[Suomi] [Castellano]
Latin American and Iberian Literature in Finland
Maailmasta toiseen is a literary festival in Spanish, Portuguese, and Finnish. Curated by Roxana Crisólogo and José Luis Rico, the festival’s purpose is to address the literary and cultural dimensions of the Spanish and Portuguese-speaking world, and to offer the Finnish public a fresh perspective of these facets and changes. The current edition took place on October 14th and 15th, 2021, hosted by the University of Helsinki and Rosebud Bookstore’s downtown branch.
For the second year, Taiteen edistämiskeskus (TAIKE) has decided to support this initiative. Additionally, Sivuvalo has partnered with the faculties of humanities and political science at the University of Helsinki, represented by professors Elina Liikanen, Eeva Sippola, and Teivo Teivainen.
The Embassies of Mexico, Spain, Peru, Chile, Argentina, and Brazil in Finland have made crucial contributions to this endeavor. NOXLit—our sister association in the Nordic countries—, along with Petzétera, and Nordic Culture Fund, are also supporting the festival.
Maailmasta toiseen’s first edition took place online during September 2020. The 2021 edition consists of six panels, addressing fiction, poetry, translation, and politics/culture. Authors form Spain and Latin America will share their work as well as their perspective on the evolution of literary topographies in their places of origin. The global trends impacting their endeavors will also be broached. On the occasion of the Peruvian Independence Bicentennial, a panel will also feature experts and artists who will analyze the state of the Peruvian art and politics.
In Finnish, maailma means “world” and is a compound of the nouns “earth” and “air.” The transliteration “earthair” rings reminiscent of those modernist Poundian archaisms like “earth-weal,” and differs in its chthonic emphasis from the abstraction of the Latin “mundus.” “Maailmasta toiseen” simply means “From one world to another” and implies the convergence of several linguistic and geographical realms in a single place.
Panel 1: Terrors, Wonders, Voices – Novelists Talk Fiction & Reality
Thursday 14th, 13.00-15:00
Site: Tiedekulma Stage, University of Helsinki (Yliopistonkatu 4)
Moderator: José Luis Rico
Participants: Ariana Harwicz (Argentina), Francisco Ovando (Chile), Claudia Ulloa (Peru), Gabriela Ybarra (Spain)
In this conversation, writers will address the stories, characters, and subjects recurrent in their own work, and the trends they perceive in contemporary fiction. From mental health to dystopia, from hypermodern offices to horror imagery, the panelists will lay out the connections between larger trends in culture and the minutia of literary devices and symbols. Where are the new spaces of fictional transgression? How does the market and the hyper-visibility of the cyber space condition the writing of stories? What parricides and resurrections are happening before our eyes in the landscape of contemporary literature? What are the best kept secrets of literature in Spanish and Portuguese?
Panel 2: Peruvian Politics and Literature: From the Fujishock to the Post-Global
Thursday 14th, 16:00-17:30
Site: Rosebud Bookstore (Kaisaniemenkatu 5)
Moderator: José Luis Rico
Participants: Roxana Crisólogo (Peru/Fin), Teivo Teivainen (Fin), Rodrigo García (Mex)
On the occasion of the Peruvian Independence Bicentennial, the panelists will discuss recent Peruvian politics and literature since the inception of neoliberalism. The late 20th century in Peru saw the climax of political violence, as well as cultural renovation in the guise of chicha aesthetics and the Movimiento Kloaka in literature, among others. The year of 1990 inaugurated an era of radical privatization attempting to re-insert the country in the international economic system. Peru became a regional laboratory for neoliberalism, while artists and intellectuals attempted new ways of naming a fraught environment. In the thirty years after the so-called “fujishock” policies, planetary boom-and-bust economic cycles, increased political tensions, and the irruption of internet culture have catalyzed new social and artistic practices. The three panelists will discuss these transformations from different vantage points and make a balance of current phenomena in Peruvian politics and literature.
Panel 3: Cliffside Optics: Contemporary Peruvian Literature
Thursday 14th, 18:00-19:00
Site: Rosebud Bookstore
Moderator: José Luis Rico
Participants: Claudia Ulloa (Peru), Tanya Tynjälä (Peru), Mario Pera (Peru), Roxana Crisólogo (Peru)
Reading and discussion on the contemporary trends in Peruvian poetry and fiction. The writers will read their originals, with Finnish translations by Teo Aiha. The discussion will hover around the contemporary manifestations of literature’s sempiternal topics: the paternal terror, the imageries of death and desire, etc. Other issues relevant to Peruvian literature will also be discussed.
Panel 4: Latitude and Mirage – Latin America in the Voice of Finnish Translators
Friday 15th, 13:00-15:00
Site: Metsätalo, Room 6, University of Helsinki. Moderator: Teo Aiha
Participants: Einari Aaltonen, Emmi Ketonen.
In this conversation, translators will expound on the pleasures and challenges of interlinguistic negotiation, in the context of Latin American literature in Finnish. From foundational Spanish classics to early 20th century avantgarde, the mid-century Boom novel, the Bolaño-phenomenon, and the proliferation of contemporary narrative styles (Fernanda Melchor, Samanta Schweblin), translators have endeavored to widen the communicating vessels between the embattled Latin American reality and the Finnish readership.
What are the risks of trafficking poetry between such different societies? What kind of nuances resist exportation? What are the unexpected affinities these foreign authors have found in this latitude? Is a translator still a gatekeeper?
Panel 5: Clearings and Fragments: Latin American Poetry Today
Friday 15th, 17:00-19:00
Site: Tiedekulma Stage. University of Helsinki (Yliopistonkatu 4)
Moderator: Roxana Crisólogo
Participants: Hernán Bravo Varela (Mexico), Ricardo Domeneck (Brazil), Mario Pera (Peru)
Reading and discussion on the current trends in contemporary Latin American and European poetry. The poets will read their originals and translator Teo Aiha will read his Finnish versions. The discussion will address the commonalities and divergences in the poetry of three writers from different backgrounds. The discussion touch upon the current manifestations of literature’s sempiternal topics: paternal terror, the imageries of death and desire, etc. Emerging styles and sensibilities, hyperconnectedness, dystopianism and other global issues will also be discussed.
Panel 6: Closing Reading
Friday 15th, 20:00-21:00
Site: Rosebud Bookstore (Kaisaniemenkatu 5)
Moderator: José Luis Rico
Participants: Ariana Harwicz (Argentina), Francisco Ovando (Chile), Claudia Ulloa (Peru), Gabriela Ybarra (Spain), Hernán Bravo Varela (Mexico), Ricardo Domeneck (Brazil), Mario Pera (Peru), Rodrigo García Bonilla (Mexico)
Closing event. The participants will share fragments of their published or in-progress writing
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