Homeland What did Esko Aho in his twenties think of his homeland in the 1970s? Or Jouko Turkka in his thirties and Väinö Linna in his fifties? Two old books reveal the elite cross-country relationship

Let’s build homeland, meet my Uncle from South Ostrobothnia to say at the end of the meeting, a small smile on his face.

But what does the homeland and its construction mean to those who live in the place they have experienced as a homeland?

Nearly one hundred social and cultural figures pondered the issue at the request of book publisher WSOY in the mid-1970s.

The first work was written in 1974 My homeland.

Among the authors were, among others, the Chancellor of the University of Helsinki Mikko Juva, conductor Okko Kamu, Minister of Foreign Affairs Ahti Karjalainen, archbishop Paul, UN Under – Secretary – General Helvi Sipilä, author Arvo Salo, Member of Parliament and Vice – Chairman of the Communist Party of Finland Taisto Sinisalo, Prime Minister Kalevi Sorsa, cartoonist Kari Suomalainen, Commander of the Defense Forces Lauri Sutela and an opera singer Martti Talvela.

The book found readers well and was continued the following year with the book What about my homeland ?. The sequel was made because it was subsequently found that the average age of the authors of the first volume was 52 years.

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The mother is left with the language, but the men write with it.

Another striking thing today was not noticed, or at least little was done about it: the proportion of women writers was just over ten percent.

There are two more female writers in the latter work, but the relationship is still crushing in favor of men. As if the homeland had sex (for its name, of course). The mother is left with the language, but the men write with it. Word homeland is, of course, more gender neutral in the eyes of this time.

The dumbest thing about the masculine term “homeland” and the selection of authors of the works is that it not only hints but becomes argued that the homeland and its history is a hegemonic realm for men. History force to fall herstoryn.

Sotien 30 years had passed since its end in the mid-1970s, and reconstruction and the 1960s generational revolt were behind us. Did the Jedi Council enlisted in the books find the essence of the 70s of the homeland?

Let’s first give the Karelian songwriters a national writer who has defended his homeland for years Väinö Castle tell.

A significant part of the old concept of the homeland was the landscape, but today it has remained largely the concern of nature conservation districts. It, too, is more the object of an aesthetic approach, or only intended for recreational use, but no longer a symbol of the motherland., The castle wrote.

The castle’s concept of the homeland surprises with its urbanity and mundaneness. The war writer had had enough of the war: In fact, I guess it essentially appears every day on television as a public way of life, such as labor market issues, a political event, and commentary on it..

Like the castle, pessimism exuded the then chairman of the Finnish Communist Party Aarne Saarinen. Technological developments, a supranational consumer culture and urbanization had led to we Finns have nothing more original than part of our nature, bright summer nights and thousands of lakes. It had already been noticed at that time that the sauna had also been taken away from us.

In Saarinen’s opinion, the disappearance of the romantic glow of patriotism had a good side: harmful nationalism was disappearing. Narrow national selfishness and limitations are giving way, the concepts of Europeans and humanity, Europe and the globe, are becoming a common homeland., Saarinen envisions.

Would he agree now?

Many the writers or their father had been on the front. So if nature was not to symbolize the face of the motherland, what about the blood sacrifice?

It was an ethos taught at school to the post-war generation, the instructor recalled Jouko Turkka:

The homeland was something that had demanded a lot of blood that would demand my blood too, and in the name of all this blood, everything was boring and silly. He was not allowed to live for the motherland but had to die. It, on the other hand, was tied to God in such a way that death on behalf of the motherland meant a fairly certain heaven, even if ferocity had committed sin..

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Seen from afar, a country called Finland gets the glow of a birdhouse, writes author Anu Kaipainen.

Also a demar of the then 30-year-old MP Matti Ahde criticizes the patriotic catalog based on violence and the image of the enemy: Too often, the patriotism and internationality of the youth has been portrayed as a myth about a young student swearing at a hero’s grave defying the other shore of Ladoga.

Few of the authors of the books missed the offering of the blood sacrifice, and the authors felt that the feeling of the homeland could be experienced much more easily, for example, when traveling out of the country. Suddenly struck a longing for the homeland.

I miss Finland like an absent family member who, when he returns, becomes ordinary again. From a distance, a country called Finland gets the glow of a birdhouse, the author is in the mood Anu Kaipainen. When traveling away, the disadvantages of the homeland are also forgotten.

My love for this country may not be overwhelmingly passionate, but I still dare to acknowledge my deep affection. You can fall in love with foreign countries romantically, like a distant woman. But with regard to Finland, I have a strong childhood belief that it would not even abandon its prodigal sons, the MP is in the mood Lasse Lehtinen, 28.

The young politician wanted to build a bridge between different worlds of values: The universal obligation of patriotism for us is to balance impivarianity and industrial development.

What about on the other side of the political field, to the right of the demarches? What about the homeland there?

Homeland is a national expression based on observing the world from a Finnish perspective, formulated the chairman of the Coalition Youth Association Ilkka Kanerva and showed at the age of 27 that he mastered a worthy political Latin.

The reflection on the homeland in Kanerva also turned into a reflection on Finland’s geopolitical position:

The Paasikivi – Kekkonen foreign policy policy, which is based on a policy of neutrality, has to regain its credibility every day.

Kanerva later became chairman of the defense committee. Even in the 1970s, he was not in favor of sabotaging the sabers but of securing peace, but as a real politician at that time he was reminded that the possibility of a violent escape from the world’s problems.

In 1975, the year of the Etyk, Kanerva’s reminder was taken into account in the Finnish skies by the Migens and Drakens. It will soon be clear with which foreign brand that point will happen.

Helsinki Reviewer of messages Pekka Tarkka was My homeland book as a whole. He characterized the writings as adult school subjects and distributed grades. Laudatur was awarded to a folk poetry scholar Matti Kuusi, author Matti Kurjensaari, Colonels Wolf Halsti mixed Kerttu Kauniskangas alias rebel Juorkunan Jussi.

The word Fatherland had a “strong class content” for Kauniskangas, and also a word my was “rotten” about him. There is no ‘my country’, there is ‘our country’, he wrote. For him, Finnishness was always in contact with other Finns.

The concepts mean different things to different social classes and different social groups, said Matti Ahde, a Member of Parliament who studied to be an electrician at a young age. He illustrated this by recounting two of his siblings who, during the period of great unemployment in the early 1970s, had to go abroad in search of work. 300,000 Finns moved to Sweden, and their perception of the homeland was probably slightly different from that of those who remained in Finland.

The motherland is the country where we build socialism, wrote the translator Kersti Juva At the age of 27. Workers in this country have built all the houses. With the help of workers, a new system is also emerging.

The 21-year-old predicted a positive boost for the word Patriotic Esko Aho. He was president of the Young Center Association in the mid-1970s.

Patriotism is gaining new, cleaner and more positive content. At the forefront, it is a desire to act for the benefit of all our fellow human beings, a desire to build a society that offers every citizen of our country the opportunity for a full and humane life., Aho wrote.

He outlined that the will to defend the country was not only a military matter, but should also cover the defense of national cultural heritage.

Aho quoted a peasant senator Kyösti Kallion speech at Nivala Church in the spring of 1918: We must create a Finland where there are no reds or whites, but Finns who love their homeland.

Taisto Sinisalo, a Member of Parliament for the Communist Party, says My homeland in the book: I recently had to receive a slur on a man-by-man basis: ‘A man from two homelands.’ It did not happen much more because it was presented by a person whose concept of homeland was fundamentally different from mine..

Leftistism, which had slowed down the student movement and young cultural people, was still strong in some circles in the mid-1970s, but riding in two carts began to crumble. The Soviet Union could not be a spiritual homeland for a Finn while Finland was a homeland.

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Holkeri heard from his older party colleague: “Harri Holkeri, you have sold the motherland.”

Fatherland has also been a political weapon. It was particularly unpatriotic to sell it on both the right and the left. It was also felt by the then 37-year-old Member of Parliament Harri Holkeri.

The term of the president was extended by an emergency in 1973, which was opposed by the traditional right. When there was also disagreement in the Coalition Party over how the political opponent should be treated, Holkeri heard from his older party colleague: “Harri Holkeri, you have sold the motherland.”

What did Holkeri do after hearing this, going home in the evening? He was comforted by reading poems by respected Finnish-spirited writers. Probably Leino, Jylhä, Koskenniemi, Kaila.

In addition to Holker, there were other traders in the homeland in the mid-1970s.

In the common interest of the homeland, the homeland has once again been sold cheaply to a true alliance of the West, claimed the 30-year-old author Aulikki Oksanen. National sovereignty, its economic and political basis, is linked as one of the backbone of NATO’s economic and political backbone.

Authors even in the midst of social and other differences, their idea of ​​the homeland is based on a common history, surrounding nature, roots and homeland.

Likewise, the idea that the homeland must be built and managed so that it also exists for future generations. People change, the homeland stays.

For almost all writers, the homeland contains a sheer dose of mysticism and romance, and that’s why it simultaneously manages to evoke strong emotions, capture people’s minds but also escape definition. It is both true and false.

In many writings, the attempt to define the homeland acquired religious features, the homeland represented a higher reality. Chancellor of the University of Turku Tauno Nurmela summed it up as follows: The homeland is the kingdom of heaven owned by the childlike.

My country, 1974. What about my country ?, 1975. Ed. Simo Talvitie. WSOY.