Tonight, I had Norwegian folklore on my mind, and I found this amusing video on YouTube. It concerns the Norwegian artist Theodor Kittelsen (1857-1914), one of my favorites. He was an imaginative illustrator, and sometimes — in my opinion — he was ahead of his time, employing stylistic techniques that would become popular later on.

I came on an anecdote involving Kittlesen in my reading recently. The author Sigrid Undset, when she was a girl, went with her mother and sisters to spend a summer holiday at the seaside. They were very poor after the death of her father, but the cottage was available cheap. To her astonishment, little Sigrid found that their closest neighbor was the artist Theodor Kittlesen and his family. She made friends with Kittelsen’s daughter, and was introduced to the great artist, whom she greatly admired. At that point in her life she was contemplating becoming an artist herself. After a while she worked up the courage to show Kittlesen some of her own drawings.

“You have talent enough, poor thing,” Kittlesen sighed. He went on to warn her that art was no easy career.