Five from Finland - Mirkka Rekola, Kai Nieminen, Lauri Otonkoski, Tomi Kontio, Riina Katajavuori

Anselm Hollo on kääntänyt viiden suomalaisen runoilijan tuotantoa englanniksi antologiassa Five from Finland - Mirkka Rekola, Kai Nieminen, Lauri Otonkoski, Tomi Kontio, Riina Katajavuori (Reality Street, 2001; ISBN 1-874400-21-0).

Pidin tästä runojen kokoelmasta kovasti, vaikka lyhythän se on. Mutta silti, yllättävää kyllä, englanninkieliset runojen käännökset avasivat näköaloja suomalaisiin runoilijoihin. Erityisesti tämä koski Mirkka Rekolaa.

Kirjoitin aiheesta englanninkieliseen Light Scrape -blogiini, alla ote siellä julkaistusta postauksesta.

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I have been trying to read and understand Enlish language poetry, but it is hard going. Poetry is not easy to comprehend if you are not a native speaker of the language, at least it is so for me. But there are also differences between the poets and poems, and some poems seem to transcend the language.

I have read Enlish language poems translated into Finnish, and sometimes this works well, but it can also be that a lot is lost in translation.

Going to the other direction, from Finnish to Enlish, I got a big surprise recently. Namely, a certain Finnish poet has been a difficult one to understand for me, even though I have tried to approach her poetry every once in a while.

The poet in question, Mirkka Rekola, has been the topic of many academic treatises and dissertations, and her poems have been described as the "most spacious meeting places in Finnish poetry". There have comparisons to Sappho's "fragments", or the classical Chinese poets' works, but still, I have been baffled.

Slowly I have grown to suspect that in some of her poems the sense of being perplexed may be the key to understanding. It may be that the poems are not puzzles for the mind, but for the emotions, and thus they are spacious, open to a multitude of interpretations.

But anyway, I'm currently reading a book titled Five from Finland, which is a collection of poems translated from Finnish into English by Anselm Hollo. The five poets are Mirkka Rekola, Kai Nieminen, Lauri Otonkoski, Tomi Kontio and Riina Katajavuori.

And now I'm happy, as I suddenly got a sense of Mirkka Rekola's poetry, out of these English translations. The poems are not easy to explain, at least in words, but suddenly there is an open vista in front of me.

Here is a quote from a poem of hers (poetry collection The Wind's Last Year by Mirkka Rekola, translated by Anselm Hollo):

On the right side, on the left,
still on the same street; but no meeting.
Is that why I look at boats,
sketch a prow,
as if to solve this.
...
This I would like to leave: a boat like a leaf,
prow in the air, on its way back.

Rekola is described, as a person and as a poet, in Aarne Kinnunen's book "Fulltime Life" (Päätoiminen elämä, 2011). Kinnunen made an impressive career, serving as Professor Extraordinarius of Aesthetics at the University of Helsinki.

Kinnunen tells in his book why it is stupid to explain the works of an author by their living circumstances. However, he also knew Rekola in person (if she could be known at all), and this all is very interesting, I highly recommend the book.

But Rekola's poems are something else than her life. I don't know what they mean when they say that to become a poet you have to live a poet's life.

Virran molemmin puolin

Mirkka Rekolan kokoelma Virran molemmin puolin - Runot 1954-2004 (WSOY, 2009) osoittautui vaikeaksi, hankalaksi luettavaksi. Kirjassa on saatteena tutkija Liisa Enwaldin luonnehdinta Rekolan runoilijan työstä, tai sanoisiko tehtävästä runoilijana, ja se hiukan auttoi, mutta silti, jotenkin tuuliajolle tätä kokoelmaa lukiessani jouduin.

Rekolan kuvakielelle sanotaan olevan ominaista "yhtäaikainen tarkkuus ja avoimuus", mikä tarkoittanee sitä että runoissa on hyvinkin yksityiskohtaisia havaintoja ympäristöstä ja elämästä, mutta sillä tavalla runoksi rakennettuina että niihin on vaikea saada otetta, on vaikea ymmärtää mitä runoilija haluaa sanoa tai ajaa takaa.

Ehkä runojen ominaispiirre onkin se, että kukin lukija voi pystyttää runoihin oman näkemyksensä, oman selityksensä, aivan omanlaisensa - ja tässä mielessä teoksen runot ovat "lyriikkamme avarimpia kohtaamispaikkoja".

Otan tähän yhden esimerkin, lyhyen runon kokoelmasta Anna päivän olla kaikki:

Laskin ruokapaketin puistonpenkille.
Istuin, katselin merta.
Oli kuin vieressä olisi joku joka odottaa kotona.

Avoimeen, odottavaan tilaan näiden runojen lukemisen jäljiltä jää. En tiedä, ollako tyytyväinen, vai ei.