TOOMAS NIPERNAADI by August Gailit
This Estonian classic, written in 1928, is still very popular almost a century later. The seven short stories centre around the main character of Toomas, a middle-aged nomad. He travels around southern Estonia doing his best to charm the local women. He does this by lying about everything in his life, including his vocation; a raftsman to a rich man. Poor folks and women are depicted as second class powerless citizens. “Men are talking here; a woman should not interfere.” As well as the detailed character studies, the author and Nipernaadi share an intense love of nature. The reader feels like, they too, are in the Estonian countryside with descriptions like, “The edge of the sky turned red in its pre-birth agony” and “Sky-blue honeysuckles are in bloom, lush crested wood ferns grow in dense clumps between the branches and puddles.” A critically acclaimed film “Nipernaadi” or “The Adventurer” was made in 1983. “This little novel has a thrill in store for the persevering, as well as the power to reveal a new, exciting literary and imaginative world.” (Mika Provota Corlone, European Literature Network)
AUGUST GAILIT
August Gailit was born in southern Estonia in 1891. He was a war correspondent during the Estonian War of Independence. He had his first work, a short story, published when he was only nineteen. Gailit worked as a freelance writer, journalist and theatre director. He co-founded the influential literary group “Siuru”. He continued to write in Sweden after the Soviet invasion of Estonia. Gailit was only sixty-nine when he died. August Gailit became one of Estonia’s most popular and respected authors. Some of his other works have also been translated. It might be of interest that Gailit’s biography on Wikipedia is available in sixteen different languages.
BURNING CITIES by Kai Aarelaid
This novel was published in 2016 and was translated from Estonian to English by the author herself. Aarelaid’s hometown of Tartu, Estonia, is the location for the book. The time period is the first two decades of the Soviet occupation following World War II. The main character, Tiina, also looks back at that time from the year 2003. The reader sees this new world through young Tiina’s eyes. There are several characters whose lives are depicted as lonely, helpless and powerless. The contributing factor they all have in common is Soviet repression. For the reader who was not living in Estonia at that time, this is a moving and eye-opening glimpse into life during the Soviet occupation. Aareleid writes poignantly about those times. Tiina’s landlady says to her, “…because the stronger card is like a fire that destroys the other one, until the whole city of cards is burned to the ground…” “This is an impressive book, complex without being tiring, emotional without being overwrought, and full of pleasing explorations of memories and the way humans and places change…Burning Cities is a beautiful and intelligent piece of fiction and I highly recommend it.” (Scott Manley Hadley, minorliterature)
KAI AARELEID
Kai Aareleid was born in Tartu, Estonia in 1972. She continues to live and work there. Aareleid has studied dramaturgy, literary translation and editing in Finland and Estonia. She has translated works into Estonian from Spanish, Portuguese, French, Finnish and English. Aareleid has written articles, literary reviews, short stories and novels. She was chosen as the 2016 Estonian Writer of the Year.
FLIGHTS by Olga Tokarczuk
The narrator of this book is an unknown Polish writer. The novel is a collection of reflections, both fascinating and bizarre, on topics ranging from life and death to motion and migration. The reader is shown that we are all in transit one way or another. A Polish-American doctor returns to Poland to assist in the death of former loved one. A mother and a child disappear and then reappear. Collectors of body parts are profiled. This intriguing book is not meant for one sitting but to take the time to travel through. “Attempting to read this book all at once will result in a headache, like stuffing a box of chocolates in your mouth. Consuming it at a more leisurely pace is the trick. It’s a journey without a destination, and this will naturally frustrate the reader who demands Story, who adores linearity. But for those who like traveling beyond the edges of the map, “Flights” could do the trick.” (Silvia Moreno-Garcia, NPR)
OLGA TOKARCZUK
Olga Tokarczuk was born in Poland in 1962. She is one of the most critically acclaimed and commercially successful authors in Poland and a noted political activist in Poland. She has been the recipient of several significant awards. In 2018, Olga Tokarczuk was presented with both the Man Booker International Prize and the Nobel Prize in Literature.
