Novelist, passionate, advocate of women´s rights and author of the first novel in Norwegian literature dealing critically with the position of women; its inmense influence on later writers -especially Ibsen, Bjornson, Jonas Lie and Alexander Kielland- is reflected in the late 19th century, when women´s emancipation became the burning topic of the day.
She was the sister of Norway´s beloved national poet Henrik Wergeland and as a young woman she was in love with his greatest rival J.S. Welhaven. Her relationship with Welhaven ended unhappily and she later married Peter Jonas Collett who strongly encouraged her writing.
It was not until after his death and the death of her parents and brother that she wrote the novel for which she is most famous Antmandens dottre (1855; The Governor´s Daughter). In it spoke for all women who wanted to become functioning, self-determining, free human beings. She attacked the existing inequality of the sexes and the conventional marriage and home based on patriarchal dominion.
The theme of her second novel I de lange naetter (1862; In the Long Nights) was less aggresive; it deal with reminiscences of her childhood and youth.
The rest of her works were dedicated to the social and emotional emancipation of women.
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