Book review|In the novel Äärimmäinen laidalla by Jenni Lintur, known for her war depictions, a family moves to a Helsinki suburb in 1971.
| Updated
Novel
Jenni Linturi: On the extreme side. Rubber. 222 pp.
Jenni Linturi is known as a photographer of the wars and post-war Finland. The first novel that was nominated for the Finlandia and Helsingin Sanomat literature prize For the sake of the motherland (2011) took Finnish men into the German Waffen–SS forces during the Continuation War. Next, Linturi described the devastating beginning of the civil war, then the wounds left behind by the Second World War.
A leap forward twenty years is therefore a small surprise – and a good one. On the extreme edge – novel, the family of 12-year-old Mirkku Lehtonen moves in 1971 to Helsinki’s Äärimmäinen Laida, Finland’s first block-built neighborhood. I would guess Pihlajamäki as an example.
The area of the Helsinki suburb was already in novels Ore, 1917 and Reconstruction (Malmi was not incorporated into Helsinki until 1946, so Ore, 1917 not actually located in Helsinki). The characters and stories in the novels were based on Lintur’s own family. Now gray everyday life is described through the eyes of a pre-teen.
“
There is a kind of class trip going on.
On the extreme edge the era is strongly present in both the ideas and the clothes. The knowledgeable journalist father has had enough Erkki Raatikainen From Yleisradio after the documentary he planned together with Mirku’s aunt ended up on the shelf.
The family has moved from Tampere first to the apartment owned by the grandparents in Töölö and then to Äärimmäinen laida. There is a kind of class trip going on, a glimpse into the life of a part of the population with different starting points and ideals.
Through his parents, Mirkku knows the importance of feminism and civil rights struggles, Italian neorealism and the plight of indigenous peoples. However, on the slope of the extreme Hynda, it is more important to know which is better, Wigwam or Hurriganes.
Most of the residents of the neighborhood are not highly educated, knowledgeable or socially active like the Lehtons. The class setting is structured in the novel from a child’s point of view, in many places insightful. Mirkku quickly notices that his family is different, but does not understand the reason for his outsiderness.
To the customs of the neighborhood the acquaintance is Pauliina, whose mother may or may not be dead, father may or may not be violent. Pauliina and Mirku’s friendship reflects the same tones as Elena Ferrante The relationship between Lenú and Lila, known from the Naples tetralogy.
Like Lila, Pauliina gets A’s on tests at school even though she fails most of the time and seems to do everything but homework, she has a hostile attitude towards almost everyone and is constantly dirty.
Sometimes it also comes to mind by Monika Fagerholm magnificent Prima donna, but Linturi does not embark on a postmodernist examination of language and narrative, just like Fagerholm. Mirkku is an old, decent girl whose rebellion is very small.
Jenni Linturin in novels, the most important thing happens below the surface. Small and big lies question the existence and meaning of truth in a time that lives in performances.
Linturi has condensed the language even more, the sentences are broken in the middle, breathlessly halting. The rhythm vividly reaches the world experienced by the child, the truths and actions flooding in from all sides. The company assembles a whole from the shards thrown here and there.
Correction August 6 at 10:50 a.m.: Corrected the spelling of Pihlajamäki, which was mistakenly in the form Pihlajanmäki in the story.
Read more: In Jenni Lintur’s novel, the everyday life of a small village is gray, but under the surface smolders
Read more: Great uncle underwent a lobotomy in Töölö, and he ended up in Jenni Lintur’s new novel – like many other family stories
Read more: War and peace – in which was the young man from Malmi wounded worse?
#Book #review #family #move #Töölö #suburbs #Jenni #Linturs #clever
