'' The Trouble with Happiness: And Other Stories ''
Written by  Tove Ditlevsen

About the Book:

The Trouble with Happiness is a powerful new collection
of short stories by Tove Ditlevsen, a terrifying talent
(Parul Sehgal, New York Times).

A newly married woman longs, irrationally, for a silk umbrella;
a husband chases away his wife's beloved cat;
a betrayed mother impulsively sacks her housekeeper.
Underneath the surface of these precisely observed tales
of marriage and family life in mid-century Copenhagen
pulse currents of desire, violence, and despair, as women
and men struggle to escape from the roles assigned to them
and dream of becoming free and happy--without ever truly
understanding what that might mean.

Tove Ditlevsen is one of Denmark's most famous and beloved
writers, and her autobiographical Copenhagen Trilogy was
hailed as a masterpiece on re-publication in English,
lauded for its wry humor, limpid prose, and powerful honesty.
The poignant and understated stories in
The Trouble with Happiness, written in the 1950s and 1960s
and never before translated into English, offer readers a
new chance to encounter the quietly devastating work of
this essential twentieth-century writer.

About the Author:
Tove Irma Margit Ditlevsen
(14 December 1917 – 7 March 1976)
was a Danish poet and author.
 With published works in a variety of genres,
she was one of Denmark's best-known authors
by the time of her death

Ditlevsen was awarded the Tagea Brandt Rejselegat in
1953 and De Gyldne Laurbær in 1956. In 2014,
she was included in the literary canon for Danish
primary schools.

Her poem "Blinkende Lygter", from the poetry collection
of the same name, is referred to and namesake for the
2000 Danish film Flickering Lights, directed by Anders Thomas
Jensen and often named the most popular feature film in
its native Denmark in various polls. Her novel Barndommens
gade was made into a film in mid-1980s and Anne Linnet
released an album with poems by Ditlevsen, sung by Linnet.
The music from the album was also used in the movie
Barndommens gade.

Book characteristics:

Print length
17X 22 cm
183 pages
Language
English
Publisher
Penguin
Publication date
March 3, 2022