Lit in Translation

This Should Be Written in the Present Tense

Dette burde skrives i nutid

Helle Helle (born 1965)

Translated by Martin Aitken

English editions

In English

  • This Should Be Written in the Present Tense

    Soft Skull Press · United States · 12 January 2016 · Paperback

    Buy on Bookshop.org US*

  • This Should Be Written in the Present Tense

    Harvill Secker · United Kingdom · 2014 · 186 pages

  • This Should Be Written in the Present Tense

    Vintage · United Kingdom · 5 November 2015 · Paperback · 192 pages

    Buy on Bookshop.org UK*

* Affiliate link. As an Amazon Associate and a Bookshop.org affiliate I earn from qualifying purchases. The price stays the same for you.

Dorte Hansen is twenty, enrolled in literature at the University of Copenhagen, with a flat to herself next to the station in Glumsø. Every day she takes the train into the city, and every day she fails to go to her lectures, killing time at the Scala centre instead. There is a great deal she ought to do: hang curtains in the new flat, end her affair with the boyfriend of the woman next door, write. Her memories move back and forth in time, through her first boyfriend Per, the men after him and her halting attempts at writing, while she explains at the outset that most of what she wrote has gone in the bin.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form
Novel
Length
158 pages in the original
Genres
Coming of age (assigned by AI)
Set in
Denmark
First published
2011 by Samleren
Author's age
46 when first published
ISBN

9788763817851 (original)

9781846558054 (Harvill Secker, United Kingdom)

9780099587477 (Vintage, United Kingdom)

9781593766337 (Soft Skull Press, United States)