On December 8, 1832, in the Norwegian town of Kvikne, in Østerdal, he came to the world Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson. Five years later, the family moved to Ness, in Romsdal, a land of great tourist attraction, where his father Pedro, an evangelical pastor, was assigned the local parish. Here he began his studies to continue them, between 1846 and 1849, in a boarding school in Molde.
Being still a teenager, Bjørnstjerne He was already enthused by the ideal fervor that positioned him at the forefront in the struggle for the independence of his country, and his literary streak was beginning to manifest itself in both prose and poetry.
He continued his studies in Christiania, where he moved in 1850. During these years, he discovered the theater, which fascinated him and wrote his first play, “Valborg“; He also began a collaboration with the newspaper” Morgenbladet “. The two activities absorbed a great amount of time to the point of making him abandon his studies in 1854: coming of age in fact gave him the maturity to determine his objectives, to denying his previous writings and even destroying them.
He based his new life under the motto “Nature and truth”, a synthesis of a new conception of existence that opposes the need for truth to the need for external beauty. In 1856 Bjornson he settled for a time in Oslo, and wrote the drama “Between battles“(” slagene Mellem “). In Copenhagen the following year, he met the elderly Catholic poet Nicolai Grundtvig and was influenced by his” gay Christianity. ”
In Rome he lived for two years during which he wrote the historical drama “King Sverre“(” Sverre Kong “) and the trilogy”Sigurt the violent“(” Sigurd Slembe “) and sharpened his dramatic art. After leaving Rome he went to France and Germany.
In 1865 Christiania paid homage to Bjornson giving him the direction of his theater, a position he left the following year to return to journalism and dedicate himself to politics in which he was an intransigent Republican and radical opponent of Sweden and the monarchy.
In 1880 he went to the United States, where he gave a series of lectures. Meanwhile he continued his political commitment until the birth, in 1903, of a government of the left. In the same year Bjornson received the prestigious Nobel Prize in Literature, as “a tribute to his noble, magnificent and versatile poetry, with which he stood out for the clarity of his inspiration and the rare purity of his spirit. ”
Among his last works are, in 1909, the patriotic song “When the new wine blooms“(” Naar den ny vin blomstrer “). He died in Paris April 26, 1910, at the age of 78.
His pioneering work in lyric, prose, and theater was a point of reference for many writers, including Knut Hamsun, Selma Lagerlöf, Johannes V. Jensen. Among other works by Bjornson we remember: “The farm of the sun”, (1857), “Hulda la renga” (1858), “A cheerful boy” (1860), “Novellette” (1860), “The fisherman’s daughter” (1868), “The journalist “(1875),” Leonarda “(1879),” Dust “(1882),” Beyond human forces “(1883),” Flags in the city and the port “(1884),” On paths of God “(1889),” A glove “(1893).