Finland: People, Nation, State

by Max Engman, David Gordon Kirby (Editor)

English, Swedish (translation)

254 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 1989

Reviews

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a Finnish history book covering the background of the Finnish people, the importance of the Finnish forests, the key role of Karelia in Finnish identity, what Finland was to both the Swedish and Russian empires, and the party politics of Finland in the twentieth century up to the book’s publication in 1989. Despite its age, with all of the text written before the rise and fall of Nokia, the collapse of the Soviet Union and Finland’s membership in the EU, it was still very informative. Having been in the country for a while, I already had a rough vision of Finnish culture and history before starting but the contents put my earlier knowledge into better focus.

Depending on the style of each of the 14 writers who contributed to the book, some of the chapters were more engaging than others, but all of the writers were either native English-speaking historians or Finnish academics whose English was expertly edited to native level, which made it a pleasure to read.

This is the second book in a personal project in which I attempt to understand Finnish history more deeply.

[Snail in Danger (Sid) Nicolaides]

A little dated, but it has some interesting linguistic and archaeological info.