countrymen the best version of _Macbeth_ up to that time.

Monrad himself reviewed Hauge's _Macbeth_ in a careful and well-informed
article, in _Nordisk Tidsskrift for Videnskab og Literatur_, which I
shall review later.


D

One of the most significant elements in the intellectual life of modern
Norway is the so-called Landsmaal movement. It is probably unnecessary
to say that this movement is an effort on the part of many Norwegians to
substitute for the dominant Dano-Norwegian a new literary language based
on the "best" dialects. This language, commonly called the Landsmaal,
is, at all events in its origin, the creation of one man, Ivar Aasen.
Aasen published the first edition of his grammar in 1848, and the first
edition of his dictionary in 1850. But obviously it was not enough to
provide a grammar and a word-book. The literary powers of the new
language must be developed and disciplined and, accordingly, Aasen
published in 1853 _Prøver af Landsmaalet i Norge_. The little volume
contains, besides other material, seven translations from foreign
classics; among these is Romeo's soliloquy in the balcony scene.[14]
(Act II, Sc. 1) This modest essay of Aasen's, then, antedates Hauge's
rendering of _Macbeth_ and constitutes the first bit of Shakespeare
translation in Norway since the _Coriolanus_ of 1818.

[14. Ivar Aasen--_Skrifter i Samling_--Christiania. 1911, Vol. 11,
p. 165. Reprinted from _Prøver af Landsmaalet i Norge, Første
Udgave_. Kristiania. 1853, p. 114.]