The Red Room

A young idealist quits a government sinecure to make his own way, and the novel follows him through the newspaper offices, publishers, theatres and bureaus of the capital, sharpening into satire as it goes. The map opens on the heights of Södermalm looking north over the water, crosses to the old-town islands where the officials sit, and comes to rest in the Red Room at Berns, the salon where the young bohemians drink and argue.

Arvid Falk

Mosebacke terrace, Södermalm

Chapter 1

The book begins on a spring evening on the high ground of Södermalm, with the whole city spread out below to the north, spires and rooftops catching the last light across the water. It is a wide, hopeful opening view, set just before the story turns down into the offices and quarrels of the streets beneath it.

Chapter 1

explicit The novel opens on the Mosebacke heights on the northern edge of Södermalm; the coordinates mark the terrace and square above the cliff, where the view north over the city and water is still open today.

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Arvid Falk

Riddarholmen / the old town offices

Chapter 1

The story sends its young hero out of a dozing government bureau in the old town, one of the slow salary offices on the state islands where clerks pass papers and little happens. His decision to leave it and live by his pen sets the whole novel in motion and gives Strindberg his first target for satire.

Chapter 1

explicit Riddarholmen is the real old-town islet of state offices and archives; the salaried-officials bureau the hero walks out of is Strindberg's satirical invention, sited here on the government island of central Stockholm where such offices clustered.

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