A review by raulbime
Dependency by Tove Ditlevsen

5.0

With this I’ve finished The Copenhagen Trilogy, and it was with some difficulty, I have to admit, that I held my tears back as I read the last pages. A lot happened in this final book. Tove becomes a successful writer and has to deal with the jealousy and insecurity the fame brings the men she’s with; she marries, divorces, marries again, divorces, marries again, divorces, and finds her last companion; she has children, and in between her second and third marriages develops an opioid addiction hence the title of the book. Given all this, more than the previous instalments even, it seemed that this book could dissolve into too sentimental a tale, and there is every reason for that as the writer had a difficult life, but it still maintains an extraordinary level of candour and control.

Also impressive is the seamlessness in narrative, none of the jerks and jolts as one point of life meets another—as it happens often with the memoir genre, but a wonderfully flowing story. There are harrowing parts, especially where Tove narrates of her addiction and the husband who played the big role in introducing her to demerol, chloral and methadone, using these drugs as a way to maintain control over her, and the descent into total dependency, and the struggle to break free of addiction. Definitely one of the best autobiographical works I’ve ever read and one that I won’t be forgetting any time soon.