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EESTI ELU reedel, 21. mail 2021 — Friday, May 21, 2021
Tartu College Book Club – book reviews Maiki Andre Lupp – reviewer and book club member
places change ... Burning Cities is a beautiful and intelligent piece of fiction and I highly recommend it.” (Scott Manley Hadley, minorliterature) Kai Aareleid was born in Tartu, Estonia in 1972. She continues to live and work there. Aareleid has studied dramaturgy, literary translation and editing in Finland and Estonia. She has translated works into Estonian from Spanish, Portuguese, French, Finnish and English. Aareleid has written articles, literary reviews, short stories and novels. She was chosen as the 2016 Estonian Writer of the Year.
The Tartu College Book Club has been operating for ten years under the dedicated and inspira tional leadership of Kaja Telmet. We meet regularly to discuss books that have been mainly translated from Esto nian. We also read other ma terials where the subject relates to Estonian history. Below you’ll find descriptions of the books we’ve read in the 2019/2020 season. TOOMAS NIPERNAADI by August Gailit This Estonian classic, written in 1928, is still very popular almost a century later. The seven short stories centre around the main character of Toomas, a middle-aged nomad. He travels around southern Estonia doing his best to charm the local women. He does this by lying about everything in his life, including his vocation; a raftsman to a rich man. Poor folks and women are depicted as second class powerless citi zens. “Men are talking here; a woman should not interfere.” As well as the detailed character studies, the author and Nipernaadi share an intense love of nature. The reader feels like, they too, are in the Esto nian countryside with descrip tions like, “The edge of the sky turned red in its pre-birth agony” and “Sky-blue honey suckles are in bloom, lush crest ed wood ferns grow in dense clumps between the branches and puddles.” A critically acclaimed film “Nipernaadi” or “The Adventurer” was made in
1983. “This little novel has a thrill in store for the persever ing, as well as the power to reveal a new, exciting literary and imaginative world.” (Mika Provota Corlone, European Literature Network) August Gailit was born in southern Estonia in 1891. He was a war correspondent during the Estonian War of Independence. He had his first work, a short story, published when he was only nineteen. Gailit worked as a freelance writer, journalist and theatre director. He co-founded the i nfluential literary group “Siuru”. He continued to write in Sweden after the Soviet invasion of Estonia. Gailit was only sixty-nine when he died. August Gailit became one of Estonia’s most popular and respected authors. Some of his other works have also been translated. It might be of in terest that Gailit’s biography on Wikipedia is available in sixteen different languages. BURNING CITIES by Kai Aarelaid This novel was published in 2016 and was translated from Estonian to English by the author herself. Aarelaid’s home town of Tartu, Estonia, is the location for the book. The time period is the first two decades of the Soviet occupation follow ing World War II. The main character, Tiina, also looks back at that time from the year 2003. The reader sees this new world through young Tiina’s eyes. There are several characters whose lives are depicted as lonely, helpless and powerless. The contributing factor they all have in common is Soviet repression. For the reader who was not living in Estonia at that time, this is a moving and eye-open ing glimpse into life during the Soviet occupation. Aareleid writes poignantly about those times. Tiina’s landlady says to her, “...because the stronger card is like a fire that destroys the other one, until the whole city of cards is burned to the ground...” “This is an impres sive book, complex without being tiring, emotional without being overwrought, and full of pleasing explorations of memo ries and the way humans and
FLIGHTS by Olga Tokarczuk The narrator of this book is an unknown Polish writer. The novel is a collection of reflec tions, both fascinating and bi zarre, on topics ranging from life and death to motion and migration. The reader is shown that we are all in transit one way or another. A PolishAmerican doctor returns to Poland to assist in the death of former loved one. A mother and a child disappear and then re appear. Collectors of body parts are profiled. This intriguing book is not meant for one sitting but to take the time to travel through. “Attempting to read this book all at once will result in a headache, like stuff ing a box of chocolates in your mouth. Consuming it at a more leisurely pace is the trick. It’s a journey without a destination, and this will naturally frustrate the reader who demands Story, who adores linearity. But for those who like traveling beyond the edges of the map, “Flights” could do the trick.” (Silvia Moreno-Garcia, NPR) Olga Tokarczuk was born in Poland in 1962. She is one of the most critically acclaimed and commercially successful authors in Poland and a noted political activist in Poland. She has been the recipient of several significant awards. In 2018, Olga Tokarczuk was presented with both the Man Booker International Prize and the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Quotes • A best friend is like a four leaf clover, hard to find, lucky to have. • As your best friend I’ll always pick you up when you fall, after I finish laughing. • Some people are like clouds. When they disappear, it’s a beautiful day. • Please cancel my subscrip tions to your issues. • If you ran like your mouth, you’d be in good shape. • I’m not arguing. I’m simply explaining why I’m right. • I’m not shy, I’m holding back my awesomeness so I don’t intimidate you.
Life is a symphony Just as human beings are the most advanced, if not compli cated creatures on the planet (we walk, talk, think, improve on surroundings – yet wage war) the symphony is the most advanced form of musical expression. Just think – creat ing a 50-minute long opus for strings, reeds, horns and per cussion. That is why we have conductors, who lead such a large orchestra. To keep all not just on the same page, but the same bar. Musical, that is. The slimster got to musing on this theme, when supine on the couch, listening to our national treasure, the CBC. They played one of his all-time favourites, Brahms’ symphony no. 1, in entirety. Took the lean one back decades, far too many to admit in number, when first this masterpiece was heard. And the story behind it. Seems Brahms was such a perfectionist that it took him almost two decades to compose the dagnab thing. Not due to laziness and procrastination. But the fear that he would be compared to Beethoven, the composer of so many great symphonies led him to not believe in his work. In fact, he burned completed manuscripts in his fireplace over the years, so as not to have them lying around, interfere with his desires to give no. 1 the best treatment possible. And trained ears, by the bye, can detect Beethoven’s influence in the last movement. Being horizontal, listening to quality music, in any genre is a dangerous thing. It leads to philosophizing. The first stream of consciousness thought was how tiny Estonia, with just more than a million people, has produced some excellent com posers. And conductors – the Järvi clan springs to mind, but there are many more. But when it comes to Estonian sympho nies, the slender one did not have to think much to come up with more than the obvious. The Swedish BIS record company recorded a number of Eduard Tubin’s symphonies, the orchestra under the baton of Neeme Järvi. The lean one has quite a few on vinyl in his collection. This was in the eighties, and there is an in teresting back-story. Tubin fled the communists during the war to Sweden; Järvi could not work with the Soviet System and was allowed to leave Estonia, unusual at the time. To Sweden. He is considered to be perhaps the greatest conductor of the present time. And as a sidebar, Arvo Pärt also felt the constraints of censorships and he, too, left his homeland, unusual for the times. Pärt is perhaps, at present, the greatest living composer. Anywhere. His Symphony no. 4 was nominated for a Grammy some years back. Then there are other com posers, that have chosen the symphony form. Lepo Sumera’s
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certainly deserve a listen, should one not have heard them. The late Sumera, inciden tally, was the Minister of Culture in Estonia once independence was regained. Urmas Sisask and Erki-Sven Tüür both first gained promi nence in popular, rock music. Cannot see Beethoven, even though of course there was no such category then, playing electric guitar. Eino Tamberg. Ester Mägi. Many more. The slender one took these musical musings along for his daily constitutional. Music is for the soul and heart, often the mind. But the body needs look ing after as well. Exercise is de rigueur during these times, pent up as we are by today’s “conductors”, leaders, the poli ticians. During a stroll it is of ten remarkable how the fresh air and endorphins bring good thoughts to the fore. Leading to this attempt at combing music history and a bit of humour. Music, humour, and exercise – much like a sym phony com posed in three movements. So, of course, likening a symphony to life itself came naturally, enjoyably. Crescendos and diminuendos in both. Frankly, during these times pos itivity is hard to find. Take it from Dr. Slim, the best pre scription for kicking the blues include those three treatments noted above. And great classical music, which is the present genre of choice, often is uplift ing and inspiring. Life is limit ed, we all know that. But while still mobile, drawing air into the lungs and smiling at others, let us enjoy it. To be alive, even under strict rules during this infernal pandemic, is so much better than what the three great killer B’s – Bach, Beethoven and Brahms – are doing. That would be decomposing. Roll over Beethoven! OTEPÄÄ SLIM
Tartu College’s… (Continued from page 8)
level,” as Jaan Meri explains. For instance, when Meri joined the Board, he had professional experience in building and facility management. In these roles, the Board of Directors, now and those to come, give back massively to the Estonian community. Linda Karuks says that working together with the Executive Committee has “kept us on a strong path that makes us successful and helps us make balanced decisions.” It hasn’t been easy work, but the effort of the staff and Board has kept TC’s activities, finances and building in good shape. At the heart of what ulti mately converted the challenges of 2020 into positive changes is the belief in the concept of TC: a home for fraternities, sorori ties, societies, and the Estonian Studies Centre; and overall, a powerful asset to the commu nity.
