cultural resources in henrik ibsen's early environment - Ibsen.net

could just as well be called equally Swedish; and yet nobody before him has sung so
utterly nationally, so truly Scandinavianly! Therefore it is so far from being the case that
the national consciousness dilutes and loses itself by being expanded over all of
Scandinavia, that it much more precisely thereby achieves its actual courage and strength!
But still it does not end with literature; indeed we want not merely to sing for
Europe and hold uplifting conversations about our nationality--indeed, they would not
listen much to either afterwards, if we could not by more material means give our words
weight. Besides, it could possibly happen, while we sang our best, that one or another
birdcatcher could get the desire to cage us, one after the other, and then the song would
only come to a sad end. So it is a matter of being sure also to have a beak and claws; and
while our neighbors in all quarters by alliances and by an altogether better and better
organized military capability increase--one can say fearfully--in strength, we must not
remain standing in our prevailing insignificance. There was a time when our forefathers,
without creating any actual union, were feared over the whole of Europe; but that was
then, when in the army itself an individual's strength and valor were the decisive factors.
Now everything depends more on the masses and on a rational organization; now an
individual Stærkodder is of little significance; now a single flock of either Norwegians or
Swedes or Danes with all possible courage will not be able to do the deeds as in the old
days. If we will--and we must will it--retain the same relative strength as in the past, then
we must follow the development of the times; the berserker's wild energy disappeared a
long time ago, and besides would now help us greatly not; let us therefore draw our
strength from a more noble source, from the League of Nations, and from the strongest,
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