Tvesynsdiskussionen

Punktnedslag i Det forjættede Lands receptionshistorie med henblik på Henrik Pontoppidans såkaldte tvesyn

Resumé

Abstract
Henrik Pontoppidan’s works are renowned for their ambiguity, an authorial stance often characterized by the term dual vision (tvesyn). The reception history of The Promised Land demonstrates that, at the time of the novel’s publication, most reviewers expected the author to convey a distinct “message” and accordingly identified an authorial mouthpiece within the work. A few critics, however, noted the text’s ambiguity, which was later explained in psychological terms as a division within the author’s personality. In later scholarship, however, this ambiguity—or polyphony—came to be understood as an artistic form reflecting an internal conflict between equally valid modes of life. With the later emergence of an interest in situating literature within its social context, it became clear that the multivoiced, or polyphonic, form was particularly suited to capturing the spirit of rupture and the complexity of the age—forces at work both in Pontoppidan’s authorship and in The Promised Land itself.