I’m working my way through Knut Hamsun’s three books about his fictional small Norwegian town Segelfoss, and didn’t want to write anything about them until I was done with all three. However I found this passage in the third, The Road Leads On, and it’s really great and too long to fit into my essay so I’ll just inflict it on you now. It’s pretty self-explanatory, but you should know that Aase is an Lapp fortune teller/folk healer type, really one of the vestiges of the shamanistic culture. Hamsun’s protagonist August approaches her to find out about some money he’s been promised only to have her intuit what’s really bugging him:

Along about this time he happened one evening upon Aase and it was his thought at once to hear what she might have to say in regard to that money of his: would he get it, or could he kiss it goodbye? He halted her and asked her advice on a matter of great importance to him. She stared him hard in the eyes, then without uttering a word, she drew him to one side, spread her legs wide apart and lifted up her clothes, so that she stood there nude to the navel. Meanwhile she continued to stare into his eyes.

"Hey –! Well I never!" August managed to stammer.

"I just wanted to see!" she said and let her clothes drop back into place.

Now it may be that August’s face had momentarily beamed at what his eyes had witnessed and it is likewise possible that he had gone further and moistened his lips.

"You old swine!" said Aase. "That’s why you go there all the time. You want her!"

Hell and damnation! This was not what he hoped to hear from Aase, though he knew she had spoken the truth – unfortunately the words were all too true – night and day the girl had haunted his dreams.

– from The Road Leads On by Knut Hamsun