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🇨🇭 Switzerland /Culture & Society

“What a King!”: Norway’s Writers Mourn Harald V

From Neue Zürcher Zeitung · () German

Translated from German and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

In-depth Named sources Outcome reported
  • King Harald V’s death on Aug. 28 at age 89 prompted public mourning across Norway, including church bells, black-clad football fans and tributes from writers and musicians.
  • Norwegian authors praised Harald’s ability to unite the country, while Jon Fosse also criticized intrusive attention to the royal family’s private life.
  • The tributes unfolded alongside renewed scrutiny of Crown Princess Mette-Marit’s long friendship with Jeffrey Epstein.

Norway’s writers joined a national wave of mourning after King Harald V died at 89 on Aug. 28. Bells rang for a full hour in churches across the country, and football fans wore black to a championship match. The literary tributes added a deeply personal note to the public farewell.

I lost my composure, the corners of my mouth trembled.

· Tore RenbergThe novelist described his reaction after learning of King Harald’s death on a plane.

Novelist Tore Renberg heard the news on a plane shortly before departure. "I lost my composure, the corners of my mouth trembled," he told Dagbladet. "I thought: What a king! And I heard restless shuffling and suppressed sobbing." Entertainment performer Maria Holand Tösse sang the royal anthem outside the cockpit door on another flight. "I have to do it for our king," she later wrote on Instagram.

Dozens of authors, the writers’ association and rock musicians remembered Harald. Poet Edvard Hoem and composer Henning Sommerro wrote the choral piece “God’s Mysterious Reckoning” at the request of their bishop. An opera singer performed it during a memorial service at Molde Cathedral. Online, troubadour Trygve Skaug’s long poem “My King” offered consolation to adults and children, imagining the monarch as an ordinary man from the perspective of an elk.

I thought: What a king! And I heard restless shuffling and suppressed sobbing.

· Tore RenbergRenberg recalled the emotional atmosphere around him after the news broke.

Lars Saabye Christensen praised a king who “rose above without casting a shadow” and instead spread light evenly. Nobel laureate Jon Fosse said Harald’s death reminded him of his own father. The royal family had helped Norwegians see themselves as one people, Fosse said, and Harald embodied that role. Fosse also admired the king’s reading, noting that a line from his own work, “Invisible hands guide us,” shaped Harald’s 2024 New Year’s speech.

I have to do it for our king.

· Maria Holand TösseThe performer explained why she sang the royal anthem during a flight.

Yet Fosse’s tribute carried a reprimand. He criticized people who eagerly pry into the private lives of the king or his close family. That appeared to refer to reporting on Crown Princess Mette-Marit’s long friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender. The mourning for Harald has therefore also exposed tensions that remain unresolved within the royal household.

Invisible hands guide us.

· Jon FosseThe line from Fosse’s work served as a central motif in Harald’s 2024 New Year’s speech.
About this summary

Originally published by Neue Zürcher Zeitung in German. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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