Meet Oliver Lovrenski: The 21-Year-Old Author Writing From “Inside The Crisis” Of Modern Masculinity 

“If there’s a masculinity crisis,” says 21-year-old literary sensation Oliver Lovrenski, “I’m not looking at it from the outside. I’m inside it, you know? So if I write about it, I write from the perspective of the men who are in crisis.” He’s chatting to me from his native Oslo, where he’s currently out for a walk, tower blocks rising up into the leaden skies behind him. His novel, Back in the Day, which was released in the UK last week, became an instant number-one bestseller in Norway in 2023, winning a slew of prizes and huge critical acclaim for its propulsive plot and strong voice (it is written in the patois of a teenage ’roadman’, with slang borrowed from grime, crime films and from the internet – reading it does take some getting used to though each page manages to be lyrical, moving and incredibly funny).  

It catapulted the then 19-year-old to the kind of literary fame in his native Norway that most writers never reach – let alone before leaving their teens. Unlike Netflix’s Adolescence, which confronts a certain kind of algorithm-fed Andrew Tate-esque masculinity, Back in the Day explores its even quieter, more insidious form. 

Back in the Day follows Ivor and his three best friends as they come of age in a tough neighbourhood in Oslo. Faced with various challenges – from Jonas, who grows up at the mercy of a violent father to Ivor himself, whose single mother struggles to provide for him – they are gradually pulled into a world of gangs, drug dealing and knife crime. Power is everything on the streets, but getting it requires the kind of moral (and physical) sacrifices which, as an adult, you understand will have repercussions for the rest of their lives. The underlying question, which simmers away beneath every violent beating or gang retaliation is, of course, ‘is this really what it means to be a man?’ – which is how we get onto talking about the great identity crisis that see so many young men drawn towards the toxic influence of Andrew Tate.   

“I think there has been a lot of change in the world [over the past generation], and it’s not obvious what a man’s path is meant to be in society now,” continues Oliver, who comes across as deeply thoughtful and serious. “It’s become very unclear what the ideal of a man is. Personally, I think it’s about being responsible, honest, loving, hardworking and generous – but this vision is not communicated enough to young boys. And so, in that vacuum it’s very easy for other people to become influences.”

That vacuum is something he’s seen firsthand. “Maybe three or four years ago, [male gurus] began appearing on my YouTube and TikTok; watching these guys I thought, ‘Oh, I’ve seen this before. I’ve seen guys like them on the streets, approaching young boys in exactly the same way.’” Most interviews with Oliver paint Back in the Day as semi-autobiographical. Indeed, he does come from the same milieu that he writes about – an Oslo where teenagers from broken homes join gangs and deal drugs in school – though he dismisses it when I ask how much of the story is directly borrowed from his real life. “Let’s just call it fiction,” he says. Later, he does admit that he “experienced some of what the boys in the book have experienced... I’ve definitely been around and seen a lot of crime and drugs. And maybe that’s why I can write the book, because to an extent I know the environment; I know what happens and how it happens and how it feels.”  

“You asked me if there’s a [masculinity] crisis – well, if there is, it’s because we need to provide a vision of what a man should be that also aligns with what men actually want to become”

What he saw, firsthand, was how boys without stable role models could be easily groomed into drug dealing. It’s this same kind of grooming – lured by promises of riches and power – which, he says, is now playing out online.

“With someone like Andrew Tate, it’s very complicated,” he muses (I notice he doesn’t rush to denounce him as some kind of malevolent entity, like many do). “I can’t, in good faith, make a simple critique of him. Fundamentally, it’s very difficult to become a great role model for a generation...” Basically, he says, Tate is responding to some kind of need: “presenting something that’s attractive, a vision for what you can be and what future you can have. But it’s a shallow vision that doesn’t play out long term. You asked me if there’s a crisis – well, if there is, it’s because we need to provide a vision of what a man should be that also aligns with what men actually want to become.”

It’s that hunger for direction – for a version of masculinity rooted in meaning, rather than spectacle – that Oliver says he once found in the work of Jordan Peterson. The polarising Canadian psychologist, whose philosophy centres on structure and responsibility, became a lifeline. “Peterson changed my life,” he says. “Nobody has changed my life ever like him. I started watching him when I was 16 or 17, at a time when I was completely irresponsible and had no idea of what to do with my future. He just changed everything.” But, he adds, “I’ve sort of pulled away from all of this. I don’t use social media or YouTube because I noticed myself sitting for hours and becoming influenced, often negatively, by what I was watching.”  

That clarity, though, led to something else – a new kind of discipline, one that would eventually shape Back in the Day. Determined to write the book he’d been quietly carrying in his mind for years, Oliver put himself into a kind of self-imposed exile. After what he describes as ‘chaotic’ teenage years and a surprisingly successful stint in telemarketing, he realised the life he was building was quietly smothering the ambition he’d always had; the dream was slipping away. “I was like, ‘OK, well, you have to finish. You have to do this.’ I decided I would move away from everything and from everybody I know, and I wouldn’t come back until I had a book.” He spent every penny he’d saved from his telemarketing job on travelling through Croatia, Italy and Slovenia – and he wrote every day. “My worst fear is becoming that guy who had dreams or plans or ambitions and never made them happen because I got comfortable enough doing some other job and lost that desperation. I don’t fear anything more than that, like I would probably actually rather die than end up there. I’ve seen it happen; people get comfortable and it’s not one decision, it’s a million tiny, reasonable decisions which take them away from their dream.”  

Oliver clearly has the single-minded focus of a true artist – and in many ways, it’s paid off. The book has caused a sensation. But success, he says, is “double edged. It’s great – I can make a living off writing, I’ve met a lot of great people and people want to interview me... but it’s also been a wake-up call to insufficiencies outside of writing in my own personal life.” Years spent obsessively devoted to his work, he admits, comes at a price.

Oliver explains that he initially began writing the book in traditional Norwegian, with ‘normal’ chapters and exposition, but he realised that something didn’t feel true to life about it. “I switched my style completely about 18 months into the writing. I threw away everything else that I’d written before, and started all over again, in this style. Then it took about six months to finish the book.” Despite its distinctive style, though, at its heart it is, Oliver says, just a simple story of “young boys trying to become good men”. This is, in the end, the resounding feeling we’re left with: one of trying, as Ivor fights against the hand life has dealt him. It’s an almost-redemption arc that seems eerily similar to Oliver’s own life.

Back in the Day by Oliver Lovrenski is out now