwegian literature. He is also remembered as the father of writer Kristian Elster the younger, born shortly before his death.
2 Audiobooks
Vaarallista väkeä
by Kristian Elster
Päivän valaisemia pilven hattaroita
by Kristian Elster
About the author
Born in Overhalla in 1841, Kristian Mandrup Elster first planned a military career, but poor eyesight forced him to change course. He studied instead and worked as a forester, while gradually building a literary career alongside journalism and criticism.
He wrote fiction, essays, and reviews, and became known as a novelist, literary critic, and theatre critic. Sources describe him as an important early writer from the Førde official-class milieu, and note that he died in Trondheim in 1881, only forty years old, in the middle of what was seen as a very promising period of work.
Although his life was brief, Elster left a strong enough impression to be remembered in Norwegian reference works and literary history. His son, Kristian Elster the younger, was born in 1881 and later became a notable writer as well.