20th-century Norwegian writers

Anne Lise Aas (1925–2020) was a Norwegian interior designer who was active in promoting Norway's folk art and its furniture industry. After working with various architects on interior design and furnishings, in 1958 she became an artistic collaborator for the handicrafts association Den Norske Husflidsforening. In 1962, she opened her own workshop, creating furniture, textiles, glassware and lamps. She became particularly adept at designing photographic exhibitions presenting furniture, crafts and housing. Aas also worked as a writer, serving as editor of the furniture manufacturers' journal Corridor in the 1980s. In 1973, she received the country's annual craft award, the Jacob Prize.

Johan Randulf Bull Hambro (24 October 1915 – 27 February 1993) was a Norwegian journalist, translator and biographer. He was the fourth son of Norwegian politician C. J. Hambro, whose biography he wrote in 1984. He lived in the United States from 1939 to 1982, where he studied and worked as a foreign-affairs journalist, press attaché and consulate-general. He was secretary general of the Norse Federation for 27 years, from 1955 to 1982. He was decorated as a Knight, First Class of the Order of St. Olav in 1975.

Trygve Dehli Laurantzon (20 March 1902 – 21 May 1975) was a Norwegian agronomist and newspaper editor.
He was born in Kristiania as a son of Major General Jacob Ager Laurantzon (1878–1965) and Bergljot Dehli (1878–1968). On the maternal side he was a grandson of jurist and organizational leader Ole Dehli, and a nephew of Halfdan Gyth Dehli.
In 1928 he married Johanne Sandberg (1903–1985), a daughter of farmer, officer and politician Ole Rømer Aagaard Sandberg (1865–1925). As such he was a brother-in-law of Ole Rømer Aagaard Sandberg, farmer and MP from Furnes. Laurantzon died in May 1975 in Hamar.During the German occupation of Norway he edited the magazine Norsk Jord from 1941 to 1945. During the last phase of the Second World War he edited the newspaper Nationen for two and a half months, and headed the collaborationist Quisling regime's Ministry of Agriculture for a short period from April to May 1945. In the legal purge in Norway after World War II he was convicted of treason and sentenced to fifteen years of forced labor, only to be released in 1950.

Andreas Holmsen (5 June 1906 – 20 February 1989) was a Norwegian historian, author, and educator. He is most commonly associated with his textbook Norges historie fra de eldste tider til 1660 (Norwegian History from the Oldest Times to 1660), which is a standard introduction to early Norwegian history.

Otto Sverdrup Engelschiøn (30 October 1902 – 8 May 1982) was a Norwegian marketer, businessperson, resistance member and genealogist.
He was born in Kristiania as a son of consul-general Søren Dass Brodtkorb Sverdrup Engelschiøn (1867–1909) and Janka Hansen (1869–1935). In 1928 he married Gudrun Irgens Garmann.Engelschiøn finished his secondary education in 1922 and graduated from the Royal Frederick University with the cand.jur. degree in 1926. He was an attorney from 1927, and also director of I. Sverdrup Engelschiøn which had the rights to distribute Swedish Tomten products in Norway. In 1929 it was merged with Norsk Barnengens Tekniske Fabrik. Engelschiøn spent the rest of his career in the company, from 1929 as director of the sales and marketing department and from 1948 to 1968 as co-owner.In the 1930s he was a member of Nasjonal Samling. He left the party in the 1937 party split, continuing though in the Ragnarok group around national socialist Hans S. Jacobsen, and edited the magazine Ragnarok in 1940. In 1940, however, Norway was invaded and occupied by Nazi Germany. Engelschiøn joined the resistance movement and was the head of intelligence in Milorg's District 13, Division 3 (Asker and Bærum) from 1943 to 1945. He received the Defence Medal 1940–1945 with rosette.Engelschiøn chaired the Norwegian Genealogical Society from 1957 to 1968, and thereafter served as deputy chairman. He was also a bibliophile, chairing Bibliofilklubben twice as well as the contest jury for the Most Beautiful Book of the Year. Engelschiøn also issued a crime novel under a pseudonym.He resided in Bærum. He died in 1982 and was buried at Haslum.

Leif Longum (19 November 1927 – 5 May 1997) was a Norwegian essayist and literary researcher. He was born in Oslo. He was assigned to the Nansen Academy from 1960 to 1972, and the University of Bergen from 1972 to 1995; from 1992 as a professor. He published the textbook Å lese skuespill in 1976. His principal work is an analysis of the "cultural radicalism" in Norway in the interwar years, with particular focus on the troika Sigurd Hoel, Helge Krog and Arnulf Øverland. He published the essay collection Å krysse sine spor in 1995, while the collection På fallrepet was published posthumously in 1998.

Christian Norberg-Schulz (23 May 1926 – 28 March 2000) was a Norwegian architect, author, educator and architectural theorist. Norberg-Schulz was part of the Modernist Movement in architecture and associated with architectural phenomenology.

Yngvar Løchen (31 May 1931 – 28 July 1998) was a Norwegian sociologist.
He took his dr.philos. in 1965 and was hired as associate professor of community medicine at the University of Oslo the same year. In 1971 he was appointed professor in the sociology of medicine at the University of Tromsø. He served as chancellor from 1977 to 1981.He was also chairman of the Hovedkomiteen for norsk forskning from 1974 to 1977, and of the Rådet for samfunnsvitenskapelig forskning from 1985 to 1989.Løchen's 1965 work Idealer og realiteter i et psykiatrisk sykehus (Ideals and Realities in a Psychiatric Hospital) was selected for the Norwegian Sociology Canon in 2009–2011.

Finn Einar Mortensen (January 6, 1922 – May 23, 1983) was a Norwegian
composer, critic and educator.Mortensen was born in Oslo. His parents were publisher Ernst Gustav Mortensen (1887–1966) and Anna Marie Damnæs (1886–1960). Mortensen grew up in a publishing environment and it was at first expected that he would go into his father's publishing firm, Ernst G. Mortensens Forlag A/S. He studied harmony with Thorleif Eken (1900–1955), composition with Klaus Egge and with Niels Viggo Bentzon at The Royal Danish Academy, as well as the piano and double bass at the Oslo Conservatory of Music. He also participated in the Darmstadt summer school and in the classes conducted by Karlheinz Stockhausen at the Studio für Elektronische Musik in Cologne.The first public presentation of one of Mortensen's compositions was the Trio for Strings, Op. 3, which was played at the Young Nordic Music Festival in Oslo in 1950. In April 1954 he had his debut as a composer, along with Øistein Sommerfeldt. He was the leader of the group Ny Musikk, a Norwegian advocacy group for contemporary music, between 1961 and 1964, and between 1966 and 1967. From 1963-73, he was a music critic in Dagbladet, and he was also for many years correspondent for the major German magazine Melos. When the Norwegian Concert Institute was established in 1968, he became the institution's first director. From 1970 onward, he taught at the Oslo Conservatory of Music, becoming Norway's first professor of composition in 1973.
Rolf Wallin, Jon Mostad, Lasse Thoresen, Terje Bjørklund and Synne Skouen are among his students.
Until about 1953, Mortensen's music was mostly influenced by neoclassicism and expressionism. It later assimilated twelve-tone and aleatoric influences, creating what Mortensen termed a "neo-serial" style. From a point of departure in neo-classicism he became deeply involved with serial techniques. In Norway, Mortensen's works are still regularly performed by leading orchestras. In the rest of the world, however, he is less well-known.

Erik Egeland (21 July 1921 – 19 March 1996) was a Norwegian journalist and art critic.