2024
What makes Scandinavian misanthropy particular? According to Norwegian new-born literary supernova Matias Faldbakken, it is the particular mixture of a welfare state, high standards of living, modern corporate culture, consumer ideology and a society that not only is tolerant, but downright benevolent towards its own opponents and deviators from the norm. The Scandinavia of Faldbakken is a place of early adaptors – pure heaven if you’re in the world of marketing and want to test new consumer products, new strategies, new cultural habits and new ideologies. Only, there are no ideologies left according to Faldbakken. In the world that he depicts, talk is cheap, nothing is shocking and perversion is the norm. In short, anything goes.
The second novel of Matias Faldbakken takes the nihilistic satire from his first novel to yet another level. In Macht Und Rebel - Scandinavian Misanthropy II, Faldbakken shows a world where all choices are fakes and the inescapable poverty is the absolute loss of values. There is simply nothing to rebel against. This time, Faldbakken takes on the counter-culture as prime target for his satire.
There is a bleakness here and a linguistic subtlety which makes other young contemporary literature seem like babbling Winnie the Pooh books … all the same the novel is unusually funny because the absurdity of modern times is hit off to a T.
Masterful, but uncomfortable, Norwegian novel takes the pursuit of provocation and novelty to its limits. Macht Und Rebel is a brilliant novel: it stages an apparently intellectual dilemma as an existentialist drama.
Matias Faldbakken
Ivar Kvaal
