Dependency is the third and final volume of Tove Ditlevsen’s masterful Copenhagen Trilogy, a searing work of autofiction that chronicles a life marked by artistic ambition, potent writing talent, vulnerability and addiction.
Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
Genre: Memoir, Autofiction, Classics, Non-fiction
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Review in one word: Heart-rending
Dependency finds Tove as a young woman in her twenties, having achieved her childhood dream of becoming a published poet. She is married to the much older and influential editor, Viggo F. Møller, a relationship that provides stability but stifles her youth and passion. The narrative follows Tove as she navigates the literary circles of Copenhagen, feeling like an outsider while yearning for connection with artists her own age.
The trajectory of the book is a harrowing descent into depression, addiction and malaise. If that sounds like a heavy book to read, well in many ways it should be, however Ditlevsen manages to captivate your heart and attention with her vulnerable, curious and raw real self, and having a glimpse into this world – it’s hard to put this book down!
The memoir is a stark and moving recollection of how she found creative and emotional dependency on one man – her first stifling marriage to Viggo, a short but fiery relationship with a university student and then a deeply disturbing marriage to a sadistic doctor with mental problems who gets her hooked on opiods as a way to control her and make her dependent upon him.
If you have ever known someone who has fallen into addiction, this book might be triggering for you. I found this memoir to be sad but fascinating, like watching a car crash in slow motion.
Ditlevsen has cultivated a raw and unrelenting narrative of her body and mind as colonised territory. This is an absorbing and deeply powerful and timeless memoir and it is little wonder that Ditlevsen’s trilogy is considered a classic in Scandinavia.
Content Catnip 