Selma Lagerlöf was born in 1858 and died in 1940 at her family farming estate Mårbacka, located in the Swedish region of Värmland. In 1909 she was the first woman writer to receive the Noble Prize in literature and a few years later, in 1914, she was also the first woman to be elected into the prestigious Swedish Academy, and thus came to be part of the body selecting Nobel Prize laureates in literature. Lagerlöf is considered to be one of Sweden’s most significant prose writers, and her strength lies above all in the masterly composition of stories exploring complex psychological processes, often by drawing on the features of folk-tales and other non-realistic genres. Her narrative strategies can be said to lie at the crossroads between fantasy, dream, the supernatural and…

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Citation: Wijkmark, Sofia. "Selma Lagerlöf". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 14 June 2013 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=12817, accessed 06 October 2024.]

12817 Selma Lagerlöf 1 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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