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There may be culture clashes in Swedish literature for children
and young people but…
There are still boys’ books and
girls’ books
BY LENA KJERSÉN EDMAN
It is here at last: the first rousing action adventure for
speed-crazed pre-school kids who love exciting stories with
slimy slithering worms! Pratmasken, Tjatmasken and a couple
of other characters (all worms) hitch a ride with the Motocross
worm who is cruising around in Stora maskboken (The Big Book
of Worms) by the wonderful artist Pernilla Stalfelt. The Big
Book of Worms is great literature. As opposed to the equally
amusing Fickspöken (Pocket Ghosts, both Erikson &
Lindgren) — a pocket-sized picture book by the same
artist — which could be described as pocket literature.
Pocket Ghosts features a strictly scientific and serious narrator
in contrast to the child-like yet dramatic and rather sprawling
idiom of the illustrations. The book tells you all you need
to know about pocket ghosts. For instance, these tiny ghosts
are very good-natured when cosily curled up in your pocket,
but they may sometimes bite people and they like to pee in
flowerpots. And they have milk moustaches. Because pocket
ghosts think that is really cool.
Mr Muffin the guinea-pig is nearing the end of his life.
Ulf Nilsson and Anna-Clara Tidholm tell us about life and
death with great warmth, wistfulness and dignity, helping
the reader come to terms with grief and sorrow.
These were the grounds given by the jury for the August Prize
when the picture book Adjö, herr Muffin (Goodbye, Mr
Muffin, Bonnier Carlsen) was awarded the Swedish Publishers’
Association’s prize for best children’s book of
the year. Mr Muffin, a seven-year-old guinea-pig, paints up
his life in delightful pastel pictures while preparing to
die. He has become old and grizzled. Once upon a time, he
was a young, strong guinea-pig who could easily lift very
big cucumbers. Mr Muffin makes a list of all the good things
in his life:
1 very wise and kind wife
1 small blue house with its very own letterbox
6 small fuzzy children
3 times a day for cuddles
728 entire cucumbers eaten during entire life
2555 bunches of grass, hay and dandelions.
And letters in the letterbox from time to time.
Then I read När mamma var indian (When Mummy was an
Indian, Bonnier Carlsen) aloud to eight-year old Eddie, only
to be asked to do it again. After that, Eddie took the book
and read it to me. We were both equally thrilled about this
Indian book with shades of feminism, dedicated by author Ulf
Stark and artist Mati Lepp to their own mothers.
The action takes place on a summer day when Ulf was six years
old. He is Little Silent Foot and he is a brave Indian who
sets free the female slave of the palefaces, Big Sad Smell
of Frying (who bears a passing resemblance to Ulf’s
mother). She is all in favour of living a wild and free Indian
life far away from cooking and other tedious everyday chores.
It is positively amazing that Gunilla Bergström never
gets stuck in a rut despite thirty years of writing and thirty
or so books about her hero, Alfons Åberg. Alfons Åberg
with his square head, spiky hair and bright eyes never fails
to entertain, and 2002 is no exception. Alfons ABC (R&S)
is an absolute treasure trove and source of inspiration for
both the young and old, jam-packed as it is with word-play
and the sheer joy of language.
Numerous nosy Norwegians nicked noggins and nibbles and
noisily partied for nineteen nights.
But now no more.
No! Nevermore! None.
Nix to noggins and nibbles.
»Nå er det nok«
and »Nettopp« (as the Norwegians would say).
Girls will be girls…
What does it mean to ‘go out together’? Nine-year-olds
Vinni and Alex in Vår Vinni (Our Vinni) by Petter Lidbeck,
and Alva and Love in Annika Thors’s love story Rött
hjärta, blå fjäril (Red heart, blue butterfly,
both Bonnier Carlsen) all spend a lot of time pondering things
like how to find out if a boy fancies you and going out together.
If a girl and a boy only ever meet at school, could they still
be an item? If they kiss when they aren’t playing a
game like ‘Truth or dare’, does that mean they
are an item then?
These were just some of the great books available to the boys
and girls who like to read about kids their own age that they
can relate to. In addition to Vinni and Alva, I’d also
like to mention Cornelia, who is never lost for words, in
Cornelia K. Noll Koll – Full Kontroll (Cornelia K. Clueless
– Totally Clued Up, R&S) by Pernilla Oljelund. Or
Tomi from Nicaragua in Snöänglars land (Land of
the Snow Angels, Alfabeta) by Annika Holm, or Gerda, Katja,
Mimmi, Inez, Fanny, Mirja, Nelly, Hanna… Because the
sensitive and thoughtful main characters in these stories
of friendship, families and love are almost always girls.
A look at the list of Swedish children’s books published
in 2002 compiled by the Swedish National Council for Cultural
Affairs shows clear evidence of this trend in the gender of
main characters in books in realistic settings for children
between the ages of eight and thirteen.
There are two different worlds, in fact. Suspense and amazing
stories in the boys’ world. Relationships among friends
and family in the girls’ world. In fact, no different
from boys’ books and girls’ books in the 19th
century. Whatever happened to the path we were on, supposedly
heading for a world with greater equality?
Fantasy and imagination
A great deal of fantasy was published in 2002 — and
usually set in a historical period. (Can it be that the fantasy
genre has asserted exclusive rights to times long past? Very
few of last year’s realistic novels for young people
had a historical setting, after all.) Spår i snö
(Tracks in the snow, Raketförlaget) by Ewa Christina
Johansson, a writer with a firm background in history, is
a spine-chilling mix of realistic present-day narrative and
mysterious ghost story set in 1595 complete with alchemists,
sorcerers, executioners and ominous signs and portents. An
easy read that you cannot put down!
Personally, I found the most gripping work of fantasy to be
Kristoffer Leandoer’s Tornseglarna (The Swifts, Bonnier
Carlsen), the fourth volume of his David quartet. David has
grown up and become an astronomer, and he realizes that the
universe is threatened by heat waves, climate changes and
severe cases of grouchiness. If the world is to be saved from
disaster, someone will have to sacrifice their life for humanity,
much as Christ once did.
Leandoer is a poet and he balances expertly between past and
present, high and low, angels and devils. He writes with great
beauty about very serious issues. And on top of it all he
is very, very funny.
Culture clashes
Eva Ibbotson’s Journey to the River Sea (now in Swedish
translation) is a great book to read aloud with children over
the age of 12. It is the story of orphaned Maia, who leaves
England in 1910 to travel to a new home with distant relatives
who live by the Amazon river. The following is just part of
what’s on offer: a stern governess with a deep dark
secret. A handsome young Indian. Spoilt, mean twin girls.
Children exchanged at birth. Courage. Suffering. Love.
Two of this year’s Swedish books for young adults are
also about culture clashes: Det finns inga skridskor i öknen
(There are no skates in the desert’, R&S) by Mats
Berggren and Heder (Honour, Tiden) by Christina Wahldén.
These books are part of a debate about who possesses the right
to define what is honourable and what is dishonourable in
the lifestyles of different cultures. How much of Moslem morals
is it necessary to accept in Sweden? How much of Swedish morals
should Moslems in Sweden be obliged to accept?
In Sweden the concept of ‘honour killing’ was
all but unheard of prior to the recent murders of two young
women, Pela Atroshi and Fadime Sahindal. When an interviewer
asked Christina Wahldén, who is a crime reporter, why
she wrote the book Honour, about a girl whose fate is rather
similar to that of Pela Atroshi, she answered that she felt
compelled to do it in order to better understand herself and
the complex world we live in.
On the edge of adulthood
I’m Sophie. I live on the edge. Everything I know well
lies behind me and everything unknown lies before me.
That is the opening line of young writer Marika Kolterjahn’s
vibrant masterpiece Allt är mitt fel förstås
(It’s all my fault of course, Tiden), but the remark
about living on the edge could equally well apply to many
other realistic novels for young adults published last year.
2002 was an auspicious year for this genre, producing gems
like Tusen kulor (A thousand marbles, R&S) by Peter Pohl,
Sverige — Finland. En kärlekshistoria (Sweden —
Finland. A love story, W&W) by Charlotte Cederlöf,
Slutet är bara början (The end is only the beginning,
Alfabeta Anamma) by Katarina Mazetti and Sjutton (Seventeen.
R&S) by Per Nilsson.
Katarina Kieri won the award for best novel for young adults
in 2002 with a book that is ultimately about the crucial importance
of allowing a young person on the verge of adulthood to be
herself, to be as small and as old as she wants to. Ingen
grekisk gud, precis (Hardly a Greek god, R&S) is an intense
and true novel, written in positively sparkling prose. Sixteen-year
old Laura — so we are told — fell in love with
the new maths teacher, a kind man in a turtleneck sweater
who has honest eyes and who can really see his pupils, and
enjoys reading books by Hjalmar Söderberg and Tove Jansson.
How could life, which Laura thought she was so completely
in control of, suddenly get this weird? This is a book about
infatuation and friendship. About loneliness and longing.
But also about being able to weep and laugh and about the
joy of creatively using words and music.
Lena Kjersén Edman is a literary scholar and writer
Translated by The English Centre/Monica Sonck and Nicholas
Mayow
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