Caught in a Moral Maelstrom
Reviewed:
by Tarjei Vesaas
Translated by Torbjørn Støverud and Michael Barnes
Pushkin Press Classics, 256 pp., $17.95 (paper)
Publication Date: 10/7/25
The decision to care for an ailing or disabled loved one is a selfless act, but not a victimless one. By prioritizing the well-being of another who has no potential for self-sustainability, you place virtuous shackles around your own hopes, health, and happiness. This moral dilemma strikes at the heart of Tarjei Vesaas’s sentimental novel The Birds, which revolves around the relationship between a mentally challenged man named Mattis and his sister, Hege. Widely regarded as one of the greatest works of Norwegian literature, Vesaas gracefully delivers a timeless story that spotlights compassion and the cost of sacrifice.
Slowly approaching middle age, Mattis finds himself still tucked under the wing of his sole provider, Hege, who earns for them both by knitting sweaters. Known to the local villagers as “Simple Simon,” Mattis struggles to find consistent work or to establish any self-confidence due to his reputation for incompetence. Instead, he spends his time in nature or paddling on the water, his imagination sparked by various phenomena—lightning, aspen trees, and a dazzling woodcock. Meanwhile, his sister lies in anguish over the constraints and fatigue of caretaking. Their drab existence is upended when Mattis encounters Jørgen, a traveling lumberjack, across the lake and brings him home to stay. Predictably, Jørgen’s presence upsets the longstanding bond of dependency between brother and sister—the protector and the protected. What follows is a desperate plea and struggle to regain his sister’s undivided love, with loneliness and guilt looming over them like one of the ominous storms referenced in the novel:
“Didn’t she realize how frightened he was? What was going to become of him the day she left and wasn’t around any longer? Hege’d been within arm’s length all his life, he’d never known anything different.”
Split into three parts, the narrative is direct and delicate, possessing a keen sensibility for the distress of those with mental disabilities. When peering into Mattis’s psyche, his underdeveloped speech reveals a broader spectrum of emotions limited in expression, sometimes even unintentionally vocalizing his premature thoughts. Hege’s character develops more gradually—from a stance of poignant pessimism, captured in her remark, “The reverse of what you dream comes true,” to a state of conflicted joy at the emergence of a brighter future for herself.
Like all enduring works, The Birds transcends mere storytelling, posing an unanswerable question about sacrifice and personal happiness. It’s an unmistakably sympathetic and nonjudgmental novel that withholds blame from all involved, allowing space for the moral concerns to slowly rise to the surface of the reader’s mind. Vesaas’s prose is terse yet packs an emotional punch in a Faulknerian manner, making parallels to Benjy from The Sound and the Fury all too natural. It’s the sort of novel that seems to tell a different story at different points in one’s life, enriching the reader’s perspective with each rereading.
