Christian Thorleif Refsum

Christian Thorleif Refsum is a Professor at the Department of Literature, Area Studies and European Languages, Faculty of Humanities, University of Oslo, specializing in Comparative Literature, Aesthetics, and Critical Theory with a current focus on the philosophy and literature of friendship in late modernity.

His research interests include:

• Comparative Literature
• Aesthetics
• Critical Theory
• Philosophy and Literature of Friendship
• Artistic Time Experiments
• Poetry
• Contemporary Literature
• Film

Refsum's recent scholarship (2020-2025) analyzes love, temporality, and autofiction in Scandinavian literature through cultural criticism, with significant contributions on Karl Ove Knausgaard's works and Michel Houellebecq's exploration of love crises, reflecting interdisciplinary engagement between literary theory and philosophy.

He actively participates in key research initiatives at the University of Oslo:

• Aesthetics of Friendship
• Forms of Resistance
• Temporal Experiments: Literary, Aesthetic and Social Modes of Thinking and Living Time
• The Oslo Poetry Research Group
• Voice in Translation Research Group