It may be added that in 1807 appeared the first volume of
Foersom's translation of Shakespeare's tragedies, and after 1807
the history of Shakespeare in Denmark is more complicated. With
these matters I shall deal at length in another study.]


B

It was many years before the anonymous contributor to _Trondhjems
Allehaande_ was to have a follower. From 1782 to 1807 Norwegians were
engaged in accumulating wealth, an occupation, indeed, in which they
were remarkably successful. There was no time to meddle with Shakespeare
in a day when Norwegian shipping and Norwegian products were profitable
as never before. After 1807, when the blundering panic of the British
plunged Denmark and Norway into war on the side of Napoleon, there were
sterner things to think of. It was a sufficiently difficult matter to
get daily bread. But in 1818, when the country had, as yet, scarcely
begun to recover from the agony of the Napoleonic wars, the second
Norwegian translation from Shakespeare appeared.[8]

[8. _Coriolanus, efter Shakespeare_. Christiania. 1818.]

The translator of this version of _Coriolanus_ is unknown. Beyond the
bare statement on the title page that the translation is made directly
from Shakespeare and that it is printed and published in Christiania by
Jacob Lehmann, there is no information to be had. Following the title
there is a brief quotation from Dr. Johnson and one from the "Zeitung
für die elegante Welt." Again Norway anticipates her sister nation; for
not till the following year did Denmark get her first translation of the