ABSTRACT
Guri Ellen Barstad’s chapter focuses on the representation of religion in the decadent novel Trætte Mænd (1891) by the Norwegian author Arne Garborg. Barstad explores how spiritual decadence was transformed in the Nordic Lutheran context. Garborg’s decadent novels mirror and incorporate elements from the debates on religion and the church, although their overarching focus is the characters’ internal and emotional struggles. The protagonist of Trætte Mænd mirrors, in its personal way, Kierkegaard’s idea of truth and his three existential stages: the esthetic, ethical and religious. The decadent aesthete’s conversion story follows Garborg’s own ideas of the Danish philosopher.
