History Of Finland Essay, Research Paper
Chapter 1
History
The History of Finland
Finland s traces of human settlements date back to the thaw of the last Ice Age some 10.000 years ago. The Finns ancestors seem to have dominated half of northern Russia before arriving on the north of the Baltic coast well before the Christian era. By the end of the Viking Age, Swedish traders and chieftains had extended their interests throughout the Baltic region.
Finland s position, sandwiched between East and West, has given the Finnish way of life and culture a distinctive flavour all of their own. For five years Finland was part of Sweden, then for a hundred years of Russia, there still are traces of this.
1.1 The Swedish period
Until the middle of the 12th century, the geographical area that is now Finland was a political vacuum. Both its neighbours, Sweden and the Catholic Church on one side, and its eastern neighbour Russia and its Greek Orthodox Church at the other side were interested. Sweden became the most of the country at the peace treat of 1323 was signed between Sweden and Russia. Russia became only the eastern part of Finland. The western and southern parts were tied to Sweden. The western and southern parts of Finland had become the Western European cultural sphere, but the eastern part and Karelia became part of the Russo-Byzantine world.
As a consequence of Swedish domination, the Swedish legal and social systems took root in Finland. The Finnish peasants were never serfs, they always retained their personal freedom.
The Reformation started by Luther in the early 16 century also reached Sweden and Finland, and the Catholic Church consequently lost out to the Lutheran faith.
The King of Sweden founded Helsinki, Gustavus Vasa, in 1550 to compete with Tallinn in Estonia for trade in the Baltic region. It moved to the present site in the 17 century, but although a new town centre was built, it was to remain a sleepy little town of wooden houses for many decades to come.
It did not really expand much until 1748, when the ruling Swedes decided to build a mighty fortress at the mouth of the harbour. The building of this fortress gave the town a great economic boost.
1.2 The Russian period
In 1809 Russia wrested Finland from Sweden, the made Helsinki the capital and Finland an autonomous grand dutchy subordinate to the Russian Emperor. During the Swedish period, Finland was subdivided in a group of provinces and not a national entity. Finland was governed from Stockholm, this was also the capital of the Finnish provinces, and now it became Helsinki. Grand dutchy, that is the way the Grand Duke was called. He was the Russian emperor, whose representative in Finland was the Governor General.
The Russian Emperor Alexander I, was Grand Duke of Finland in 1809-1825. He gave Finland extensive autonomy thereby creating the Finnish state. Alexander I died in 1825 and was succeeded by Nicholas I. It was under his rule, that the nationalist Finnish movement began to gain momentum. Alexander II, who became Tsar in 1855, issued the Language Manifesto in 1863. Finnish should be accorded equal status with Swedish Language of the civil service and courts of law within twenty years. But the Swedish retained its dominant position until the early years of the twentieth century.
During the reign of Alexander III, from 1881-1894 and particularly of Nicholas II, from 1894-1917, nationalist circles in Russia gained increased influence. The Russification of Finland began during the First Oppression , from 1899-1905, and continued during the Second Oppression , from 1909 till 1917.
The revolution of 1905 gave the Finns a brief respite, during which they managed to enact a new Constitution replacing the old Diet of Four Estates with a unicameral Parliament elected by universal suffrage applying to all men and women aged 24 or more. This was the most democratic national assembly in Europe at the time.
1.3 Finland as an independent republic
The First World War, which broke out in the summer of 1914, led to revolution in Russia in 1917. On the 6 of December 1917, parliament approved the declaration of independence drawn up by the Senate under the leadership of Svinhufvud, from 1861-1944.
At the end of January 1918, the leftwing parties staged a coup, and the government was forced to flee from Helsinki. The Civil Ware ended in May, and the government troops had their victory. Finland became a republic in the summer of 1919, K.J. Stahlberg was elected as the first president. From 1865-1952.
Construction of the new independent republic now got under way. A law on compulsory education was enacted in 1921, and compulsory military service the New Year.
The left-wing parties got a taste of power as the country had its first Social Democratic government, from 1926 to 1927. The ultra-rightist Lapua Movement, modelled on the Italian Fascist party, staged mass demonstrations in 1929, demanding a ban on all Communist activity. The enactment of the Communist laws of 1930 met this demand.
Independent Finland concluded a highly advantageous peace treaty with Soviet Russia in 1920.
1.4 The Second World War
In August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact, which included a secret protocol relegating Finland to the Soviet sphere if interest. After the Finns had rejected Soviet territorial demands, the Soviet Union rescinded the 1932 non-aggression pact between the countries, and invaded Finland on 30 November 1939. That was the beginning of the Winter War. This War ended with the signing of the Treaty of Moscow on 13 March 1940. That meant giving south-eastern Finland to the Soviet Union.
When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in the summer of 1941, Finland entered the War as a cobelligerent with Germany. The continuing War was ended in September 1944.
In 1955 Finland joined the United Nations and the Nordic Council. This under the leadership of Paasikivi. Finland s international position grew stronger.
In Finland the upheaval in great power politics that took place at the end of the 1980s and early 1990s was evident in both a liberalised intellectual atmosphere and in greater latitude in foreign policy.
Finland became a full member of the EFTA in 1986 and finally a member of the Council of Europe in 1989.
Chapter 2
Culture
2.1 Architecture
Ideology game – an architectural review
There has been little discussion of architectural ideals in Finland during the 1990s. In fact only Juhani Pallasmaa and Kai Wartiainen have, in non-convergent lines of thinking, enunciated form-giving s ideological underpinnings. Simultaneously architecture has sought a new direction. A complex polymorphic style has quietly shifted towards simplified forms.
Even if they are not discussed, architectural ideals do not disappear or cease to exert their influence. Various present-day form languages have visible and hidden links to the principles, values, and ideals that designers consider meaningful. Ideals also include aesthetic desires. Defining the significant differences between form languages demonstrates architecture s tendency towards branching out – and at the same time is an attempt to understand what is happening.
Metaphysico – Theologo Cosmolonigology
To represent the current state of Finnish architecture, we have selected plan drawings of buildings. Plans symbolise the buildings presented. Additionally we have described the plans geometry as part of an ideological geography. In selecting projects we have aimed at a representative, diversified and progressive sample. A problem arises as to the number of projects because the media has also worn out the neutrality of numbers: duality, three colours, six memos, in seven houses… After serious consideration we arrived at the number thirteen. In our table of trends we have replaced the plan drawing with the designer s last name. This action reduces the size of the table, and the surname alludes to the architect s entire output, which in turn happily increases the number of contradictory interpretative possibilities. We have imagined that the present state of affairs will last approximately ten years.
In establishing the review s objectives, and in unclear cases, of which there are several, we draw on Pangloss s philosophy. Master Pangloss taught the metaphysico-theologo-cosmolonigology. He could prove to admiration that there is no effect without a cause; and, that in this best of all possible worlds, the Baron s castle was the most magnificent of all castles, and My Lady the best of all possible baronesses. (Voltaire) What is the best possible of all possible modern Finnish architecture?
Rationalism – Romanticism
Traditionally contemporary Finnish architecture has been understood by dividing it in two. The split results in two halves: Rationalism and Romanticism. To Rationalism belongs the names Frosterus, Revell and Ruusuvuori, along with the catchwords construction, modern technology and universality. The Romanticism department includes the names Sonck, Aalto and Pietil as well as the attributes form, individuality and place.
The Rationalism-Romanticism conception has flourished particularly well in The Museum of Finnish Architecture (Ky sti +lander 1966, Asko Salokorpi 1971, Marja-Riitta Norri 1990). The model is, however, not conservationist but a process containing practical benefits. When other conceptual dualities are associated with the bipartition, the finished results inadvertently produce value systems. Popular associated pairs have been international-domestic and universal-individual.
When analysing the current state of our architecture ( 7 Viewpoints exhibition, 1990), Marja-Riitta Norri finds the familiar rationalism-romanticism pattern. She softens the duality somewhat by stating that at no point had the bipartition occurred in a completely linear fashion (Norri 1990). She does not define rationalism as a universal truth. Instead she finds deepened rationalism and gives to it the local colour favoured by that time: It is a matter of interpretation as to whether the architectural vanguard represents a new local school of deepened rationalism or not; in any case it is not completely at the level of clearly defined forms. (Norri 1990)
2.2 Literature
In terms of the number of people who speak it, Finnish is far from being one of the world’s major tongues. A member of the Finno-Ugric family of languages, it has only five million speakers and sounds exotic to the neighbouring peoples of both Scandinavia and Russia. Nonetheless, the language is intensively used. The people who speak it have boasted one of the world’s highest literacy rates since at least the beginning of the century, and are also heavy users of written information. Furthermore, Finland has always been proud of its writers. The honorary title of National Author was given to Aleksis Kivi long ago, but the names best known to international readers are Nobel laureate Frans Emil Sillanp and Mika Waltari, the author of Sinuhe, the Egyptian.
F.E. Sillanp (1888-1964) was Finland’s most respected prosaist in the inter-war period and
also the countries best known author abroad. His main works were the novel Meek Heritage, set against the background of the civil war that erupted after Finland had declared independence in late 1917, and “Silja the Maid”, a lyrical description of the fate of a young girl. It was the latter work that won him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1939. Sillanp ’s main works have been translated into many languages.
Sillanp , who originally planned to become a doctor, published his first novel, “Live and Sun”, in 1916. With its charming descriptions of nature and bold examination of sexuality, it caused quite a stir. It was long regarded as a summer love story, but on closer examination turns out to be a tale of a young student who tries to use his relations with women as a means of boosting his low self-esteem.
The central themes of Sillanp ’s output are already staked out in his debut novel. These include the difficulty of sustaining self-esteem, problems of identity, sexuality and the incomprehensibility of death. Sillanp ’s characters have a poor awareness of their own needs. They do not know what motives prompt their actions and are therefore astonished at their own behaviour. When internal conflicts and reality threaten, they flee into their fantasies.
Mika Waltari (1908-79) is not only Finland’s internationally best known writer, but also by far the most versatile in terms of output. Yet his enormous productivity as an author of novels, plays, detective stories, cartoon books, fairy tales, travelogues and even wartime propaganda did nothing to lower his standard. Everything he wrote has held its own right across a broad front and the sense of historical reality found through his writer’s intuition continues to astonish scientists.
Waltari, who studied philosophy, aesthetics and literature in addition to theology, began his career with a booklet entitled “God in the Leading Role” (1925), which was published by the Finnish Seamen’s Mission Society. His breakthrough as a novelist came with the publication in 1928 of “Great Illusion”, a youthfully melancholic and very lucid reflection of the mood of life in the 1920s. From then on he was regarded as a typical Helsinki writer, whereas Sillanp , who came from the heart of the inland province of H me (Tavastia), drew his strength and inspiration from the Finnish rural heartland.
Yet the novel that earned Waltari international fame, “A Stranger came to the farm” (1937), described a triangular drama set in a lonely, dilapidated country house. The book has been published in 17 languages. Its great success convinced Waltari that he could write for international readerships, and he decided to do just that.
In 1945 he wrote “Sinuhe, the Egyptian”, which describes the life of its main character, a physician, in Egypt between 1390 and 1335 BC. The novel can also be read as an exposition of the Finnish middle class’s disappointment and the collapse of life values in the aftermath of a lost war.
With its lively character descriptions and many levels of meaning, Sinuhe is Waltari’s greatest achievement in the art of the story. It rapidly propelled him to dazzling world success and is the only Finnish book to have made it onto the bestseller charts in France and the USA. So far, too, it is the only book to have headed the American bestseller list for two years. It was also made into a movie (directed by Michael Curtiz, 1954).
In common with Sillanp , Waltari wrote about difficult things. He was interested in periods of intellectual upheaval in world history, the plight of humanism caught in the squeeze of tough material values, the eternal problem of good and evil, and people struggling in the cross-currents of ideologies.
The literature of Finland has a double root from which it continues to draw its vitality. One fork reaches far into the past, into the oral Finnish-language folk tradition and the sources of anonymous poetry, the world of the Kalevala. The other follows the Swedish-language mother culture deep into the European tradition, of which it remained a part long after Finland, as a result of war between Sweden and Russia, was separated and made an autonomous grand duchy of Russia in 1809. With the help of those links, more than a century and a half ago, an independent Finnish literature began to seek its place in European culture.
The national awakening stressed self-reliance, but also the desire rapidly to become a part of the literary world, to grasp Shakespeare in one hand and Dostoyevsky in the other and to create works equal to their genius in Finnish and Swedish. In the poetry of J.L. Runeberg, a Finnish ideal interpreted in the Swedish language and the European poetic tradition encountered one another both in individual feelings and in the historical vision of V nrikki Stoolin tarinat ( The tales of Ensign St l , 1848, 1860). The Kalevala, which appeared in 1849, was a composition by Elias L nnrot, of the Finnish people s poetic heritage, and Aleksis Kivi continued the shaping of the national identity with his independent creativity. Zachris Topelius was a master of the historical novel in the spirit of Walter Scott, particularly in his V lsk rin kertomuksia ( Tales of a barber-surgeon ), prose written in Swedish and immediately translated into Finnish.
Kivi s role as a key artistic figure in Finnish literature must be considered unique. He created the first Finnish plays, he gave form to lyric poetry that reflected the beauty of the Finnish language and wrote Seitsem n veljest ( Seven brothers , 1870), a novel which was at first met with opposition but later became a national symbol. The novel marked a step from depiction of ordinary people carried out in the spirit of idealistic romanticism toward realism. Clearing of virgin territory, a subject dear to Kivi, took on allegorical overtones: it meant working for the triumph of Finnishness in the cultural sphere.
Original realism
In the late 19th century, Finnish literature absorbed influences from European realism and naturalism strongly. At the same time, there opened up a connection with Russian literature, its demands of originality and faithfulness to reality. In Finland, realism took on a homespun aspect: there were plenty of wrongs to be exposed, authentic folk figures were sought in the wildernesses, there was a need to speak out on behalf of the disadvantaged and of women.
Of the change in world-view, too, was born literature reflecting the new fragmentary nature of life-experiences and moral conflict, its leading writers Juhani Aho, with his concentration on emotional experiences, and Minna Canth, with her unwavering analysis of the position of women. Juhani Aho developed language as a means of expression of psychological sensitivity and found a lasting symbol in the Finnish landscape. In her many plays and stories, from Ty miehen vaimo ( A working man s wife , 1885) onward, Canth gave voice to the disappointment and feelings of emptiness of married women. Women lived at the mercy of men, and the leap to freedom of which they dreamed did not generally succeed. In the end, religious redemption was, for Canth too, the solution to human problems.