Pan

Pan is a novel by Knut Hamsun influenced by Dostoevsky & written in Paris & Kristiansand. The tale starts with Lt. Th Glahn, hunter & ex-military man, living in a forest hut with his dog Aesop. Upon meeting Edvarda, a merchant's daughter, he falls in love. She's unfaithful, having affairs in the nearby town. Dejected, he behaves childishly around her, as well as humiliating the Doctor, who completes a love triangle. In the end he visits her for the last time in military uniform. She asks for Aesop to remember him by. Instead of consenting, afraid she'll abuse it, he shoots Aesop, sending her the corpse before sailing off for duty. Glahn's dreams of two lovers & their conversations foreshadow much of what happens. Symbols of nature & culture are important. They fall in love in Spring, make love in Summer, break off in Autumn. Glahn belongs to nature, Edvarda to culture. The Epilogue, Glahn's Death, is a number of stories about him ending with an 'accidental' shooting & death. This is contradictory as he himself wrote Pan. Perhaps he faked his death, simply for the novel's purposes, getting back at Edvarda for their failed love.