Estonia as a literary borderland 1993-2009: From Tode to Uncyclopedia
Kristian Nilsson NB: Early draft
1 Introduction
Estonia has through history been located on the border between Russia and its neighbours; sometimes on the Eastern side and sometimes on the Western side. Estonia's character as a border country, which due to the twists and turns of history has belonged to both sides of the border, has arguably affected the literature and other narratives about the country. This specific historical characteristics of Estonia makes it interesting to investigate how narratives about Estonia have been related to dramatic changes in Estonian history.
In this study, I will focus on two important historical changes from the last decades. A major political change began with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the re-independence of Estonia. The transition ended in 2004, when Estonia became a member of the European Union and NATO; thereafter being a part of the Eastern border of “Europe”. A major technological change was initiated with the invention of the World Wide Web in the mid 1990s and it is still in progress with new approaches to communication and technology, often referred to as “Web 2.0”. Considering the debates about the position of Estonia, Web 2.0 does not primarily provide new empirical arguments, but it challenges the established relationships how narratives are communicated between “authors” and “audiences”.
The study consists of three major parts. The first section is a short overview over the changing positions of Estonia as a borderland from the area was brought into Western Christianity through the Crusades in the 13th century, until the re-independence of the Estonian republic in 1991. The largest part of the section covers the Communist era and the role of the intellectuals played in resisting Communist ideology. The second section presents the novel Borderland by Emil Tode and describes how Tõnu Õnnepalu — the real author behind the pseudonym Emil Tode — redefined Estonia's relation to Europe. The third section presents the phenomenon of Web 2.0 and its impact on discussions about Estonia.This is exemplified with a short presentation of literary online- encyclopedia Uncyclopedia.
Borderland and Uncyclopedia are used as case studies to show how dramatically the medial landscape of Estonia has changed in 15 years. The study does not include literary works which could represent stages or phases between Borderland and Uncyclopedia — it is the contrast between the works which is of interest for the study. The opening section about the history of Estonia is used as a background to put the modern debates about Estonia as a borderland into a historical context.
1 2 Historical overview
Estonia, which had been incorporated into Western Christianity largely through Danish and German crusades during the Middle Ages came from the thirteenth century onwards under the political rule of the Livonian Order, Denmark, Poland and Sweden. Even when Sweden lost its Baltic provinces to Russia at the treaty of Nystad 1721, the Baltic provinces remained separated from Russia due to different juridical and political organisation. Thus, the provinces belonged to the Russian Empire but they remained culturally and religiously a part of “Western” Europe. Estonia was overwhelmingly Lutheran and Estonian was written in the Latin alphabet. The only major “Eastern” feature of Estonian ethnicity, which separated them from their Latvian and Lithuanian neighbours, was the fact that the Estonian language is not Indo-European, but belong to the Finno-Ugric language family. It was generally believed in the nineteenth century that the Finno-Ugric proto- language had been located in the Volga region east of Moscow, or even as far East as the Altai mountains in Central Asia. Thus, ethnic Estonians were regarded as an “eastern people” which has effected Estonian discussions about self-identification into the present century.
Estonia's first independence from Russia was formalised in the peace treaty of Tartu 1920, which became a starting point for Estonian state- and society building with the ideals and values from Western liberal democracy. At the beginning of the Second World War Estonia was occupied and became formally incorporated into the Soviet Union. As a result of Nazi German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, Estonia came under German rule as a part of the province of Ostland. The German occupation lasted until September 1944 when Estonia became reincorporated into the Soviet Union as a Soviet republic.
Estonia and the other Baltic states, although politically belonging to the East-European Soviet superpower, never recognised themselves as being mentally or culturally part of this empire. They rather believed that the political border should follow an envisioned cultural border between Eastern and Western Europe along the eastern borders of the Baltic states and not along their western borders in the Baltic Sea. Thus, the sense of being occupied European outposts was an integral part of the Baltic struggle for cultural and linguistic survival.
This general identification of being Westerners under a ruthless Eastern communist power was a strong foundation in Baltic resitance against Sovietification and linguistic Russification of the Baltic cultures, civil societies and self-identification. In this sense, Estonians could feel, despite a parallell notion of them fighting a loosening battle against the Sovietification, a sense of superiority as defending Western values against the Soviet enemy of Europe. This struggle of the Baltic republics was according to Hogan-Brun et al. based on factors of psychological resistence:
− ethnic defence mechanisms based on collective memory; − the perceived low status of Russian-Soviet culture among the Baltic population; − the differing boundary positions between their historical types of civilisation (Hogan-Brun et al 2008:72).
A different struggle against the Soviet regime which united inhabitants in all communist countries was the effort to create alternative spheres against the ideological domination of the public sphere by the party. Polish sociologist Karol Jacubowicz describes in his book Rude Awakening (2007) how the media landscape (including the publishing and distribution of literature) was firmly controlled by the ruling Communist parties. The aim of such medial monopoly was according to co- opt also the “personal sphere” by invading it with the state controlled “public sphere”:
2 “The communist system sought to gain total information control and, originally, full thought control. That, of course, required full control over the public sphere, but not only that: the original goal of the Communist strategy of remodelling social organization had in reality been to eliminate the private sphere and and fill the void with the values and patterns of the public (i.e. government-controlled) sphere.” (Jacubowicz 2007:129)
There existed, however, in oppositon to the official public sphere alternative venues, where alternative news reporting and narratives could be transferred to the national audiences (Jacubowicz 2007:128-135). Artists could play an important role in the resistance by belonging to both the official and alternative public spheres. An author could be a member of the official writers' union, but could still in his/her writings provide substantial material for the resistance of the reading audience. Authors, who had not sold their souls to the Communist party, could gain moral and political influence on the general public to an extent which an author in the West could never hope to reach. This aggregated influence was clearly visible during the years of political transitions from communism to post-communism where authors and other intellectuals played important roles and often reached the highest positions in the society.
The Soviet occupation of Estonia finally ended in 1991 with the disintegration of the union; Estonia regained its independence and could begin the “return” to Europe and the Western world.
3 Borderland and Tõnu Õnnepalu
The surprising end of the struggle for independence against the Soviet Union created after the initial euphora an intellectual vacuum. The Estonians had regained their independence and were now free to form a future which however seemed very uncertain. People searched for guidence in literature and other arts how to cope in this highly volatile and emotional environment. The Estonian reading public waited eagerly for an author who could describe and hopefully put this truly remarcable era in Estonian history into some context. Their wishes were partly answered in 1993 when the novel Borderland (Piiririik) by the the young author Tõnu Õnnepalu (1962-) was published.
Õnnepalu's novel (which he had published under the pseudonym Emil Tode) marked a significant break in Estonian literature. Estonia had been independent for almost two years, but since most artists and authors had been personally involved in the Estonian struggle for independence, literature had not evolved as fast as the political development. Õnnepalu's book made up this discrepance and when it was published, the book made a tremendous impact due to its novelty in thematics, style and overall atmosphere. The fact that the book was written under pseudonym certainly helped to bolster the hype. This catching-up by culture to the political development was also reflected in Õnnepalu's private life as he gave up his work as a civil servant in the department of Foreign Affairs to pursue a career as an independent author and intellectual.
In Borderland Õnnepalu presented a description of the newly independent Estonia and its “return to Europe” through the story of the life of a young Estonian intellectual in contemporary Paris. The major character was a homosexual Estonian in his early thirties who was translating modern French poetry to Estonian. He had recieved a grant from an European institution which promoted the integration of Western and Eastern Europe, which allowed the character to work in Paris. The novelty of the book was not only the theme of homosexuality, which had been thoroughly suppressed in Soviet literature, but the description of an Estonian who could move freely around the world and reflect on difference in various parts of Europe and about the future of Estonia and its supposed return to Europe. The style of Õnnepalu's prose was also widely celebrated as an reinvention of Estonian literal style.
3 Õnnepalu highlighted the new opportunities for East Europeans, but he also described the darker aspects of these opportunities and the new cultural confrontations which emerged in the contacts between dirty and barbarian East Europeans and more sophisticated but naive Westerners. The protagonist felt especially disgust towards the vulgar consumerism which he could recognise in himself and other East Europeans —if they had the means to emulate the life of Western consumerism.
The un-named Estonian had during his stay in Western Europe also to confront the ironic feeling that life behind the old Iron Curtain somehow felt more real: The taste of an apple was much stronger there, since apples were scarce and available in the shops only a limited time of the year. Apples were always available in Western Europe, but eating them could not arise the similar sensation as the apples in the distant homeland — by now far away in both space and time. Thus, in 1993 Õnnepalu described both the disgust and nostalgia over a lifestyle which was inevitable lost with the breakdown of the Soviet Union.
From the publication of Borderland, Õnnepalu gained the position as the Estonian “Euro-author”, which he is still identified as, much to his own uneasiness about such stereotypical descriptions (Kongas 2008). The author has since 1993 regularly been consulted by Estonian mainstream media about his opinion how Estonia and the Estonians are proceeding with their “return to Europe”. Õnnepalu has also remained interested in the process how Estonians have continued to push themselves and their borderstate to become increasingly Westernised. He looks at the processes of the Estonian integration into the West and its “individualistic-atomic” lifestyle. He describes this process harshly:
“Are Estonians now considered Westerners? In this sense, of course. We are even worse. More atomic than the real Westerners. By the way, it is less and less difficult to see the difference. Ten years ago, you could tell from the people’s appearances who was who – from the West or from the East. The difference seemed to be almost anthropological. But we have very quickly learned to ape Western ways.” (Õnnepalu 2004:37-38)
Moreover, he analyses the role of the English language in this process of Estonia's integration with the Western and the globalising World. English becomes a tool for Estonians to reach beyond their own provincial language. This adoption of English gives the Estonians an additional layer of communication: “English is very good for both lying and sincerity. It is like being abroad.” (Õnnepalu 2004:36). Õnnepalu also elaborates his thoughts about Estonia entering the West in an interview from 2008. Here he points out that the open borders have affected the regular Estonian so thoroughly that in every provincial town it is possible—and even common—to meet individuals who may have worked in Ireland; their sister is married to an Italian and their children are studying in the United States (Konsa 2008:8).
The previously culturally and socially homogenous Estonia is broken up into a large variety of separated lifestyles. While a mental Estonia could during Soviet occupation be located by the Estonians in the West, their ordinary life was in the Estonia of the East. Today it is much more difficult to locate a mental Estonia. The Estonians are split between a local Estonian-speaking Estonia and a global largely English-speaking world. The Estonians become fragmented and this would arguably also affect descriptions about Estonia.
4 4 Estonia as a borderland in the 21st century: Web 2.0 and Uncyclopedia
Since the publishing of Borderland, the world has gone through dramatic cultural and social changes as the breakthrough of the World Wide Web, which arguably has reduced the authority of authors as “megaphones” with largely passive audiences. The previously dominant role of the authors have been weakened through the increasingly creative participation of their audience — mainly on the Internet. The phenomenon of increased participation on the Internet is often described as Web 2.0. Swedish sociologist Simon Lindgren (2007) provides a definition:
“As a concept, the “Web 2.0” was coined by the American media company O’Reilly Media in 2004. It refers to a second generation of internet based services that enable people to share information online in ways that were previously unavailable. Web 2.0 applications and services are characterised by elevated degrees of interactivity, cooperation, file sharing and social networking, as compared to the more unidirectional and less dynamic Web 1.0. In brief we can say that we have gone from mere websites to a large number of creative communities.”
The change in the interaction between authors and other content producers and their audience from a monodirectional relation of megaphones and consumers to more dynamic and polydirectional conversations has gained the attention of media researcher. Of special interest for the present article is the thinking by American ethnologist Henry Jenkins, who has described how the previously well organised and separated channels of media production and consumption have become increasingly blurred through the effects of participatory culture by the media consumers. Jenkins describes this process as part of the convergence culture (Jenkins 2006). Moreover, one of the greatest results through the conversations and interactions has been the emergence of the collective intelligence, a term which Jenkins borrows from French cybertheorist Pierre Lévy. Jenkins describes the process as: “None of us can know everything; each of us knows something; and we can put the pieces together if we pool our resources and combine our skills.” (Jenkins 2006:4). These key activities outlined by Jenkins can be used to explain e.g. the phenomenon of Wikipedia. With the convergence culture and the increasing amount of material which is digitalised and available through the Internet, individuals can participate in the process of building the online- encyclopaedia. Wikipedia is both the activity and the result of the collective intelligence.
Uncyclopedia is an interesting example of Web 2.0. The wiki was created in 2005 by Jonathan Huang and the pseudonym Stillwater as a reaction to the policies by Wikipedia about content filtering. There was no room in Wikipedia for outspokenly witty and nonsensial material. Refused material was removed to a Bad jokes and other deleted nonsense-section of Wikipedia. Huang read this section with great interest and came to the conclusion that there was a demand among contributers and readers of Wikipedia for a spoof Wikipedia with a humoristic touch; an encyclopedia which could ignore to be accurate or objective (Source Wikipedia: Uncyclopedia).
An article in Uncyclopedia can, as in Wikipedia, be the result of the effort of a single user or of a larger group of contributers. The point of writing, editing and reading Uncyclopedia is supposedly for enjoyment and entertainment. Thereby, Uncyclopedia is more akin to a piece of art than to an encyclopedia like Wikipedia. Uncyclopedia was initially written in English, but the idea of a spoof Wikipedia had emerged in other languages as well. Today, various language versions are inter- connected as in Wikipedia, although the various language editions in the universe of Uncyclopedia are more diverse than the editions in Wikipedia. English is the largest language with about 25 000 articles. Other languge editions range from only a few dozen to thousands of entries.
5 In the polyglot world of Uncyclopedia it is possible to find various ideas about Estonia and its character as a border state and it is possible to discover the relative importance of Estonia in various languages/ cultures as the content of the articles in Uncyclopedia differs far more than articles in different languages about Estonia in the more rigorously editing in Wikipedia. An investigation of narratives about Estonia therefore enters a more complex level of research in contrast to monolingual sites, since it includes the opportunity to compare differences between various language editions. This is possible to do due to good translation services on the net. Google Translate was used for this particular study.
There is an article about Estonia in seventeen editions of Uncyclopedia, where an article can be from only a few letters long (Latvian) to thorough articles (English, Finnish). In some cases the article includes typical national stereotypes about Estonia (Finnish and Russian versions). In other languages Estonia lies to far away and there are no specific cultural stereotypes about Estonia. The stereotypes are about geographical location and language (German and Italian). In some cases Estonia only plays a role as a brick in a larger project of a language describing its own history (Chinese and Spanish). Of special interest is the Portuguese article, which clearly shows that knowledge among Brazilians about Estonia is due to communication on the Internet.
As in Wikipedia, the English entries in Uncyclopedia are often the most elaborated, unless the topic is about a specific national place, person or historical event. In the English article about Estonia the majority of the contributers of the article are most likely Estonians. Their effort to write an entertaining article about Estonia has resulted in the interesting fact that no-one has bothered to write an article about Estonia in Estonian. The English article is ambitious and shows that Estonians, like their Nordic neighbours have acquired enough knowledge of English to write entries in English. The feeling that Estonians as a small people must make themselves heard and speak about Estonia since no-one else will do it is still prevalent in an age of globalisation.
5 Conclusion
The relation between author and audiece in Estonian literature has changed dramatically during the timeperiod 1993-2009 through the transitions from post-communism to liberal democracy and through the Internet revolution. The authors have lost their role as providing guidelines for their readers as the audience now can search and obtain information and literature without any censorship.
Both Õnnepalu and the anonymous authors of Uncyclopedia create narratives about Estonia. Õnnepalu's narratives are spread through established channels of publishing houses; literary journals; university courses and international festivals. The narratives about Estonia in Uncyclopedia are created by the direct access of authors and editors to the online text. Uncyclopedia is an example of the process where intellectuals as Õnnepalu have lost their monopoly of creating and maintaining national narratives due to the openness of the Internet and the emergence of the collective colaborations and the collective intelligence. Before the Internet revolution, the privilege of production of influential historical and political narratives was largely restricted to leading politicians, scholars, artists and other intellectuals. With Web 2.0 the struggles of narrative production have to some extent entered the public arena, where in principle everyone with an Internet connection can participate.
6 The changing character of the relation between the author and audience is arguably due to the introduction of technology which allow the collective intelligence to be created. This changing relationship certainly leads to Marshall McLuhan's famous statement that “the media is the message” i.e. it is the technology of the media which defines the content. The statement and its conclusions are certainly questionable but it leads to a debate which is beyond the scope of the present article.
Sources
Literature
Dutta, Soumitra, & Irene Mia (eds), 2009, The Global Information Technology Report 2008-2009. World Economic Forum
Hogan-Brun, Gabrielle; Ozolins, Uldis; RamonienE, MeilutE & Mart Rannut, 2008, 'Language Politics and Practices in the Baltic States' in Kaplan, Robert B. and Richard B. Baldauf Jr. (eds), Language Planning and Policy in Europe, Vol.3: The Baltic States, Ireland and Italy. Multilingual Matters, Bristol, Buffalo, Toronto
Jacubowicz, Karol, 2007, Rude awakening: Social and media change in central and eastern Europe. Hampton press, Cresskill
Jenkins, Henry, 2006, Converging culture: Where old and new media collide. New York University Press, New York
Kongas, Kerttu, 2008, 'Tõnu Õnnepalu – Eesti kirjanik Euroopa kultuuriruumis' in Eurokratt Nr 5, pp. 8-12
Lindgren, Simon, 2007, From Flâneur to Web Surfer: Videoblogging, Photo Sharing and Walter Benjamin @ the Web 2.0 in Transformations, Nr 15, (http://www.transformationsjournal.org/journal/issue_15/article_10.shtml)
Luhmann, Niklas, 2000 [1996], The reality of the mass media. Stanford University Press, Stanford
Tode, Emil, 1993, Piiririik, Tuum, Tallinn
Tode Emil, 2004, 'Ego with Alter Ego' in Snel, Guido (Editor) Alter Ego: Twenty Confronting Views on the European Experience. Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam
Internet (checked 2008-11-27)
The history of Uncyclopedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncyclopedia
7 Links to Uncyclopedia articles about Estonia in various languages
English http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Estonia Bosnian http://bs.neciklopedija.org/wiki/Estonija German http://de.uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Estland Spanish http://inciclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Estonia Estonian http://ebatsuklopeedia.org/wiki/Eesti Finnish http://hikipedia.info/wiki/Viro French http://desencyclopedie.wikia.com/wiki/Estonie Croatian http://hr.neciklopedija.org/wiki/Estonija Hungarian http://unciklopedia.org/wiki/%C3%89sztorsz%C3%A1g Italian http://nonciclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Estonia Lithuanian http://juokopedija.org/wiki/Estija Latvian http://lv.neciklopedija.org/wiki/Igaunija Norwegian http://ikkepedia.org/wiki/Estland Polish http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Estonia Portuguese http://desciclopedia.org/wiki/Est%C3%B4nia Russian http://absurdopedia.wikia.com/wiki/%D0%AD%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%BD %D0%B8%D1%8F Chinese (Taiwanese) http://uncyclopedia.tw/wiki/%E6%84%9B%E7%B4%97%E5%A6%AE%E4%BA%9E
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