Helge Torvund

Vivaldi

Vivaldi

Tyra is a girl who is unhappy at school. She has stopped talking when she is at school, but the others talk about her. And they kick her, and they look at her with a stare that makes her feel very small. But Tyra is ok at home, and one day she gets a kitten. Something changes. She is not just Tyra anymore. She is Tyra and the cat.

This is a picture book about bullying for older children / young adults. In a poetic and beautiful way it depicts a child’s experience of bullying and the beginning of a way out of it.

Illustrated by Mari Kanstad Johnsen.

Photo: Studio Vest (Copyright: Aschehoug)

Helge Torvund is one of Norway’s best known poets. He has published over two dozen collections of poetry, along with children’s books, essays, and translations.

Torvund deals with the intimate: landscape as it relates to the individual, relationships of family members and friends, small things in a wide world. His tone ranges from the idyllic and magical through the down to earth and dystopic, always sensuous, often surprising. Reviewer Eric Lodén points out his gift of “uniting the timeless with the everyday, the global with the local.”

Torvund’s work has met with both critical and popular acclaim and he is the recipient of several literary prizes.