On her family
It was eternally gray — those long winter's nights. My father would be sitting in a corner, scribbling figures on a newspaper. On the other side of the room my mother is repairing ragged old clothes, sighing. We children would be talking in very low voices, or just sitting silently. We are filled with anxiety, as if there is danger in the air. Such evenings are unforgettable for a sensitive girl.
Where we lived, all the houses and apartments looked alike, their ugliness matched by everything surrounding us. Even the grass gave LIP trying. Usually in May some greenery tried to grow amid the ugly wilderness. I watched it with tenderness and watered the few blades of grass each morning and night. But in spite of my care they languished and died. They died just as did the children in our forlorn neighborhood.
On her sister
My sister! My little sister — I called her that, in spite of the fact that she was two years older than me. She had always been so fresh, so beautiful. And suddenly, she was ill. It started very slowly, and then…
I had hoped that she would come to America and join me. She had been in movies in Sweden a little, and I am sure she had a future in the movies.
On her childhood
I was always sad as a child, for as long as I can think back. I hated crowds of people, and used to sit in a corner by myself, just thinking. I did not want to play very much. I did some skating or played with snowballs, but most of all I wanted to be alone with myself. Although I was the youngest of the family, my parents always looked upon me as the oldest. I can hardly remember a time that I was ever very little, or as little as other children. I don't think anyone ever regarded me as a child.
Young as I was, I always had my own opinions and my brother and sister let me make the decisions for us all. It has been said that I was prematurely grown up. I was tall as a child but did not grow any more after the age of twelve. I cannot put a year to the time that my love for the theater first began. It seems as if I have always carried it inside me.
Already when I was very small and could still hardly talk I had a certain mania to paint — not on paper, as most children do, but on my own face.
Little Greta painted
With the aid of a small paintbox my father had given me I painted my lips and face, believing that this is what real actresses do. No one in my family could escape my paintbrush. Then I forced them, together with me, to perform big dramas, amid screams which would make any spectator doubt that I was in possession of my senses.
I never enjoyed playing with others, even with my sister and brother, but preferred to sit alone with my dolls and picture books, and I found my greatest pleasure in my childish dreams. Unfortunately I am still the same now — finding it difficult to adjust to other people.
Schooldays
As for my schooldays, I lived in a constant state of fear, disliking every moment of it and especially two subjects: geography and mathematics. I could never understand how anyone could be interested in faraway places, or in trying to solve such ridiculous problems as how many liters of water could pass through a tap of such and such width in one hour and fifteen minutes.
I not only thought it was stupid to lose time with such questions, but to the astonishment of my teachers I even dared to say so out loud. The only subject I really liked was history, which filled me with all kinds of dreams. I read my schoolbooks on history just as if they were novels and often let my fantasy wander.
Her fantasy
According to my fancies I might shorten the life of a cruel king and replace him by a romantic knight, or reawaken an unhappy queen centuries after her death. When the history teacher asked me questions I started by giving the correct answers, but then would get carried away, spluttering forth with conjured-up visions of my own.
When the teacher stopped me and told me to start again from the beginning, I could no longer remember what I had said before and turned red. My embarrassment was taken as proof of my ignorance and I would get the lowest marks.
The death of her father
I was fourteen years old when my father died, after a long, lingering illness. He was only forty-eight. From that time there was only sobbing and moaning to be heard in our home. My brother and sister would not even try to control their grief, and I often had to ask them to be quiet. To my mind a great tragedy should be borne silently.
It seemed disgraceful to me to show it in front of all the neighbors by constant crying. My own sorrow was as deep as theirs, and for more than a year I cried myself to sleep every night. For a time after his death I was fighting an absurd urge to get up in the night and run to his grave to see that he had not been buried alive. Our lives were always ruled by extreme poverty.
Father's paltry wage was the only income we had to live on until his death. Now it became necessary for all of us to work. My brother and sister found jobs in various shops, earning a few kronor. I was still too young, and besides, my mother wanted me to stay at home with her. But we badly needed every penny, and soon afterward a friendly neighbor got me a job in one of the local barber shops.
The local barber shops
My work there consisted of lathering the men's faces, preparing them to be shaved by the barber. While he shaved one I would be putting soap on the next one's stubble. I soon conquered my early shyness and a certain feeling of degradation, and was not at all unhappy anymore, knowing that I did a good job. I was never as proud as of my first week's wages.
Source: Lektyr Magazine, Sweden 1931
