Det forjættede Land og den romantiske middelalderisme

Resumé

Abstract
The promised land, Henrik Pontoppidan’s first major novel, is regarded as a representative of the Modern Breakthrough in Danish literature. In this essay, I shift the focus to the novel’s ambivalent attitude towards Romanticism and the displaced return of Romanticism in symbolist aesthetics. Emanuel Hansted, Pontoppidan’s protagonist, is fatally drawn to romantic notions of rural life and its noble simplicity. Only when it is too late does he realize that his ‘promised land’ has a sinister and indeed demonic underside. Pontoppidan does not share in his main character’s naivety, yet as indicated by his use of imagery – drawn from Danish folktales and -songs on treacherous magic mounds – and his depictions of alluring and uncanny landscapes, he himself is certainly not immune to the fatal attractions of Romanticism and Symbolism.