UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones 12-2010 Your Presence Is Requested at Suvanto Maile Chapman University of Nevada, Las Vegas Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu/thesesdissertations Part of the American Literature Commons, Literature in English, North America Commons, and the Modern Literature Commons Repository Citation Chapman, Maile, "Your Presence Is Requested at Suvanto" (2010). UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones. 727. http://dx.doi.org/10.34917/1957940 This Dissertation is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It has been brought to you by Digital Scholarship@UNLV with permission from the rights-holder(s). You are free to use this Dissertation in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. 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YOUR PRESENCE IS REQUESTED AT SUVANTO by Maile Chapman Bachelor of Arts The Evergreen State College 1988 Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Syracuse University 2001 A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of The requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy in English Department of English College of Liberal Art Graduate College University of Nevada Las Vegas December 2010 Copyright by Maile Diane Chapman 2011 All Rights Reserved THE GRADUATE COLLEGE We recommend the dissertation prepared under our supervision by Maile Chapman entitled Your Presence Is Requested at Suvanto be accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English Megan Becker-Leckrone, Committee Chair Richard Wiley, Committee Member Anne Stevens, Committee Member Marta Meana, Graduate Faculty Representative Ronald Smith, Ph. D., Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies and Dean of the Graduate College December 2010 ABSTRACT Your Presence Is Requested At Suvanto by Maile Chapman Dr Megan Becker-Leckrone, Examination Committee Chair Associate Professor of English University of Nevada, Las Vegas This creative dissertation is a novel set in a fictional private hospital on the southwestern coast of Finland. The main character, Sunny Taylor, is an American nurse whose loneliness and isolation give the novel its distant emotional atmosphere and outsider’s perspective on life in Finland (a densely forested country long perceived as linguistically, culturally, and geographically remote from the rest of Europe). Other main characters include a reserved, chronically ill Finnish woman born before independence from Russia and educated as an architect; an unpleasant expatriate Danish woman who once gave ballroom dance lessons in Finnish cafés; an American obstetrician who comes to Finland with his young family; and a group of American “timber wives” attached to a joint Finnish-American timber venture. The American obstetrician brings maternity cases to Suvanto, and the predominantly childless American patients react with anguish and anger. Tensions escalate within the nearly snowbound hospital, resulting in the violent death of the obstetrician and the disappearance of his nurse. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................................... iii PROLOGUE ....................................................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER 1 ....................................................................................................................... 3 CHAPTER 2 ..................................................................................................................... 25 CHAPTER 3 ..................................................................................................................... 42 CHAPTER 4 ..................................................................................................................... 56 CHAPTER 5 ..................................................................................................................... 75 CHAPTER 6 ..................................................................................................................... 99 CHAPTER 7 ................................................................................................................... 110 CHAPTER 8 ................................................................................................................... 123 CHAPTER 9 ................................................................................................................... 136 CHAPTER 10 ................................................................................................................. 161 CHAPTER 11 ................................................................................................................. 182 CHAPTER 12 ................................................................................................................. 209 CHAPTER 13 ................................................................................................................. 221 CHAPTER 14 ................................................................................................................. 229 CHAPTER 15 ................................................................................................................. 240 CHAPTER 16 ................................................................................................................. 254 iv CHAPTER 17 ................................................................................................................. 268 CHAPTER 18 ................................................................................................................. 270 CHAPTER 19 ................................................................................................................. 277 CHAPTER 20 ................................................................................................................. 282 EPILOGUE ..................................................................................................................... 294 VITA ............................................................................................................................... 304 v PROLOGUE We cared only for ourselves. We had large windows, and we watched the sky thicken with snow. We pulled open the metal door to the roof and positioned ourselves along the curving promenade, scraping our lounge chairs over the concrete, turning to absorb the winter sunlight through fur-lined hats and soft, generous coats. From the promenade you can see the cornerstone; we discovered this by carefully leaning out over the railing, into the air, looking down to where the building meets the ground. Pictures were taken, and we'd like to see them now, because we were beautiful then. We'd like to be beautiful again, and in memory we will be, and then we'll tell you all about that winter, including the early deaths, some say preventable, some say one, some say three, that happened at Suvanto. We're nearly ready, we're always almost ready and it takes only a little time for the vessels to flush and fill with memory, and then we can open our eyes, lift our heads, sit up in our beds, and turn to meet your gaze. We'll tell you what we remember; we love the body as you love a warm wet leather glove, pulled on with difficulty in cold darkness. Propped and reading in the bed, pages moving behind the windows of the high private rooms, sometimes we're the ones doing that, but mostly we're happy downstairs, turning, moody in the black dress, hairpins in firelight, a winter tango, staring over one another's shoulders for a slow display of emotion in the cold, quiet country. Just for fun, just among these friends. And in retrospect we love the other creatures too, the dark birds and the small siili, our little hedgehog, and that bowl of fish near the heating panel in the Solarium. The hedgehog we think we caught in photos. The fish are floating, pulsing like blood cells in the eye, pulsing like piano and especially violin, like a record turning 1 unattended, fires lit and flaring against the windows, bright against the shadows of the blackening birch, the cedars, and the ever-present pines, the backdrop, the audience, it is so hard to catch attention from the pines. And they are thicker now. But we love the pines outside the windows of that room where we pushed back the couches and practiced, harmlessly. We love everything that we did. Including even the burden of hot water in the bowels, the squeeze in the viscera and trace of metal in the mouth, damp heat at the hairline, and the hidden unpleasantness that returns along with blood. We love these memories because pain is a haunting beyond the muscles and repetition serves a purpose. We are happy that we're happy now, and happy that we're safe now, and so we'll repeat this for you: we are safe and happy now, and this is what we wanted. 2 CHAPTER 1 Julia arrives in August, on an afternoon that is warm and damp and thick with the smell of berries and pine hung low in a buzzing blue sky. Mosquitoes are fat and hysterical, moving