
How Finland Rebranded Itself as a Literary Country - abtaylorxo
https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2018/07/16/how-finland-rebranded-itself-as-a-literary-country/
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hodgesrm
Finland has some interesting literary quirks. My favorite is that it's one of
the few places other than the Vatican where you can read the news in Latin,
for example:

[https://areena.yle.fi/1-1931339](https://areena.yle.fi/1-1931339)

It's an account of the US/North Korea meeting in Singapore. A little out of
date on July 18 but still appealing since most other 'news' you can read in
Latin happened 2000 years ago.

~~~
yosito
This is interesting. But why does anyone bother to write news in Latin?

~~~
hodgesrm
Why not? It's fun to bring old languages back to life.

Also, Latin is a better 'universal language' than many alternatives, in part
because it occupied exactly that role for many centuries throughout much of
Europe. Something to consider in the EU if Brexit goes through. ;)

~~~
icebraining
English will still be the official language of two EU countries :)

~~~
craigsmansion
Still be _one_ official language of two EU countries.

Ireland has Irish, and Malta has Maltese; both non-Germanic languages, very
different from English.

Oddly, Brexit can solidify the use of English as a common language in the EU,
since its general use can now be considered not to give a political advantage
to the UK.

(Of course, English is already a default de-facto common language in the EU,
but some larger countries can be rather protective of their national language
in an official capacity.)

~~~
pjmlp
As former Swiss resident, and fluent speaker of three of the national
languages, seeing Swiss speak among themselves in English was always kind of
ironic. :)

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mar77i
Finland has a huge collection of quirky things, really:

\- the allegedly worst musicians: Elekäläiset

\- Literature that starts with glorification of collective suicide only to be
attempted, failed, called off some pages later. Then rescheduled, and called
off again, lather, rinse, repeat.

\- the most quirky looking blues-harpists: Sväng

\- allegedly Finland remains the only nation without weaponizable satellites

\- Finnish music, from classical through to folk, rock, metal and Avant-Garde
there's literally everything and anything. Did you know they invented Tango?

\- Finland is kind of the opposite of Japan with its many islands when it
comes to lakes. There are too many of them to count.

\- The language is amazingly versatile and abstract. The Finns also don't like
borrowing words from other languages. If there's a word, there's probably a
Finnish construct for it that sounds nothing like what you've heard of.

\- Home to a certain author famous for pissing off translators for her
frivolous approach at above language.

\- Finland is, together with Scandinavia, home to an amazing bunch of Eurasian
indigenous people

\- Finland is home to the creepiest Santa Claus there is. No dispute there.

\- Oh, and whatever started on that comp.os.minix newsgroup in 1991 is
currently running my entire IT infratructure as well as that of my
workplace's.

I could provide sources to all of these claims, but that would be no fun at
all, right?

~~~
AltVanilla
Other quirkiness:

\- Finland has 45 firearms per 100 people (3rd highest in the world) yet is
was ranked the safest country in the world.

\- Enough saunas that the whole population could do it at the same time.

\- Most heavy metal bands, per population.

\- Annual championships in wife-carrying, air-guitar, boot and phone throwing,
sauna, cattle calling, swamp soccer, mosquito swatting, ant nest sitting, etc.

\- Mämmi: food that looks like diarrhea.

\- Candies made of tar.

\- Birch branches are used to whip yourself with in sauna.

\- New years tradition of throwing melted tin in water. The shape tells of the
future.

\- Easter tradition of kids dressing up as witches and going trick-or-
treating.

\- No trespassing laws, so you can roam and camp anywhere (although not too
close to anyone's home).

\- Finland is a 3rd world country by the original cold war definition
(politically non-aligned with either NATO or the Communist block).

~~~
digi_owl
> \- Finland has 45 firearms per 100 people (3rd highest in the world) yet is
> was ranked the safest country in the world.

I wonder what the ratio between hunting and handguns are...

~~~
AltVanilla
I googled a bit. Officially Finland has 1.5 million firearms. Mainly for
hunting and sport. Handguns make up only 0.2 million, which is about 13%.

Most all murders in Finland are done with a knife while drunk.

(The Finnish police, which keeps a database of firearm permits, objected to
the mentioned study that Finland is ranked 3rd in the world. The study was
updated and now Finland is ranked "only" 8th:

[http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/fileadmin/docs/T-Briefing-
Pap...](http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/fileadmin/docs/T-Briefing-Papers/SAS-
BP-Civilian-Firearms-Numbers.pdf) )

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mr_overalls
One Finnish scifi author that I've particularly enjoyed is Hannu Rajaniemi,
who has a PhD in Physics and writes excellent speculative novels like The
Quantum Thief and The Fractal Prince.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannu_Rajaniemi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannu_Rajaniemi)

~~~
anateus
And is a YC founder (post-books)

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timwaagh
i dont think literature can ever replace actual business. most books that sell
are not even literature.

as for the new nokia, maybe the old nokia is also the new one? i have no doubt
a lot of people there still know how to make good phones.

