Gustaf Froding

Gustaf Froding Poems

Gustaf Froding Biography

Gustaf Fröding ( August 22, 1860 - February 8, 1911) was a Swedish poet and writer, born in Alster outside Karlstad in Värmland. The family moved to Kristinehamn in the year 1867. He later studied at Uppsala University and worked as a journalist in Karlstad. His poetry combines formal virtuosity with a sympathy for the ordinary, the neglected and the down-trodden. It is highly musical and lends itself to musical setting; as songs it has developed in to the much wider world of popular music and frequently been re-recorded by Swedish singers like Olle Adolphson and Monica Zetterlund. He wrote openly about his personal problems with alcohol and women and had to face a trial for obscenity for that cause. He is generally held to be one of the greatest poets of verse that Sweden has ever produced, on par with Carl Michael Bellman.)

The Best Poem Of Gustaf Froding

The Old Mountain Troll

The evening draws on apace now
The night will be dark and drear;
I ought to go up to my place now,
But 'tis pleasanter far down here.

Mid the peaks where the storm is yelling
'Tis lonely and empty and cold;
But 'tis merry where people are dwelling,
In the beautiful dale's green fold.

And I think that when I was last here
A princess wondrously fair,
Soft gold on her head, went past here;
She'd make a sweet morsel, I swear!

The rest fled, for none dared linger,
But they turned when far off to cry,
While each of them pointed a finger:
'What a great, nasty troll! oh, fie!'

But the princess, friendly and mild-eyed,
Gazed up at me, object of fright,
Though I must have looked evil and wild-eyed,
And all fair things from us take flight.

Next time I will kiss her and hold her,
Though ugly of mouth am I,
And cradle and lull on my shoulder,
Saying: 'Bye, little sweet-snout, bye!'

And into a sack I'll get her,
And take her home with me straight,
And then at Yule I will eat her
Served up on a fine gold plate.

But hum, a-hum! I am mighty dumb,--
Who'd look at me then so kindly?
I'm a silly dullard--a-hum, a-hum!
To think the thing out so blindly.

Let the Christian child go in peace, then;
As for us, we're but trolls, are we.
She'd make such a savory mess, then,
It is hard to let her be.

But such things too easily move us,
When we're lonely and wicked and dumb,
Some teaching would surely improve us.
Well, I'll go home to sleep-a-hum!

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