Freedom in the mountains

This photograph was displayed on the first page of the Norwegian Trekking Association’s 1943 yearbook. It is a prime example of how the trekking association cunningly used symbols, such as the Norwegian flag, to express political opposition to the Nazis. The photograph tells a story of the mountains as a place of freedom, exempt from flag bans, and where the memory of an unoccupied motherland was still alive.

Throughout World War II, Norwegian nature was frequently depicted in pictures, literature and resistance poems. It strongly resonated in Norwegian patriotism, and can be understood in extension of the nation-building process of the previous century. The link between nature and a common national identity enabled a form of political activism, which largely went unnoticed by the occupying power.

The Norwegian Trekking Association’s yearbooks were popular among the association’s members, and have been published every year since 1868. In 1943, as the association marked its 75th anniversary, the Norwegian mountains were the theme of the yearbook. The mountains can be read metaphorically as the free Norway. This photograph is displayed at the front of the book with the subtitle: ‘Skagastølstindene mountains seen from Turtagrø’. The text is misleading because it is the prohibited Norwegian flag, flying in the wind in Jotunheimen, that is the picture’s actual motif, while Store Skagastølstind mountain, Norway’s third highest mountain, is partially hidden behind a cloud. The message is reinforced in the opening statement that follows the photograph. The Norwegian Trekking Association’s chairman at the time, Wilhelm Munthe, described how hiking in the mountains was a way of taking part in national unity, and he cunningly added a line from the Norwegian national anthem. Munthe believed the outdoor life to be synonymous with unity and political resistance.

Previously, outdoor life in the mountains was something reserved for the privileged few, and reflected the class divisions in Norwegian society. The occupation changed all this. In the yearbooks from the war years, we can read about how Norwegians from all walks of life flocked to the mountains during the summer seasons, and the Norwegian Trekking Association’s membership numbers more than doubled during the war. Outdoor activities became accessible to more and more people and were a welcome break for a war-stricken nation. It would also suggest that the Norwegian Trekking Association’s message reached its target audience: Hiking in the mountains became a way forward for Norway. Nature was a sanctuary that accommodated a common longing, and a place where Norwegians could meet in national unity. By virtue of this, referring to or living out an outdoor life became a politically symbolic act, and the distinction between nature as a metaphor and as a place to be, disintegrated and became one and the same.