Estonia As a Literary Borderland 1993-2009: from Tode to Uncyclopedia
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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