 |
||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
A Plunge into Finnish Mythology: Finland's leading educationalists Snellman, Lönnrot and Runeberg were enjoying an extended working lunch in the 1800s at the Kaisaniemi Restaurant. They were all part of the project team ”How to build up the body and soul of the primitives of Finland”. Runeberg was already drunk enough to start reciting his own poems. Snellman, the project manager, picked up on this and banged the table sharply with his full pint. – To the point, lads! We have nothing together yet! This project is, after all, urgent as hell. The country's not about to become a nation at this rate. The people are filthy and lazy. They're all just drinking and loitering. Nobody even bothers to learn to read. God damn it, Johan Ludvig, you made me spill my drink! – Now, now my dear Johan Wilhelm. Quit being so cross and barbed all the time. You remind me of my fair Fredrika when you act like that. A propos, I do agree with you; I even have a proposition to make. As you well know, there is absolutely nothing as unutterably beautiful as a young warrior's crimson gore on the virgin snow. But the youth of today are listless. They get cold in the winter. It is impossible to make them fight a war in the freezing cold. If this continues, I will run out of material for my winter poems. I may end up being remembered as a regular baker, a bloody tart maker! – So what is your proposition then, my old chap, Lönnrot interrupted. We have plenty of coldness to go around. All this ice and snow. Do you not think the youth would learn to cope with frost? – Elias, my beauteous companion of old, do not tell me you can not see how people live now. Finland is no longer like your Uhtua village where every cabin's every beam is constantly letting in a hearty gust of cold wind. People are living too warmly, cuddled around their ovens. Horses pull them along and they wrap themselves in bearskins, the slackers! – You're exaggerating as usual, Johan Ludwig, but come on now, tell us your proposal, snapped Snellman. – The ice hole! That is my proposal, ”my loving Fredrika, yours always I yearn to be”. We'll tell Cygneus to include winter swimming in his curriculum. Damn it, we will build a new Sparta right here in the North! The icy water will toughen our warriors, and first we'll conquer Russia and then.. – Shut the hell up, Johan Ludwig! Do you really want to end up scraping the permafrost in Siberia with your pen? But your idea might have something in it. What thinks brother Elias, the swift and the wise? – In these dismal Northern regions, in the dreary land of Pohja, the sauna will raise the offspring, the wind the pullet! – Mein Gott. This is going nowhere. Kaisa. One more round! But nothing for Johan Ludvig this time. – Johan Wilhelm, you are nothing but a zero. Hegel's hanger-on. A schoolmaster. A mark maker. An antithesis of the rouble. ”At dusk, Minerva's owl takes flight.” Ha, ha! – I think I have it now. Danke, mein lieber master baker. Thesis: sauna. Antithesis: ice hole. Synthesis: both of them! Sauna: the purification and renewal of the body. Ice hole: the enlightenment and toughening of the soul. These two together: a pure, courageous, valiant spirit, Finland! We'll have Cygneus to write a report on this. Well done, lads! Well done, Johan Ludvig and Elias! Kaisa. More food! Bring something to drink for Runeberg too. – Oh bastard, Fredrika's coming!
TEXT: Jaska Poranen |
|
 |
Festival News 2002 festnews@uta.fi |