Youth — Tove Ditlevsen

The acclaimed Danish poet Tove Ditlevsen's autobiographical Copenhagen Trilogy ("A masterpiece" -- The Guardian) continues with Youth. Following Childhood, this second volume finds the young author consumed in trials by fire that only fuel her relentless passion for artistic freedom -- placing her on a devastating and destructive path recounted in the final volume, Dependency.

Forced to leave school early, Tove embarks on a checkered career in a string of low-paid, menial jobs. But she is hungry: for poetry, for love, for real life to begin. As Europe slides into war, she must navigate exploitative bosses, a Nazi landlady, and unwelcome sexual encounters on the road to hard-won independence. Yet she remains ruthlessly determined in the pursuit of her poetic vocation -- until at last the miracle she has always dreamed of appears to be within reach.

Youth, the second volume in the Copenhagen Trilogy, is a strikingly honest and immersive portrait of adolescence, filled with biting humor, vulnerability, and poeticism.