Writer: Arto Paasilinna
Year: 1988
Pages: 208
IBSN-13: 978-84-339-7400-6
Nota: 10/10
(I think the book is not
published in English yet?)
SYNOPSYS
In the quiet countryside near
Helsinki, and older woman waters the lawn, the swallows chirps and the cat
snoozes. But the idyll is only apparent: the life of Linnea Ravaska, an
eighty-year old widow, is poisoned by some criminals that every month take her
pension. Her unnatural grandson Kauko and his friends destroy everything on
their way, they torture the cat, hit everything for pleasure, and she did not
say anything, until the day she cannot stand it any longer and decides to call
the police and flees to Helsinki. The war and revenge of the horrible trio
could turn into a nightmare if Paasilinna would not have chosen the via of the
farce and the paradox to criticize a society whose ills he is observing with
lucidity. Forgotten old age, marginalized youth, collapsing of the
institutions, drugs, alcoholism, AIDS: everything is made out in the bizarre
unexpected events of the amusing old lady that walks armed with a Parabellum
and whose truly weapons will end up being the candor, a naïve cruelty, and her
tireless defence of her own honour.
In 2016 I lived in Pori (Finland) and,
as it happens wherever I go, I got so interested in the culture of the place.
Doing a research about the writers of that country, I came across Arto
Paasilinna. After reading lots of reviews (bad reviews, indeed) I decided to
buy Reverend Huuskonen’s Beastly Manservant which I loved and leave me
wanting to read more.
I decided to wait ‘til I finish I
exams so I can fully enjoy the book. I decided not to ready any review or
synopsis of this book to let Arto surprise me.
And indeed he did.
It is a mixture of amazing Finnish
humour, suspense and surprise that hooks you from the very beginning until the
end of the history.
The book starts with the history of
Linnea Ravaska, the widow of a colonel that lives in the outskirts of Helsinki,
in Harmisto. What in the beginning seemed an idyllic retirement to spend her last
years turns out to be a hell in life. Every day she get the pension paid, her
nephew Kauko ‘Kake’ Nyyssönen and his two friends Pertti ‘Pera Lahtela and Jari
Fagerström come from the city to ‘ask’ for it. One day, Linnea gets tired of
them stealing her, getting drunk (so strange considering they are Finnish haha)
and destroying her house, so she decides to run away to Helsinki from the
nearby forest and seek refugee in the house of an old lover, a doctor. Linnea
called the police to warn about the damages in her house, this made the guys decide
to give her a ‘lesson’. Thus, a series of situations are set off that seem to
be part of the A Clockwork Orange (Anthony Burgess) where violence,
scorn for life, greed and envy prevail. We can see how the poor, weak and
dependent grannie just tries to save her life and, thenceforth there is a
succession of events guided by luck that do not cease to amaze us, especially for
all the surprising plot twists.
Even though at the beginning my feelings
for Kake were “I totally hate this person”, as the book advances, you can start
to understand his personality, or how he had reached that situation, at least. It
is quite difficult to grow up practically neglected and alone, in a suburb,
with all the inequality, classicism, and prejudices that were in that time in Finland
(luckily not anymore) and get along. That is why there is a Kake’s quote that
got my attention and can be take out of context and be applied to any society
at any time (sadly):
How many hide gifts were wasted in
that police state, due to the frustrating living conditions, people with a
superior intelligence were isolated from society for the only reason that they
refused to yield to the slave oppression of the mean laws and norms.’
But it does not justify his behavior
at all.
This book has fascinated me practically
as much as Reverend Huuskonen’s Beastly Manservant did, although I had
much fun with this, I laughed more, even though the themes of this book are
more tragic and deep, that dark-Finnish humour is always latent and, the
surprises it gives you and how the themes are expose, it hooks you from the beginning
until the very end. You are reading in need of more and more until, suddenly,
you have finished the book.
For me, this book and Arto Paasilinna
are highly recommendable!
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