Cecil Bødker as an arena modernist

When you say Cecil Bødker, most people nod in recognition, but most often think of the beloved children's book author. Secondary literature about her writing for adults exists largely only in literary historical overview works, despite the fact that Bødker has received a multitude of awards for both children's and adult literature, including the Danish Academy's Store Prize.
Cecil Bødker as Arena modernist shows how in the 1960s Bødker made a pioneering contribution to Arena modernism's renewal of the novel genre in Danish literature. Her works have a strong aesthetic connection with European prose modernism, and they do so in an original way. With weight and lightness, Bødker writes in intense dialogue with and independent extension of Samuel Beckett. With this, she anticipates to a large extent not least Per Højholt.
In Cecil Bødker's forgotten, radically experimental novel Pap (1967), the reader feels immediately fascinated and entertained, and at the same time existential questions about identity, language and subjectivity are raised, as well as the question of what a novel really is.
With this publication, Hanne Godtfeldt wants to pave the way for recognition of Cecil Bødker's overlooked efforts. And in a larger perspective, she hopes that the book can contribute to changing the still persistent tendency for the history of literature to be written about predominantly male authors.