Martti Haavio
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Martti Haavio (22 January 1899 in Temmes - 4 February 1973) was a Finnish folklorist, poet and professor, writing under the name of "P. Mustapää". Haavio is considered along with Aaro Hellaakoski as one of the most important poets of the transitional period between traditional and modern verse. A member of the Finnish Academy from 1956 to 1969 Haavio's poems are noted for their sense of irony, relativism, and skillful use of poetic rhythm and free metre. Later he started to use traditional metrics with masterful freshness.
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[edit] Background
Martti Haavio was born in Temmes, as the son of Anna Lydia Ahlgrén and Kaarlo Haavio, a priest. At an early age, Haavio started to write short stories and poems. After the Finnish Civil War broke out in 1917, Haavio joined the Civil Guard. He studied at the University of Helsinki, receiving his Ph.D. in 1932. Although he had reserved nature, he was active in different student organizations and wrote for student magazines and was a member of the Tulenkantajat literature club.
From 1932 to 1949 Haavio was a lecturer at the university and professor of folklore from 1949 to 1956. In 1929 he married the critic and folklorist Elsa Enäjärvi; they had five children. She had reviewed Haavio's first collection of poetry, written under the pseudonym 'Mustapää', in 1925, praising his poetic intuition and untamed temperament. Her own dissertation, The Game of Rich and Poor (1932), was a comparative study of singing games. Enäjärvi-Haavio's other publications include Über die nordischen Kinderspiele (1936), Inkerin virsi (1943), and Pankaamme käsi kätehen (1949). She died in 1951, at the age of fifty, after suffering from cancer for some years. In 1960, Haavio married the fellow poet and translator Aale Tynni and with her Haavio wrote ABC-books and readers for schools.
[edit] Career
After graduation, from 1924 to 1931 Haavio worked at the publishing house WSOY as an editor and much later from 1946 to 1951 as the director of literature department. Under his direction, WSOY published after the war a number of classical and modern works of world literature in Finnish. In 1939 Haavio, a member of the Center Party, ran unsuccessfully for Parliament. During the Continuation War between Finland and the Soviet Union (1941-44), Haavio served in the Finnish army at the information department and edited with Olavi Paavolainen the illustrated work Taistelu Aunuksesta (the battle on Aunus), which was never published. However, in 1969 Haavio's Me marssimme Aunuksen teitä appeared, based on his war diaries.
[edit] Folkorism
Haavio's academic work as a folklorist consist of basic research of formerly previously unknown types of Finnish folklore: stories, legends, myths etc. Among these studies are Suomalaisen Muinaisrunouden Maalima (1935), presenting the culture which created Kalevala and ancient Finnish poetry, Suomalaiset Kodinhaltijat (1942), exploring trolls, spirits, fairies and other such creatures in Finnish folk mythology which have become part of everyday life. In 1950 Väinämöinen (1950), a study of Kalevala's major hero figure was released and in 1967 and an extensive study of Finnish mythology Suomalainen Mytologia. As the director of the Finnish Literature Society's Folklore Archive from 1934, he organized collecting, research, and publishing projects.
[edit] Poetry
In his poetry Haavio's approach to culture and tradition is playful - he did not feel necessary to create his fame as a poet, but it was a supplementary activity for him alongside folklore. Haavio's first collection of poems, Laulu Ihansita Silmistä appeared in 1925. His pseudony, P. Mustapää, Haavio named from a middle-aged house, which he had seen in Estonia, on Toompea hill in Tallinn's old district.
The 1925 collection was followed two years later in 1927 by Laulu Vaakalinnusta in which Haavio had abandoned free verse and began to develop ballad metre. The poetry, inspired by the works of Aleksis Kivi and the lyrics in the old hymn book however was not critically well received by Lauri Viljanen, the leading Finnish critic of the literary group Tulenkantajat (The Flame Bearers).
Haavio was more inspired by the traditional cultural milieu of Southwestern Finland, its old churches and vicarages, but was also influenced by Kilping, Bertolt Brecht, Birger Sjöberg, Erik Axel Karlfeldt, and the Estonian poets Marie Under and Henrik Visnapuu. Brecht's Three-Penny Opera (1928), translated by Haavio, was performed in Finland in 1930. From the Finnish poets he admired most V.A. Koskenniemi and Aaro Hellaakoski, who shared his disregard for conventional expression. In the 1920s Haavio adopted the national idealism of AKS (Academic Karelian Society), which stressed that, as prerequisite for the formation of a Greater Finland, Finland would first have to be transformed into a consciously national and patriotic state, free of any remaining remnants of foreign influence.
Lauri Viljanen's sullen critic was perhaps the primary reason for Haavio to stop writing lyric. After a long silence as a poet, Haavio published JÄÄHYVÄISET ARKADIALLE (1945), which established him as one of the most important writers. The work was born during the hard war years, expressing the sense of disappointment and resignation typical of the post-war Finnish middle class. "Yes: that black mob of jackdaws / blinded the poor fool: / in the country of the jackdaws / drastic laws are the rule." (1945) It was followed by KOIRUOHO, RUUSUNKUKKA (1947), a long verse about the tinsmith Lindblad, in which the tone is more idyllic. Lindblad, a soulmate of Karlfeldt's Fridolin, is the most lovable character in Finnish poetry. He is a folk musician, philosopher, hard working craftsman, and unrealistic dreamer, who falls in love in the Summer, loses his love to a rival, and eventually finds consolation in the thought that he is one of the Magis. Lindblad is buried in the Winter; his funeral marks also the end of idealism. The reader meets again Lindblad in EI RANTAA OLE, OI THETIS (1948) in the poem 'Uusi virsi' (new hymn). Lindblad is in heaven where he plays his accordion for the Apostles - sometimes the instrument is attributed to the Devil, which Haavio must have known.
[edit] Examples of poetry
Oi, Linblad, onkiessas, niin, onkiessas tuumailet elämän arvoitusta: jos maisema on musta ovat raamit punaiset. (from 'Muudan rikas mies' in Koiruoho, ruusunkukka, )
"Grey grief he's had his measure Sweet joy has given him pleasure, With both his life was rife." (from 'Dolce far niente', in Koiruoho, ruusunkukka, 1947 - trans. by Cid Erik Tallqvist)
In the poem 'Selitys' from Koiruoho, ruusunkukka Haavio emphasized that he did not have a certain philosophical position. The prevailing mood of his collections was pessimistic, but in some poems he also asked is love possible at an old age. At that time Aale Tynni, whose works were also published by WSOY, was his "muse". However, they had to put off their marriage for several years because of family reasons. Their marriage was a happy union of two creative souls. Haavio's later works include LINNUSTAJA (1952), in which several poems drew on classical mythology, TUULI AIRISTOLTA (1969), which included nostalgic autobiographical poems, and memoirs NUORUUSVUODET (1972). Martti Haavio died in 1973. After Haavio's death, Aale Tynni edited the second part of his memoirs, OLEN VIELÄ KAUKANA, which came out in 1978.
[edit] Works
- Laulu ihanista silmistä (1925)
- Laulu vaakalinnusta, (1927)
- Jäähyväiset Arkadialle (1945)
- Koiruoho, ruusunkukka (1947)
- Linnustaja (1952)
- Tuuli Airistolta (1969)
