Sweden and Visions of Norway: Politics and Culture, 1814-1905 FROM THE PUBLISHER
"H. Arnold Barton investigates Norwegian political and cultural influences in Sweden during the period of the Swedish-Norwegian dynastic union from 1814 to 1905." "Although closely related in origins, indigenous culture, language, and religion, Sweden and Norway had very different histories, resulting in strongly contrasting societies and forms of govemment before 1814. After a proud medieval past, Norway had come under the Danish crown in the fourteenth century and had been reduced to virtually a Danish province by the sixteenth." In 1814, as a spinoff of the Napoleonic Wars, Denmark relinquished Norway, which became a separate kingdom, dynastically united with Sweden with its own government under a constitution independently framed that year. Disputes during the next ninety-one years caused Norway unilaterally to dissolve the tie.
SYNOPSIS
Most historical literature on the union of Sweden and Norway during the 19th and early-20th centuries has focused on the controversial origins, disputes and crises, and eventual dissolution of that union. Barton (history, Southern Illinois U. Carbondale) turns attention instead to the mutual impact of the countries on one another, particularly that of Norway on Sweden. He argues that Norway's constitution of 1814 "became the guiding star of Swedish liberals and radicals" and that Norway's creative artists strongly influenced the literature, art, architecture, and music in Sweden between 1850 and the late 1880s. Annotation ©2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
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