Lagerlof, Selma

Selma (1859-) a Swedish novelist, the winner of the Nobel prize of $40,000 for literature, December, 1909. She was born in an old rectory named Marbacka in the province of Warmland, Sweden. She was fitted for a teacher at the normal school in Stockholm and followed the profession of teaching for many years. Her first book to win notice was The Saga of Gosta Berling, published in 1899. She is known especially as a teller of fairy tales or old folk tales and legends which have been familiar to her from her youth up. Those of her books which are familiar, through translations, to American readers are The Story of Gosta Berling, Invisible Links, The Miracles of Antichrist, The Wonderful Adventures of Nils, and Christ Legends.