About the Author

Jan Kjærstad made his debut as a writer in 1980 with a short story collection, The Earth Turns Quietly. The three books making up the Wergeland trilogy—The Seducer, The Conqueror, and The Discoverer (forthcoming from Open Letter in 2009)—have achieved huge international success, and led to Kjærstad receiving the Nordic Prize for Literature in 2001. He has also received Germany's Henrik Steffen Prize for Scandinavians who have significantly enriched Europe's artistic and intellectual life.

Barbara Haveland has translated works by several leading Danish and Norwegian authors, including Peter Høeg, Linn Ullmann, and Leif Davidsen.

Reviews

"Veering from the broadly comic to the beautifully sad, with detours for deadpan meditations on the 'Norwegian national character,' this book is not just big, but big-hearted."—New York Times

"One of the most influential writers of his generation. Say his name, and I think of Milan Kundera, Martin Amis, and Frank Zappa."—Linn Ullmann

"The voyage that The Discoverer will impel, thanks to Barbara J Haveland's lively, fluid and at times sparkling translation, is a return one, to the beginning of the whole trilogy—a work so ample in its riches that further discoveries are inevitable."—Independent