They often have names that lie outside, augmented with umlauts and acute accents on strings of consonants. Savings on vowels perhaps, but above all not literature. In bookstores, it’s “the invasion of Finnish authors”judge Jérôme Rémy, artistic director of Les Boréales, a Norman festival dedicated to Nordic culture since 1992.
At the dawn of his 32e edition, the event “in the North” nourishes its DNA with this small avalanche, with the presence of nineteen authors parachuted from the very top of Europe, including ten from Finland. The headliner? Sofi Oksanen, definitely. The success of his writings on women’s rights, freedoms and immigration extends beyond the borders of his country. Since his “bestseller” Purge (2010), “he is the star of Finnish literature, translated into around fifty languages”. She will naturally kick off these 2024 Boréales.
Three Finnish “Goncourt”
Translation is the pitfall and the key to success for these pens that have long been difficult to export. In Finland, people write in Finnish, Swedish, the second official language, or Sami (from Lapland). Until the early 1980s, only around fifty books had been translated. Today, everything has changed. Like the series, Finnish books have ended up seeing popularity in the country.
As is often the case in Scandinavia, crime fiction is not neutral, like the writings of Satu Rämö. Afterwards, it would be like wanting to compare Michel Houellebecq to Marc Lévy, a number of styles and comments are expressed. Arto Paasilinna, for example, is not in the 2024 convoy, but he is a regular in the Boréales and he is known for his novels that are both gritty and ecological (Vatanen’s hare, Small suicides between friends).
This year, the festival boasts of hosting three Finlandia awards, “the equivalent of our Goncourt”. This applies to Sofi Oksanen, but also Pajtim Statovci, whose surname betrays Kosovar origins, and Jukka Viikilä, twice honored writer, poet and playwright.
The Finnish author adapts very well to a triple hat. Pirkko Saisio, at 75 years old, is known in the land of fjords as a writer, but also as an actress and director.
Meetings and signings, conferences, literary cafés, readings, audio reveries, crime fiction weekend. Literature remains the cornerstone of this Norman event which nevertheless opens its pages to all forms of aesthetics (concerts, theater, circus, exhibitions, cinema, gastronomy). In ten days, the Boréales achieved the small feat of accumulating 150 events, including 90 free.
From November 20 to 30, in Caen (Calvados) and Normandy. lesboreales.com
