For six years there has been silence from Jonny Halberg. To find the previous novel in the series, we have to look all the way to 2014 and “The Defeat”. A collection of stories came out in 2016. The big breakthrough came in 2000 with the award-winning “The Flood”. The new novel, “Johannes’ revelation”, is thus an event. Mostly because it’s good. No longer funny Meet Johannes Kaupang. A former stand-up comedian who has decided he’s not funny, he’s quit comedy anyway. He is broke and newly divorced. It has been a long time since he was at home in Western Norway and on Skatøy. Now he is going home to mother Toril to bury his father, also a Johannes, who hanged himself from a ceiling hook in his own doctor’s office. Johannes the younger has not spoken to the elder for several years. BREAKTHROUGH: Author Jonny Halberg (b. 1962) was hailed at the start of the 2000s as the new star of Norwegian literature. In 2001, he won the Critics’ Prize for the novel “Flommen”. Photo: Terje Bendiksby / NTB There are several reasons for the breach. Some of them go back to childhood and growing up, but the most important is the stand-up show “En lege til begjær”, with which Johannes was successful. Based on experiences with his father, Johannes thoroughly entertained his audience – but at his father’s expense. He thought he was in the right. It was his story, he did with it what he wanted. The father disagreed, hurt and angry. Visually strong and confident in dialogue At his best, Jonny Halberg is a vividly vivid, realistic and concrete narrator. He is also in “John’s revelation”. The dialogues sit with great confidence on the pages, they are characterized by the author’s ear and sure flair for characters and their ways of expression. Observations of weather, nature, big and small, social life and class slip elegantly into the reading. Halberg’s realism has often given rise to associations with an American way of writing and storytelling. Then short story master Raymond Carver has also been mentioned more than once in reasoning that has included Halberg. In other words, the secrets of life “John’s revelation” tackles ancient literary material that we will never finish: father and son, family ties, people’s life secrets and the loneliness that comes with it. What is family, when it comes down to it? We cannot escape the past and the stories that may lie there, hidden. In parallel, Halberg gives his reader an insight into what we can call the elusive character of the past, already hinted at in the quote from William Faulkner that opens the book: “The past is never dead. It isn’t even past.” In this way you can say that Jonny Halberg’s theme in this novel is not original. However, there is no real objection, more a confirmation of the seriousness. Two faces and a class trip Johannes experiences that the past can live its own life as he begins a sort of clean-up after his father’s life. A harsh and unforgiving letter of farewell to himself, a several-year-old diary and a Bible – which call up memories of “John’s revelation”, the first edition so to speak. Johannes searches and finds. The question marks stand in a queue while the revelations emerge and adjust the son’s image of his father, the man with two faces: one loved by the public for outdoor use, another at home. The father’s class journey from an overcrowded childhood home in Koppang to medical training and a life in the upper echelons on Skatøy. What did it do to the father, what did it cost? The development in the son’s ambivalence towards his father is interesting and closely narrated. Johannes’ struggle to find the truth about his father draws the reader into the story. Who is John himself in light of the revelations? The novel is easy to read, but by no means light-hearted. On the contrary. In long pieces, it is as if the narrative reads itself – just from the speed. It is a pleasure to register that Jonny Halberg is back. We have to hope that more is in the offing. news reviews Photo: Kolon Forlag Title: “Johannes’ revelation” Author: Jonny Halberg Publisher: Kolon forlag Genre: Novel Number of pages: 238 Date: 2023
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“Johannes’ revelation” by Jonny Halberg – Reviews and recommendations
