Selma Lagerlof

The Emperor of Portugallia Selma Lagerlof

The Emperor of Portugallia is called the "Swedish King Lear" by Lagerlöf. It was a success with critics and readers, considered to be at the same level as Lagerlöf's earlier novels Gosta Berling's Saga and the first part of Jerusalem. Taking place in 1860 or 1870 in Lagerlöf's native Värmland, it tell the story about the tenant farmer Jan in Skrolycka and his daughter Glory Goldie Sunnycastle. More than anything else he loves his daughter, but after she moves to Stockholm at age 17 and becomes wealthy and well-known, she stops sending letters home. The father sinks into a dream world where he imagines she has become a noble empress of "Portugallia", and he a great Emperor.