The Life (Un)Lived

What does "home" mean for us today? In our hectic and confusing modern world, it often seems like one doesn’t even need to experience natural disasters, wars or other terrible misfortunes to feel displaced and lacking of identity. In season's final episode before the summer break, bestselling Finnish author Merja Mäki discusses the trauma of displacement in her debut novel ⁠Before the Birds⁠, as well as the various notions of home.

What drives people to continue on living even in the worst of circumstances? Environmentalist and awarded author Juha Kauppinen has written about nature and environmental movement for two decades. Yet, he is still often asked the same old question: why is it important? In the new Literature from Finland episode, the author discusses the diversity of life, Kurt Vonnegut, and the integrity of action and hope.

How can writing help in the process of remembering? With her debut The Body of Evidence, the winner of the Helsingin Sanomat Literature Prize, Susanna Hast, brought autotheoretical literature to the Finnish literary scene, and posed the question: how to write out the truth in order to regain humanity? In the new Literature from Finland episode, the author discusses autotheoretical narration and literature of remembering.

How does one write entertaining historical fiction? Ann-Christin Antell found a way to the hearts of wide readership with her commercial historical romance, the Cotton Mill trilogy. In the new Literature from Finland episode, the author discusses the exciting history of the city of Turku and reaching her audience with writing about times past.

Do authors today still experiment to push boundaries, or simply out of boredom? Throughout their respective careers, writers Laura Lindstedt and Sinikka Vuola have been interested in experimenting with form and language. In 2022, together they published an Oulipo-inspired murder mystery 101 Ways to Kill Your Husband – a piece of sheer joy and fascination for readers, writers and translators. In our new episode, authors discuss literary experiments, possibilities, and... revenge.

Do Finns, a stereotypically shy nation, feel more shame than others? In the new episode, author Antti Rönkä, whose debut novel Off the Ground (2019) encouraged a public discussion in Finland about the mostly unspoken side of young men, discusses shame as a subject in literature, the lure of autofiction, as well as unexpectedly good sides of shamefulness.

Can YA literature help the youth of today cope with their lives? In the newest episode, author Ellen Strömberg discusses the unbearable lightness of the young adults’ world, understanding and handling one’s own feelings, as well as her newest YA novel, We’ll Just Ride Past.

What is the lure of fiction? Marisha Rasi-Koskinen, the author of the Lynchian masterpiece REC, claims that we all tell many stories, and being unreliable is just being human. In this month’s episode, we discussed the unreliable narrators, the ways of telling a story, and the need of today’s human to fictionalise their own life – and sometimes, death.

How can anxious characters enrich our lives? Finlandia-nominated author Marjo Niemi doesn't think angst has to be a gloomy experience. In this month's Literature from Finland episode, we discuss Niemi's lauded novel Hearing, trauma narratives, Finnish methods of coping, and art as a way of finding communication in the world of isolation.

"Children don't read as much anymore" is a statement as old as the world. But do adults themselves take children's literature seriously enough? In the newest episode, Finlandia-winning author Tomi Kontio and the awarded author and illustrator Sanna Pelliccioni tell us more about how children read in Finland, what authors they grew up reading and what makes Finnish children's literature truly exceptional.