from To Storm Skerry
by Anni Blomqvist
introduced and translated by Kate Lambert
Anni Blomqvist (1909–1990) wrote the Stormskärs-Maja series of five novels in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Set in the Åland islands in the mid-to-late 19th century and drawing on events from her own family history, they tell the story of Maja, the second of seven children, who grows up at Vestergård farm in Simskäla and goes on to forge a life with a husband, not of her choosing, and children on a remote island in the Åland archipelago. The books depict, in all its agricultural and domestic detail, a tough, self-sufficient way of life in a rural patriarchal society.
At the point of her marriage, the fictional Maja is little more than a child, incurring her mother’s wrath for daydreaming and imagining stories when she should be gathering sand to scrub the table or feeding the cows. Young Maja could be an L.M. Montgomery heroine, and the books contain similar digressions into local tales, some supernatural. The five novels take Maja from childhood to old age in a world of Nordic stoicism in the face of the elements.
The real Stormskäret, the isolated island to which Maja moves with her husband at the end of the first book in the series, was the island of Väderskär in the north-east of the Åland archipelago, barely a couple of kilometres square. This is a harsh life in a harsh climate with the sea an ever-present neighbour and threat. In the second book, an additional threat is posed by the English, when the Åland islands become part of the Baltic theatre in the Crimean War.
Photograph: SLS/Historiska och litteraturhistoriska arkivet
Anni Blomqvist was the eldest of ten children and lived all her life in Simskäla on Åland. She was actively involved in community issues and campaigned to bring electricity to her home island. Although she won a prize for a story about a day in the life of a farmer’s wife in 1949, and wrote columns for the local paper, her career as a novelist did not take off until she was in her late fifties. In 1966 she was asked to contribute to a book of local history. Instead she found herself writing about the tragedy of her husband’s and son’s deaths at sea in 1961. This first book, I stormens spår (In the Path of the Storm) was so popular that the publishers asked for more and the Stormskärs-Maja series, loosely based around the life of her great-aunt, Maria Lovisa Mickelsdotter (1824–1903) was the result.
Anni Blomqvist won the Pro Finlandia medal in 1977. The books were made into a successful television series in the 1970s and Helsinki City Theatre is set to re-open with a new musical adaptation in celebration of 100 years of Finnish independence in 2017.
In this extract from Vägen till Stormskäret, Maja and her older sister Anna are coming home for Saturday night supper, laughing with friends and neighbours Per and Magnus.
Extract from To Storm Skerry
Anna adds that the boys can come back tomorrow. They will bring them something nice to eat to thank them for helping carry the milk churn.
‘There’s visitors.’
Greta is standing on the steps to tell them the news.
‘Who is it?’
‘Fish-Erker and his son.’
It’s an odd feeling, like a blow to the stomach. But then Maja straightens her shoulders and thinks; Anna is the eldest and it will be her turn first.
Mother has seated the visitors at the table for supper and indulged in more ceremony than usual by setting out the silver spoons for them. From her place by the porridge stool, Maja can see that Mother has not stinted on the food either, as both cheese and mutton are set on the table, and butter for the bread too.
Her mind elsewhere, Maja scrapes the porridge pot with her wooden spoon and when she reaches her spoon out to the basin of milk standing next to the porridge pot, her hand shakes. She spoons the milk out a tiny amount at a time so as not to spill it on her best Sabbath apron.
What does Anna feel about it?
Maja peers at her sideways but Anna looks just as usual. But it must be hard for Anna to think that she will soon leave home and Maja wonders whether she will miss her badly. They do quarrel sometimes, but usually only over little things. And they usually make up again almost instantly. But Anna is so happy with Per, Maja thinks. It must make you feel sad to be given to someone else, when you don’t even know if he is fish or fowl.
As it is Saturday night, it is Father who says grace after the meal. Otherwise the little ones have to do it.
‘The grains could have been crushed a little more, but otherwise the porridge was good. And the pot is empty so the weather will be fine tomorrow too,’ says Father appreciatively, getting up from his seat beside the porridge stool.
‘It is unwise to go to bed burdened by a job left undone,’ Fish-Erker breaks the silence that has fallen after a conversation about all manner of things.
‘That’s true enough, but if you have something on your mind, you must speak up,’ says Father.
‘It is for Janne, my son, that I ask – if he may have the second of your daughters to wife?’
‘Maja?’
‘Yes, her sitting there,’ says Erker.
Maja feels a shudder run through her. Me? It has to be Anna, she thinks helplessly.
‘It should be the eldest first,’ Father says after a silence that lasts forever.
‘Janne has his eye on the second one. Maja. I think the same myself. Many’s the evening I’ve sat here during my travels and I can see that she’s helpful and quick with her hands. Like the saying goes: it takes a stranger to notice what’s under your nose. But, my dear Mickel, here I mean no disrespect to any of your other daughters.’
Maja feels as though she has turned to stone, but she manages to wonder whether Mother is going to say something, or whether it is just Father who decides. She does not know how these things are usually decided; she has never had to think about things like this. But it is such an important thing. Happiness or unhappiness hanging in the balance.
Maja looks at Mother. She is sitting by the stove. Unfathomable. Far away. And Maja’s heart is beating like a frightened bird and she looks at Mother and then back at Father again. The silence lasts so long, and she is in agony, wishing someone would say something so that it is over quickly.
Father is sitting in his place at the head of the table. Unafraid. Or is he afraid? No he couldn’t be. What does he have to fear? He is hardly under any obligation to Erker and Erker in his turn is not an unreasonable man. Maja is sitting at an angle to Father so she cannot see his face, however much she wishes she could. Instead she sees his red-and-yellow striped waistcoat, his white shirtsleeves and his clasped hands. It is how she is used to seeing him sit when it is the Sabbath and they have visitors.
Finally, Father moves, places his hands on the edge of the table, turns and looks at Maja. He only looks. He says nothing. Then he sits back down again.
‘If we agree, have you thought where the young couple will live?’
‘Of course,’ Erker answers. ‘Here at Simskäla, you own many islands and are only two households at the moment. I was thinking of Stormskäret, Storm Skerry, as a fine croft, in a good spot for fishing and seal hunting.’
Again the silence comes. Maja wants it all to be over quickly. This slowness is so unbearably hard. And Mother says nothing. She sits stock still, her hands clasped in her lap, looking straight ahead through the window. Mother is not quite in her Sunday best but nearly. Her sleeves are so blindingly white and her bodice is neatly tied and her ribbons knotted with care.
‘Storm Skerry, you say,’ Father finally answers. ‘Our land and islands are jointly owned and shared, with the tenancy shifting every thirty years. Storm Skerry belongs to Millangård farm, and, as you well know, there is a tenant there who is hard to get along with. As to the marriage, the matter is not yet settled because to my mind, Anna, the eldest, should be the first I marry off.’
The silence resumes. Maja needs to squeeze Anna’s hand, but she is sitting where Maja cannot reach her without getting up. She gazes at the juniper twigs arranged in a square in the middle of the floor. They compete to set them out as beautifully as possible every Saturday night in the summer and everyone takes care not to step on them. Today it was Greta’s turn.
‘In fact, Maja and Anna are only a year apart in age,’ Father continues, ‘so we can agree there is only a hair’s breadth in it.’
Maja looks at the juniper on the floor and her heart beats violently.
Father speaks solemnly:
‘So we are agreed that your son and our daughter Maja are to be betrothed. You must stand up, Maja, and place your hand in Janne’s.’
Maja closes her eyes and feels Magnus’ hands clasped around her waist. That she should remember that now. It hurts so much and she stays seated.
‘My mother, when she was alive, used to say “Shyness is a virtue”, but now it is time to stand up,’ says Father, getting up and coming towards to her.
He plucks her sleeve and leads her to the table as if in a game. Maja stretches out her hand without looking up.
‘Take the betrothal gift out now, Janne,’ says his father.
Janne takes her outstretched hand and places a ring on one of her fingers.
‘God bless you, my children,’ says Janne’s father.
Maja curtseys and goes back to her place.
She looks at the ring. It has a blue stone and in the middle of the stone there is a golden cross. Maja recoils as if from a blow. Is she going to die now? A cross means death.
Mother clears her throat. Maja listens. Is Mother going to save her from death?
‘I want it to be agreed that the wedding cannot be soon because Maria is little more than a mere child and she has much to learn before she is ready to move to Storm Skerry. It lies so far out in the sea, and she will be without neighbours and must learn to meet life and death alike when they come to her door. I will add that I hope that Maria will be able to stand at her wedding with an unbroken bridal crown, as happiness that is taken before its time is short-lived. Our Lord knew this well when he gave us his Commandments to obey. And finally I wish that Almighty God may bless and keep these young people.’
So now it is decided. Maja gazes at Mother in great wonder. Mother called her Maria. No-one, not even the priest, has ever called her anything other than just Maja before.
Did Mother speak so solemnly so that she would listen?
Maja cannot sleep. All the girls are sleeping, but not her. She feels as if she is filled with tears and her eyelids are burning like fire. If only she could cry, so the big lump sitting inside her chest would melt away, it would be easier to go on living. What would Magnus think if he knew how things are for her now, if he knew that he won’t be allowed to come and carry the milk churn, nor throw her high in the air in the joy of a dance, nor arrange things so they can sit close to one another in the barn where they play games and dance, nor walk with her to the gate and hold her hand. All the joy and all the fun have come to an end.
Tomorrow he will know. Tomorrow. Maja is shocked. If only Anna hadn’t been so welcoming and invited them tomorrow night. Now everything has come to nothing. They won’t go to church together. There will be important guests. So much has happened. She wants to shake Anna and say that the boys must be warned but she stops herself. It is the middle of the night.
Then she hears quiet steps and the low door to the attic creaks. Mother enters cautiously, and comes to the bed that Maja shares with Anna. Maja closes her eyes. But when Mother strokes her hand over her hair, she looks up. She looks at Mother as she has never looked at her before. Mother’s face is pale in the low light of the summer’s night and without saying a word she straightens up and leaves the room.
Mother’s caress smoothed things out and hurt at the same time.
Mother is so different from the way Maja thought she was when she was beating her and punishing her. When she went to play games or dance and Mother said she must behave properly, when she felt the stirrings of defiance inside her, but now as she remembers Mother saying tonight that happiness must not be taken before its time, she understands at once that Mother was probably only thinking what was best for her.
Did Mother also imagine a pair of hands clasped around her waist when she became Father’s bride? Might that have been why Mother came and stroked her hair, because she knew how a heart can weep?
The walls creak, the way they do when the house is sleeping. Something is becoming clear. She will say the prayer she used to say when she was a little girl: God who holds his children dear, see me small before thee here. Wherever in the world I stand, my joy doth rest in God’s own hand. Joy may come and joy may go. Beloved by God this joy shall know.
It feels easier. She thought she would never say that childhood prayer again once she was grown, but now it is this very prayer she needs most of all. Magnus came and Magnus has gone. Will Janne be the one to bring her joy? She carefully folds back the hides and steps onto the floor, and tiptoes to the window so that the boards do not creak. With an eager hand she gropes for the small shelf under the roof for the ring she was given, that she placed there, determined not to wear it until she had no other choice. The cross gleams and she shivers, but now she resolutely goes back to bed and lies back down with the ring on her finger.
The tears come. She cries silently for a long time. When she has cried herself out, she sighs deeply. Again and again she sighs. Anna’s hand fumbles for hers. So Anna is awake, she thinks, and the light pressure from Anna’s hand does her good. It is a comfort and the deep sighs gradually fade away.
Vägen till Stormskäret
Söderström, 1928
Rights: Ålands Kulturstiftelse
We thank Ålands Kulturstiftelse for permission to publish this translated extract from Vägen till Stormskäret.
All five novels in the series were published by Söderström between 1968 and 1973. They were republished as the one-volume Stormskärs Maja by Schildts & Söderströms in 2007.
Kate Lambert has a degree in Swedish and history and a master’s in translation. After working as an English teacher in northern Finland and as an assistant lecturer in translation, she now translates from Swedish and Finnish, particularly appreciating texts that use historical research skills and. as in this case, where familiarity with Finland is a plus.