{"id":13045,"date":"2019-11-11T19:22:51","date_gmt":"2019-11-12T00:22:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=13045"},"modified":"2019-11-11T19:22:51","modified_gmt":"2019-11-12T00:22:51","slug":"the-power-of-paper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=13045","title":{"rendered":"The power of paper"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Photo credit: Annie Spratt @ anniesprat<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Okay, I\u2019ve got another thing<\/strong> to write about Hans Nielsen Hauge<\/a> (look a few inches down for my first post on him. It’s the one with the Sissel song), the Norwegian lay revivalist of the early 19th<\/sup> Century. (I\u2019m doing my article for the Spectator <\/em>too, but this is extra.) As was noted by the lecturer I talked to last week, Hauge is a hero both to the right and to the left in Norway \u2013 to the right for his religious influence, and to the left for being one of the founders of their movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because in those days of yore, liberalism had little or\nnothing to do with socialism. It had nothing to do with sexual practices or the\nsize of government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Liberalism was about whether the common people should be\nallowed to participate fully in society. To move out of the social classes they\nwere born into, and aspire to higher ambitions. Even to politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One thing our speaker mentioned that I hadn\u2019t appreciated\nbefore was Hauge\u2019s sideline in manufacturing paper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019d known that he established a paper mill, called the Eker\nPaper Mill. In it he employed unemployables \u2013 the blind, the crippled, amputees\n\u2013 allowing them to live productive lives and contribute to the community. I\nthought that a very nice thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What I didn\u2019t realize was the significance of the paper mill\nitself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cheap paper was a new thing in those days. Paper use had formerly been limited to the elite, and the paper they had was often of poor quality. But new manufacturing techniques involving paper pulp permitted a larger public to get hold of the stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hauge immediately recognized the wider significance of cheap\npaper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was usual in those days for the common people to be able to read. They had to be able to read to finish \u201cConfirmation,\u201d the Lutheran process that gave young men and women access to the Bible and the Catechism, in order to be full church members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But those people generally could not write. (I\u2019d never thought about this, but writing is a very different skill. Only the upper classes [and not all of them] could write in those days.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hauge had a vision of \u201cawakened\u201d (his term) Christians corresponding with each other all over the country. They could share inspiration, news, and practical information, forming what we\u2019d call today a Haugean \u201cnetwork.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In order to make that happen, he did two things. One, he\nbuilt a paper mill (perhaps more than one; I\u2019m not sure), and he organized\nclasses to teach people to write.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This, by the way, was alarming to the authorities. They saw no reason why people should have any regular contacts outside their home parishes. Revolution was abroad in Europe, after all; you never knew what those peasants might get up to. This accounts for some of the hostility Hauge encountered, leading to his ten year incarceration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But his followers kept writing on Hauge\u2019s paper. Eventually\nthey started newspapers and publishing houses. And today he is a hero of\nliteracy and liberal politics in Norway.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Okay, I\u2019ve got another thing to write about Hans Nielsen Hauge (look a few inches down for my first post on him. It’s the one with the Sissel song), the Norwegian lay revivalist of the early 19th Century. (I\u2019m doing my article for the Spectator too, but this is extra.) As was noted by the … Continue reading The power of paper<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[14,1,17],"tags":[1160,2047,2130],"class_list":["post-13045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-religion","category-uncategorized","category-writing","tag-hans-nielsen-hauge","tag-norway","tag-paper"],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13045\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}