Translation originally published, 2009.
A satire of the rapidly changing society of the 1870s, it was Strindberg's first novel and marked his literary breakthrough. It contains some of the great set-piece scenes in Swedish literature, a gallery of unforgettable caricatures in the spirit of Dickens, humour, pathos and satirical targets as apt now as they were then. August Strindberg (1849-1912) is best known outside Sweden as a dramatist, but he was also a prolific writer of novels, short stories, essays, journalism and poetry - as well as a notable artist and photographer. Although he spent many years abroad, Strindberg was born, grew up and died in Stockholm and The Red Room is perhaps the quintessential Stockholm novel. A satire of the rapidly changing society of the 1870s, it was Strindberg's first novel and marked his literary breakthrough: it offers, he said, 'a panorama of a society I don't love and which has never loved me'. It contains some of the great set-piece scenes in Swedish literature, a gallery of unforget