Kalevala: Elias Lonnrot (Vintage Classics) - Softcover

Lonnrot, Elias

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1784873047 ISBN 13: 9781784873042

Publisher: Vintage Classics, 2017

Synopsis

Kalevala is the poetic name for Finland: ‘the land of heroes’. Here you’ll find the cultural essence of a young country but an old land, the stories, songs and poems that recount the mythical adventures of humankind. Ambition, lust, romance, birth and death can all be found within its pages, as well as the sampo, a mysterious talisman that brings great happiness to its possessor and over which great battles will be fought.

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY HORATIO CLARE

About this title

Review:

"One of the great mythic poems of Europe" (New York Times)

"I was immensely attracted by something in the air of the Kalevala" (Tolkien to W.H. Auden in 1955)

"Did so much to bolster early Finnish nationalism on the road to independence" (Guardian)

"The Kalevala , the 19th-century folk epic that crystallised national resistance to Russian rule, was compiled by Elias Lonnrot from ancient runes sung from memory in the eastern forests of Karelia. The Kalevala inspired not only Sibelius but JRR Tolkien, whose Middle Earth and elfin tongue tapped Finnish myths and language" (Guardian)

Book Description:

Discover the great Finnish epic on the 100th anniversary of the birth of the country of Finland.

About this edition

• Publisher: Vintage Classics
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1784873047
• ISBN 13: 9781784873042
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 704