How much is too much?
Norwegian writing sensation Karl Ove Knausgård has been meticulously documenting his life for years. His acquaintances flock to bookstores to find out if they have been included in his latest volume. Knausgård works closely with a lawyer to avoid legal entanglements, but isn’t afraid to stoke controversy. The title of his book deliberately references Adolf Hitler’s screed Mein Kampf, a work censored until recently in Germany, in a challenge for readers to think for themselves.
Knausgård’s My Struggle is a 3,600-page work in six volumes that focuses intensely on his personal life—from his father’s alcoholism and death to his own failed marriage—and raises compelling questions about ethics and surveillance in literature today. He participated in the 2012 PEN World Voices Festival.
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Photo ©Beowulf Sheehan/PEN American Center