The Good Hope

First published in 1964 The Good Hope won The Nordic Prize for Literature. It is the first English translation of one of the greatest novels in the Danish language. . The Good Hope is an epistolary novel based on the life of the Reverend Lucas Debes, a larger than life character called Peder Ba, rresen in the novel. It tells a story of brutal oppression, poverty and terrible diseases, but also of resistance and of having the courage of one's convictions. It is a dramatic fantasy in which Heinesen's customary themes -- the struggle against evil, sectarianism, superstition and oppression --emerge on a higher plane, set against the backcloth of the Faroe Islands in the 1690s. The Good Hope is a masterpiece which took 40 years to write.