novelists-from-finland

"Mikä olen? Tähdenlento Luojan ikuisessa yössä, tomujyvä aavan aineen lakkaamattomassa työssä.'Mutta sentään! Tahdon antaa hehkun hetkelleni tälle, tahdon loistaa, tahdon laulaa kiitoslaulun elämälle.'Tahdon laulaa: mitä siitä, jos ma lopuin, kussa aloin, mutta silmänräpäyksen valokaarin yössä paloin!'Hetken sykin, liekkisydän, aurinkona maailman oman tunsin kauneuden kaipuun, rakkauden rajattoman.'Alistukaa, avaruudet, pienen tähden välkynnälle! Tahdon loistaa, tahdon laulaa kiitoslaulun elämälle."

"After days of demon drink"

"A LITTLE EPISODE:"

"It was told that when God long ago created Sipirja he settled it by the river and trampled the path nearby the houses: go wanderer, stay a while but not longer! In the houses of Sipirja people speak their own language so that no stranger can understand what they say; it remains unexplained. They are like mute, armless, eyeless and there is not heart in any one’s chest, only the possessed and lashed flesh. When a stranger comes to the village of Sipirja, they despise him like an animal and they laugh at his speech, and all the old painful things and injustices which everyone has suffered sometimes are exposed. Children and old hags stare after him when he has left, they imitate his speech and the way how he walked and moved his arm, and they say: a creature like that! so ugly! They ask the stranger inside and they fill his cup with delicious coffee and urge to drink, but when he is gone they speak about him with despise: a creature like that!"

"'Finnish president Risto Ryti and the National Orchestra proudly present ... a polka: "Up Shit Creek Without a Fucking Paddle".'"

"'The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics won, but racing to the line for a strong second place came feisty little Finland.'"

"Rather dear, those boys."

"He pointed diagonally across the lake with a ski-pole, to where a broad slope of pine trees covered with frost shone golden in the sun."

"Finnish autobiographer Kalle Päätalo wrote perhaps the longest bestselling autobiography in the world, and most certainly in his native Finland."

"WHEN father bought the lamp, or a little before that, he said to mother:"

"No music was made from grief, moulded from sorrow."

"Eikö olisi oikeaa tuomiotaktiikkaa ottaa joku prosentti vihollisen toisestakin sukupuolesta – siten siveellisesti varoittaakseen niiden kurjia ammattisisaria. Sudenjahdissa kelpaa maalitauluksi juuri naarassusi ehkä enemmän kuin uros, sillä metsästäjä tietää, että naarassusi synnyttää pahoja penikoita, joista on oleva ikuinen vastus. Todistettu on, että Suomen kansalaissodassa punakaartilaiset ovat petoja, monet heidän naisistaan – susinarttuja, vieläpä naarastiikereitä. Eikö ole hulluutta olla ampumatta petoja, jotka meitä ahdistavat."

"Are they human beings? Ask from those who have flown through the fires of hell if the red-Russkies are humans! Our boys outright deny it!"

"Ilmari Kianto is best known for his humorous depictions of rural life in Finland"

"Despite the fact that it is quite obvious, EU leaders do not want to admit that they will lose to America and China, superpowers with strong economies in the West and the East, if they do not come together with, or, at least, improve relations with Russia."

"By the way, the leader of any country does likewise. In the West, there is a great excuse: 'We are spreading freedom and democracy around the world.' The United States uses it at all times, even in wars, waged in its own interest."

"Suppose Russia falls apart. Thousands of refugees will huddle together at the Finnish border. This is one of the reasons I want Russia to remain a strong power. Who else could be in such a position other than Putin, who in Finland is repeatedly painted black as a monster?"

"Two writers who have gone the furthest from their proletarian starting points are Hannu Salama and Samuli Paronen. In regard to both its structure and its perceptions, Salama's epic prose is unsurpassed. From the point of view of the lowest and poorest societal strata the very individualistic Paronen created a body of work that has proved to be remarkable, even as criticism of civilisation."

"As a child I was helpless and filled with trust, but now I am fortunately sick with fear and filled with distrust. Now I am sharp-sighted, but then I was stupid and blind goose, and I had to experience it over and over again."

"It would be madness to imagine that I or anybody else has private thoughts, private and independent: the self is the sum of the understanding the self, only when I can understand that there is also you, I can perceive my deeds and to be."

"Timo Mukka (born 1944) is a very individual author; he can be frankly romantic and writes at times a directly poetic prose, but he also describes, in a realistic manner, rootless modern life and presents a slightly surrealistic but very efficient satire of all the brutality and stupidity of the present-day world."

"In the beginning there were the swamp, the hoe – and Jussi."

"As we all know, the Lord is almighty – he knows all and sees far. And so, one day, he let forest fire burn a good swath of state land, laying waste to acres of the dry, pine forest around the town of Joensuu. The people did everything in their power to put a stop to his work, as they always did, but he burned the forest undeterred, just as far as it suited him. He had his own plans."

"The younger troops assumed their ranks. There they stood, bumbling into lines with a bit of difficulty: Mother Finland's chosen sacrifice to world history."

"Once Koskela saw that the guns were ready to go, he called out, 'Shoot for their nuts!'"

"They made it to the swamp and Kaarna pounced immediately. 'What's going on here? What's this? Look here, you boys have made a mess of this whole thing. Ay-ay-ay! Boys, boys, this isn't how you fight a war. Noo-oo-ooo. Fighting like this isn't going to get you anywhere. Now, we're going to pull ourselves together and cross this little swamp. The others are already at the enemy positions.'"

"'Are you motherfuckers deaf? Shoot here ... down here ... follow my voice ... my gun ... aaahh ...'"

"'See that officer out in front? Soon as his shadow hits that lil' spruce there, he's meetin' his maker. That's what I say. 'Nen after him, I start in on'na rest of 'em. Look at them all lined up! Waddlin' along one after the other like sittin' ducks. Poor bastards! Don't know what's about'ta hit 'em. Pretty soon you're gonna see how the Lord takes His own. Now, You lissen up up there, ol' man! If any a those fella's sinned, You take mercy on him, hear? Be quick now! They're gonna start headin' up to you soon.'"

"'Koskela the Finn. Eats iron and shits chains.'"

"'The battalion can operate very well without you. No man is indispensable in a war, no matter who he is.'"

"Jorma Kariluoto had paid his dues into the common pot of human idiocy."

"Real winners do not compete."

"Two writers who have gone the furthest from their proletarian starting points are Hannu Salama and Samuli Paronen. In regard to both its structure and its perceptions, Salama's epic prose is unsurpassed. From the point of view of the lowest and poorest societal strata the very individualistic Paronen created a body of work that has proved to be remarkable, even as criticism of civilisation."

"One day I was in rather a fix, so I went out. I strolled along in the dazzling sunlight of early spring, lost in thought, seeing and hearing nothing, really ; forming no kind of picture of what was going on around me in the Saturday bustle of the country village. Nothing. Funny, it was so typical : one of those times when a writer feels stale, when his pen has been showing signs of going on of going on strike and will soon cease to obey him altogether. Driven by his restlessness, the writer goes away like a rat leaving a sinking ship..."

"War is time that has marched through the mind, and is later presented in"

"Name is a fence and within it you are nameless."

"A person can find anything if he takes the time, that is, if he can afford to look. And while he’s looking, he’s free, and he finds things he never expected."

"I only want to live in peace, plant potatoes and dream!"

"Those damn Moomins. I don't want to hear about them any more. I could vomit on the Moomintrolls."

"I'll have to calm down a bit. Or else I'll burst with happiness."

"Maybe my passion is nothing special, but at least it's mine."

"To fall asleep in your embrace, Land of our dreams, what bliss, O you our cradle, you our grave, You the new hope we ever crave, Peninsula so beautiful, Finland for aye our all!"

"Grove of Tuoni, grove of night! There thy bed of sand is light. Thither my baby I lead. Mirth and joy each long hour yields In the Prince of Tuoni's fields Tending the Tuonela cattle. Mirth and joy my babe will know, Lulled to sleep at evening glow By the pale Tuonela maiden. Surely joy hours will hold, Lying in thy cot of gold, Hearing the nightjar singing. Grove of Tuoni, grove of peace! There all strife and passion cease. Distant the treacherous world."

"Now dig my grave Beneath the bay willows' boughs And with blackness cover it over again, There for evermore Go from my domain: I wish to slumber in peace."

"What is that land of hill and dale That is so beautiful, The land aglow with summer days, Land with the northern lights ablaze, Whose beauty all the seasons share, What is that land so fair? There many thousand lakes are bright With twinkling stars at night There many kanteles resound And all around make hillsides sing And on the golden heath firs ring: That is the Finnish land."

"Minä elän."

"Life is a hot day, perhaps death is a cool night. Life is a shallow bay, perhaps death is a clear, deep sea."

"Sinuhe, my friend, we have been born into strange times. Everything is melting - changing its shape - like clay on a potter's wheel. Dress is changing, words, customs are changing, and people no longer believe in the gods - though they may fear them. Sinuhe, my friend, perhaps we were born to see the sunset of the world, for the world is already old, and twelve hundred years have passed since the building of the pyramids. When I think of this, I want to bury my head in my hands and cry like a child."