Volume 144, 2023

Catharina Bergman, Department of Culture and Media Studies at Umeå University 

“A pedagogical Utopia for the working class? The utopian impulse in Eija Hetekivi Olssons Ingenbarnsland, Miira och De unga vi dödar” (En pedagogisk utopi för arbetarklassen? Den utopiska impulsen i Eija Hetekivi Olssons Ingenbarnsland, Miira och De unga vi dödar) 

This article seeks to explore how an utopian impulse, a concept related to the conceptualization of working-class literature, is articulated in Eija Hetekivi Olsson’s trilogy, comprising the novels Ingenbarnsland (2012), Miira (2016), and De unga vi dödar (2021). By using the concepts heterotopia and Edutopia as keys for the analysis, an utopian vision of an equal and changeable world appear in the novels. An edutopian vision that concerns both learning and teaching, is in the novels informed by the protagonist’s working-class values, her experiences of ideological reproduction, injustice and resistance in the educational system, as well as her desire to be a leader. Her Edutopia is about learning through endeavor and obtaining different perspectives as well as, through practices of collective learning, teaching students different perspectives of the world from a position equal to them.

Johan Klingborg, Department of Culture and Aesthetics, Stockholm University 

The Author at Work: The Projection Room as Heterotopia in Eyvind Johnson’s The Novel about Olof (Författaren i arbete. Biografens maskinrum som heterotopi i Eyvind Johnsons Romanen om Olof) 

The sociological understanding of Swedish proletarian literature usually goes like this: in order to become a working class author the ‘proletarian’ writer paradoxically needs to abandon labor. While Eyvind Johnson’s four-part autobiographical Künstlerroman The Novel about Olof (1934–37) at first glance appears to follow that trajectory, this article shows how a particular line of work—namely, the work as a projectionist—in fact plays a fundamental role in the protagonist’s development towards writerly consciousness. 

The article takes as its point of departure the pivotal closing sequence of the third part, in which Olof, employed as a projectionist, starts to read an edition of the Odyssey during the screening of a film. Through a media-archaeological analysis of that scene, the article argues that Olof is reading in the projection room because historically it has functioned precisely as a space for reading. Not only was the projection room secluded and out of reach from the mechanisms of perception control in the auditorium; it also granted a livelihood without claiming all of the worker’s attention. In the words of Michel Foucault, the projection room can thus be regarded as a heterotopia—i.e. a space that simultaneously stands in relation to, and inverts, the power dynamics of all other spaces—both with regard to the cinema building and to capitalist society at large. 

The article shows how Olof ’s willingness and ability to read is indeed connected to his access to this heterotopian space for reading. Moreover, it argues that Olof is reading the Odyssey specifically because the Homeric epic is analogous to the tasks of the projectionist. The repetitive labor of the projectionist makes them a Penelope figure: the former is repeatedly winding and rewinding, while the latter is continually weaving and unweaving.

Magnus Nilsson, School of Arts and Communication, Malmö University. 

From the Farm Labourers’ Ombudsman to Tourist in the Precariat (“Från statarnas ombudsman till turist i prekariatet? Om arbetarlitterära representationsmodeller”) 

The purpose of this article is to problematize working-class literature’s biographical representation model, that is, the widespread thought model according to which the political potential of working-class literature is dependent on the authors having a strong biographical connection to the working-class collectives they portray. This problematization, which takes its point of departure in an analysis of the reception of two literary works about the so-called pre-cariat—Anders Teglund’s Cykelbudet [The Bicycle Courier] (2021) and Kristian Lundberg’s Yarden [The Yard] (2009)—is both theoretical and historical. Drawing on the Marxist distinction between class in itself and class for itself, the article argues that the so-called precariat has not developed any common way of life or class conciousness that the authors could share. This is thematized in several contemporary literary depictions of precarious working conditions, which can therefore be read as an implicit criticism of working-class literature’s biographical representation model. The article also demonstrates that this model rests on a false picture of the tradition of working-class literature. Older working-class writers have not always had such a strong biographical anchorage in working-class life worlds as critics and literary researchers usually assume (and as the writers themselves have sometimes claimed). On the other hand, they have often, through their participation in the labor movement and its literary life, had an ideological/political connection to this class. Many of the contemporary authors who depict the so-called precariat also have political connections to the collectives they write about, in the form of involvement in organizations that fight against precarious working conditions. Therefore, the article argues that it can be fruitful to focus more on the ideological partisanship of writers portraying workers than on their biographical anchoring in the life worlds of these collectives.

Anna Biström, Scandinavian Literature, University of Helsinki 

“The production of knowledge and choice of subject – masters’ and doctoral theses about older Finland-Swedish authors” 

The aim of the article is to study patterns and progress lines concerning the amounts of masters’ and doctoral theses found about Finland-Swedish authors who have been publishing literary works 1830–1930. The study builds upon quantitative data based on information in bibliographies and library databases, especially Finna (finna.fi). The article takes one of its theoretical starting points in Michel Foucaults theory about subjugated knowledges and genealogies (“Society Must Be Defended”. Lectures at the Collège de France 1975–1976, 2003). The choice of subject for theses, can be seen as one of the instances, where knowledge is produced and legitimized. Against the background of former research, the study shows examples of both tradition and pioneering work, introducing new authors and categories of literature into the field of research. For instance, the study shows that doctoral theses have been one important arena for knowledge about formerly forgotten female authors, while newer literature and children’s literature have been more frequent as subjects in masters’ theses. The study also shows there is an overall decline in theses about older literature.

Emma Eldelin, Department of Culture and Society, Linköping University 

Between Archive and Imagination: The Early World-building of the Brontës in Eva-Marie Liffner’s Blåst! (Mellan arkiv och fantasi: Syskonen Brontës tidiga världsskapande i Eva-Marie Liffners Blåst!) 

The early writings of the Brontë siblings have raised critical as well as creative interest in the last few decades. In countless manuscripts, the young Brontës collectively created and depicted the imaginary worlds of Glass Town, Angria, and Gondal, inspired by childhood role-play and extensive reading. The early world-building of the Brontës has recently been the subject of several fictional rewritings, often blurring the lines between the biographical Brontës and their imaginary worlds. Looking closer at one such rewriting—Eva-Marie Liffner’s novel Blåst! (2016)—this article discusses how it creatively reimagines selected characters, themes, and items from the early fictional worlds of the Brontës as well as the Brontë children themselves. Liffner’s novel is theorised as an instance of archontic literature, building on Abigail De Kosnik’s proposed term for various forms of appropriative writing that openly announce their sources of inspiration. Appropriation for De Kosnik is an archival operation; older texts are metaphorically conceived as archives or repositories of narratives, characters, and images from which new writers can extract what they need for their own reimaginings, and such new stories likewise expand archives and potentially change them. The article identifies and exemplifies three archival strategies used in Blåst!, reshaping in inventive ways the world-building and the imaginary worlds of the young Brontës: 1) a particular attention to the “empty spaces” of the Brontë archives; 2) a modification of details from the early writings and worlds of the Brontës to support the novel’s alternative version; 3) a rearrangement or “contamination” of elements from different archives through the inclusion of components from other fictional works by the Brontës but also from other writers and from biographical sources, resulting in a destabilisation of archival boundaries that other agents (e.g. critics and biographers) may want to sustain.

Peter Forsgren, Departement of Film and Literature, Linnaeus University 

“do you give me permission to write a novel about you?”: Elin Wägner’s Unmasked – Secretive and the women writers’ Bildungsroman (“ger du mig lov att skriva en roman om dig?” Elin Wägners Genomskådad – Hemlighetsfull och den kvinnliga bildningsromanen) 

This article analyzes Elin Wägner’s autobiographical twin novel Genomskådad—Hemlighetsfull (Unmasked—Secretive), published 1937–38, by placing it in the tradition of women writers’ Bildungsroman. The aim of the author was to describe her own development as a feminist from the early 20th century to the 1930’s and at the same time the history of women liberation movement during the same period. In contrast to the traditional Bildungsroman and the ideal of harmony between the hero and the society in the end, the women writers’ Bildungsroman explores the injustices of the patriarchal society and at the same time the need for a new kind of society that brings women freedom and possibilities to develop themselves, something that gives these novels utopian qualities. 

As the analysis shows, the character Ethel bears many similarities with the young Elin Wägner, while the main character and narrator, Agnes, who is radicalized by World War I, step by step develops a feminism that the author embraced by the time the twin novel was written. This was a feminism inspired by ideas of matriarchy which underlined the importance of peace, not only between nations but also between man and nature. A third part of this autobiographical Bildungsroman was planned, but instead Elin Wägner wrote Väckarklocka (Alarm Clock), published 1941. This book became the author’s testament and in it she discusses the three main themes in her authorship: women, peace and the environment. In Väckarklocka Elin Wägner speaks with a strong personal voice in the manner defined by Susan Snaider Lanser, and the twin novel can be read as a story about how this voice was developed and why.

Anna Forssberg, Department of Language, Literature and Intercultural Studies, KUFO – The Research Group for Culture Studies, at Karlstad University

Anna Linzie, Department of Language, Literature and Intercultural Studies, KUFO – The Research Group for Culture Studies, at Karlstad University 

“An age that is slipping out and an age that is hastening in”: The value of literary sociological analysis in Lacemaker Lekholm Has an Idea by Gustaf Hellström and In This Our Life by Ellen Glasgow (“An age that is slipping out and an age that is hastening in”. Värdet av skönlitterär sociologisk analys i Gustaf Hellströms Snörmakare Lekholm får en idé och Ellen Glasgows In This Our Life) 

This article presents a comparative study of two texts that are examples of largely forgotten works in terms of literary value and valuation: Snörmakare Lekholm får en idé [Lacemaker Lekholm Has an Idea] (1927) by Swedish writer Gustaf Hellström (1882–1953) and In This Our Life (1941) by American writer Ellen Glasgow (1873–1945). These two authors are radically different in many ways, for instance in terms of geographical outlook and positioning. Hellström was working as a foreign correspondent for many years, stationed in different parts of the world, and had an external, distanced view on Swedish society. Glasgow remained based in the American South throughout her career, and focused primarily on that setting in her novels even when she did travel. There are also significant similarities, not least in terms of the valuation of their work during and after their lifetimes. Hellström received De Nios Stora Pris in 1937, and Glasgow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1942, but both have been more or less forgotten later on. Both novels also offer a similar type of sociological analysis in the form of fiction tracing ideas, historical developments, and changing societies. The main literary function of the characters is to constitute various types, which enables a discussion of the ideas that they represent. The main function of families and generations is to represent historical changes. This type of novel of ideas fell out of fashion, which probably explains the devaluation in these two cases. Our comparative reading, based on Barbara Herrnstein Smith’s concept “contingencies of value”, allows us to investigate how this particular kind of sociological analysis in novels relates to literary history, literary value, and literary valuation. When these two novels can no longer fulfill their performative potential, they become more or less forgotten.

Mats Jansson, Department of Literature, History of Ideas, and Religion, University of Gothenburg 

Narrating Landscape. On Form, Place, and Space in Folke Dahlberg’s Landscape Writings (Att berätta landskap. Om form, plats och rum i Folke Dahlbergs landskapsböcker) 

This article deals with four prose works by Folke Dahlberg (1912–1966)—Vättern (1949), Tiveden (1952), Göta kanal (1954), Leva vid Vättern (1958)—focusing the relationship between landscape and literature. Generically difficult to pinpoint, these works transgress literary boundaries by incorporating an array of literary discourses. The question of literary form becomes central and is discussed from a narratological point of view, leading to an assessment of the predominantly intertextual narrative. Furthermore, landscape is tied to the concept of regionalism, epitomizing its basic characteristics. Dahlberg re-presents the stories carried by the landscape, whereby he treats it as a “storied matter” in an ecocritical sense. To further the understanding of landscape, the analysis seeks support also from cultural geography and phenomenology. From the latter point of view landscape comes forth as a bodily experience. Since Dahlberg inserts maps in his discourse, this calls for an investigation of how cartography and topography intersect in his writings.

Christian Lenemark, Department of Literature, History of Ideas, and Religion, University of Gothenburg 

“What Men Write About When They Write About Cancer. Greider, Mankell, Rådström” (Vad män skriver om när de skriver om cancer. Greider, Mankell, Rådström) 

Against the background of the extensive research on women’s autobiographical writing about breast cancer, the article approaches the question of what and how men write about their cancer experiences. The focus is on three so called autopathographies, that is autobiographical narratives of illness, published in Sweden during the opening decades of the 21st century: Henning Mankell’s Quicksand [Kvicksand], from 2014, Niklas Rådström’s As if Nothing Already Happened [Som har inget redan hänt], and Göran Greider’s The Well of Childhood [Barndomsbrunnen], both from 2021. 

The article shows how the analyzed autopathographies largely focus on reason, rationality and self-control, while also touching on issues about feelings and the body’s relationship to the soul or consciousness. From an aesthetic point of view, they are distinguished by what I have chosen to call an aesthetics of detour and postponement. They to a large extent dwell on (re)constructing the past rather than focusing on the present of the disease. Based on the analysis of Greider’s, Mankell’s and Rådström’s autopatographies, these male authors appear at first sight to be freer to write about their cancer experiences as they wish. They are not marked as noticeably as the breast cancer autopathographies by certain narrative and cultural scripts. At the same time, the very similarities in approach that the article reveals, show that the examined male autopatographies are also characterized by a similar kind of scripting. This has not, however, been given due attention in the previous, very limited research on male autopathographies about cancer and illness in general.

Linus Ljungström, Department of Literature, Uppsala University 

Star Wars. On Astrology as a Device in Stiernhielm’s Discursus Astropoeticus (Stjärnornas krig. Om astrologin som grepp i Stiernhielms Discursus astropoeticus) 

The aim of this study is to explore the astrological motifs found in Georg Stiernhielm’s (1598– 1672) macaronic satire Discursus astropoeticus (circa 1658). How are the motifs used as literary material and what are their functions? The poem relates the events of the contemporary Dano-Swedish war of 1657–1658, but the real people and countries portrayed are disguised as mythological and astrological characters, e.g. King Charles X Gustav of Sweden is the war god and planet Mars, his opponent King Frederick III of Denmark is the sea god Neptune, while common people of their respective countries are represented by satyrs, fauns, and nymphs. The collection of characters includes several of the star constellations known at the time, and this study shows that the poem not only displays a lateral movement from the Scandinavian countries to the entire European continent, but also a vertical movement from the sea level of Neptune’s realms through the sublunar region, all the way to the fix stars in the superlunar realm. Likewise, the satiric element of the poem is two-fold: on the one side, it is directed against the enemies, the Danes, as well as against the Catholoic Europe; on the other, critique is launched against the astrologers. This study suggests a careful approach when gauging critique of astrology in the 17th Century. In the early modern era, astrology was criticized not from the outside, but from within—by humanists who also were astrologers, whose many scientific aspirations furthered the development of the modern field of astronomy. Lastly, this study delves into the elaborate ways in which the astrological motifs are put to use within Stiernhielm’s work itself.

Malin Podlevskikh Carlström, Department of Languages and Literatures, University of Gothenburg and School of Languages and Translation Studies, University of Turku 

“Swedish Crime Fiction in Russia 1992−2021. Publication, Marketing and Paratextual Framing” 

This article investigates the publication and paratextual framing of Swedish crime fiction in Russia in the period 1992–2021. Based on an analysis of publication data and the written peritexts of 230 editions, conclusions are drawn regarding: 1) publication patterns and trends; 2) representations of Swedish crime fiction; 3) representations of Swedish crime fiction authors; 4) representations of Sweden; 5) the marketing of Swedish crime fiction. The article also includes comparisons to the previously analyzed Soviet context. 

The publication of Swedish crime fiction in Russia has increased considerably during the period investigated. The boom in Swedish crime fiction reached the Russian market around 2010, which coincides with the publication of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy. In terms of editions, crime fiction is the most important genre of Swedish literature in Russia today. Sjöwall & Wahlöö, Mankell and Larsson are seen in Russia as important stages in the development of Swedish crime fiction. These three authors, who all write socially motivated crime fiction, are included in the top five for both the entire period analyzed, 1992–2021, and for the latest 15-year period, 2007–2021. While Sjöwall & Wahlöö were seen as the top writers of Swedish crime fiction during the Soviet period, this status has today been passed on to Stieg Larsson. Thus, social issues are still the cornerstone of Swedish crime fiction from a Russian perspective. The following aspects seem to be important for the marketing of Swedish crime fiction in Russia: 1) the novel itself (e.g. genre and plot); 2) aspects that signal the author’s consecration (e.g. awards and translations into other languages); 3) indications of the author being a bestseller, the best or number 1; 4) comparisons to other authors. 

While the Soviet publication of Swedish crime fiction was ideologically motivated, the Russian publication of Swedish works between 1991 and 2021 is varied and seems to be market oriented.

Thomas Sjösvärd, Division of Language and Literature at the School of Education, Culture and Communication at Mälardalen University 

“The Flight of the Ice Bird. Sparta and Alcman in the Works of Vilhelm Ekelund and Karin Boye” (Isfågelns flykt. Sparta och Alkman hos Vilhelm Ekelund och Karin Boye) 

Since antiquity, the image of the Greek city-state Sparta has been a source of inspiration for a variety of writers, partly due to its associations with militarism and male strength. Nevertheless, the archaic Spartan poet Alcman’s songs seem to express opposite values, such as femininity and vulnerability. One example is his so-called Halcyon fragment, where the aged poetic self dreams of being carried away across the water by female birds. A translation of the poem appears in the modernist author Karin Boye’s poetry collection För trädets skull [For the Sake of the Tree] from 1935. The work comprises translations of other authors of different eras. Boye adheres to a poetics based on elective friendships, supposedly enabling historically remote authors to meet across ideological and cultural boundaries. The inclusion of Alcman’s poem can be seen as a reply to Vilhelm Ekelund, an important influence of Boyes, since the Halcyon-bird had been an important motif for Ekelund from the 1900s onwards. By tracing both Ekelund’s and Boye’s relationship to Sparta, this article examines Boye’s critical appropriation of Ekelundian imagery. With Jacques Rancière’s dichotomy between mimesis and literature as a point of departure, the analysis explores a tension within the literary text, as either producing role models or objects of interpretation. Reading Ekelund from this perspective sheds new light on the purpose that his “ancient ideals” and misogyny serves to his writing. It is particularly relevant for the understanding of the much-discussed turn his writing underwent when he abandoned traditional poetry. Boye’s attitude towards Ekelund and references to Sparta, both in her novels and her poetry, shows her concern with the paradoxes of vulnerability and strength. This development culminates in her last collection of poems where a central theme is flight—an ambiguous word, as it can refer to both flying and fleeing.