Novel
Korståget
Not translated into English
Tito Colliander · 1937
Synopsis
As a child, Thomas fled the Petrograd of the revolution, where no one dared speak loudly in the street for fear of being taken for a German, and now lives in Finland, his parents' country, where he feels homeless. There he leads a life of guilt, shame and anguish, which he drowns in alcohol, and he deceives his wife. One day, on a tram, he hears of a procession that goes from village to village along the Russian border of Estonia, and he joins it.
Context
The seventh prose book of its author, written in the spirit of Dostoevsky, it was his breakthrough and coincided with his own conversion to Orthodoxy. It carries the themes of all the work that will follow: wandering, uprootedness, the search for the inner man and for peace of soul. The author portrays a seeker in conflict, who remained a mystery to himself, which earned him the name of the Finnish Dostoevsky. The novel was translated into Norwegian as early as 1946 and reprinted in Swedish with an afterword by Johannes Salminen.
Who it is for
A novel in Swedish. One must accept that everything is played out within, in the vocabulary of sin and salvation.
Prizes and reception
The book of his breakthrough as a writer, and one of the novels by which he became known outside Finland.