BRAATEN, OSKAR

born Nov. 25, 1881, Kristiania [now Oslo], Nor. died July 17, 1939, Oslo Norwegian novelist and dramatist who first brought the life of the factory worker to readers and theatregoers. Braaten was closely affiliated with the Norwegian labour movement, but his works are more concerned with depicting childhood and youth in the tenement houses of the east side of Oslo, where he grew up, than with an analysis of labour organizations or movements. He had a great popular success with the play Den store barnedpen (1925; The Big Baptism). His two most widely read novels are Ulvehiet (1919; The Wolf's Lair) and Matilde (1920). Besides his activity as an author, he worked until 1910 in a bookstore, then became a journalist, editor, and assistant director of the Norwegian Theatre.