Just about finished with "The People of Hemsö" by Strindberg, which I was surprised to see had been translated; otherwise, I wouldn't be posting about it. Very classic novel by Strindberg, published in 1887, about a farmer named Carlsson who arrives to steer things up at a property owned by a widow in the archipelago outside of Stockholm and the ensuing struggles as Carlsson tries to advance his position. Strindberg's approach is quite episodic and naturalistic, though there is an almost psychedelic scene where Strindberg describes an extremely drunk priest fumbling around in the darkness and this is my favourite passage in the novel. Strindberg has a keen sense for dialect as well as class/culture differences which makes the relatively small-scale drama compelling. I remember trying to read it when I was 13 and not understanding a single word, so it felt very powerful to return to it years later and get most of it, although some passages were still a bit cryptic and reading it on the train was a bad idea since I didn't have my dictionary with me.
Also reading "The Little Broomstick" by Mary Stewart, which if you follow Studio Ghibli-related news you may be aware was adapted by Studio Ponoc as "Mary and the Witch's Flower" a couple of years ago. Frankly, I expected something like Harry Potter in terms of style, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that while the story is even simpler than the film, the prose is excellent and the vocabulary is quite advanced.
