Josef Kjellgren

Josef Kjellgren
Born	(1907-11-13)13 November 1907 Mörkö, Södermanland, Sweden
Died	8 April 1948(1948-04-08) (aged 40) Stockholm, Sweden
Occupation	Writer, playwright
Nationality	Swedish
Period	1929–48
Literary movement	Modernism

Josef Kjellgren, (13 November 1907 – 8 April 1948) was a Swedish writer and playwright.

Biography

Kjellgren was born and grew up on the island of Mörkö in the Stockholm archipelago. Later, his family moved to a residence near Hornstull on Södermalm in Stockholm.

Kjellgren was a proletarian writer and a member of the influential modernist literary group Fem unga ('Five Young Ones') who published an anthology of the same name in 1929. Kjellgren's main theme was proletarian internationalism and solidarity within the working class. He published modernist proletarian poetry and books about his travels in Europe in the early 1930s, such as På snålskjuts genom Europa ('Across Europe Without a Penny in My Pocket', 1930). He was a journalist and editor of the magazine Kulturfront from 1942-1944.

Kjellgren is best known for his later novels, including Människor kring en bro ('People Around a Bridge', 1935), about the building of Västerbron in Stockholm, and Smaragden ('The Emerald', 1939). Kjellgren also wrote a play, Okänd svensk soldat ('Unknown Swedish Soldier', 1938), which was the basis for the 1948 movie Främmande hamn ('Foreign Harbour'), directed by Hampe Faustman.

Kjellgren died of tuberculosis in 1948 and was buried at Högalids kolumbarium in Stockholm.