Ola Bauer - Early Life

Early Life

Bauer was born 24 July 1943 in Holmenkollåsen, Oslo, during the German occupation of Norway. His father was a baker, and an active member of the Norwegian resistance movement. In 1943, he was arrested, while the rest of the family went undercover in Hadeland. Bauer's father was eventually deported to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, where he died three months before the end of the war. Bauer's family continuously moved from place to place, and Bauer had a hard time adjusting to the changes, and finding friends. He found himself consistently making friends with children of traitors, those who had supported the Germans during the war. "We were all innocent children, who had to pay for our fathers' choices. We could understand each other", Bauer later said. He used to make up stories about his father's death, a new version for every new place his family moved. He graduated from Oslo Språkskole in 1965, on his second attempt, "with a D in Norwegian, as usual".

Bauer started his literary career translating short stories from Danish to Norwegian for Allers. He quickly advanced to becoming sports reporter for Det Nye, and later a traveling journalist for Vi Menn. He stayed in Paris for more than a year in the late 1960s, and later traveled around Africa. From 1972 on he made frequent visits to Belfast, and made many friends there.