It is in this respect that Bjoernson's last tales offer so grateful a
contrast to conventional fiction. Here is a man who has resolutely
aroused himself from the old romantic doze, cleared his eyes of the film
of dreams, and with a sharp, wide-awake intensity focussed them to the
actual aspect of the actual world. He has sat down with his windows wide
open, and allowed the sounds and sights and smells of reality to pour in
upon him. And the magic spectacles are his which enable him to gauge the
significance of the phenomena and divine the causes which lurk behind
them. Therefore his characterizations are often extremely
unconventional, and amid all their picturesque vigor of phrase hint at
the kind of knowledge which could only be possessed by a family
physician. In "Absalom's Hair" we have no mere agglomeration of
half-digested scientific data, but a scientific view of life. The story
moves, from beginning to end, with a beautiful epic calm and a grand
inevitableness which remind one of Tolstoi, and reaches far toward the
high-water mark of modern realism.
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