The Wild Orchid by Sigrid Undset

Published 1929 · 360 pages · 108,500 words · about 12 hours at an average pace · Literary Fiction

How hard is The Wild Orchid to read?

The Wild Orchid scores 54 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it quite demanding. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.

Vocabulary: 55 out of 100
Norwegian in translation.
Sentence structure: 55 out of 100
Hamsun lyrical.
Abstraction: 60 out of 100
Love, nature, youth.
Information density: 52 out of 100
Norwegian setting.
Narrative indirection: 55 out of 100
First person.
Symbolic density: 58 out of 100
Orchid, nature.
Ironic distance: 48 out of 100
Romantic engagement.
Resolution withholding: 52 out of 100
Youth ends.
Structural complexity: 52 out of 100
Linear narrative.

How The Wild Orchid is regarded

The Wild Orchid holds a literary regard score of 63 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.

About the author

Sigrid Undset