Swedish Poetry 1
KATARINA FROSTENSON Joner (Ions, 1991) Many Swedi
sh poets work with ancient myths in the composing of their poems but few do so as consistently as Katarina Frostenson, who is a member of the Swedish Academy. In Joner she makes use of medieval ballads and works on several different levels that coexist and interact with each other both in terms of different places in Sweden and Europe, such as forests and cities, and in relation to different times. A notorious murder of the 1980s forms a dark background to a fragmentary account of violence and the limitless scope of human evil. Through their obvious desire to establish contact, the poems encourage idiosyncratic readings that are a far cry from fixed interpretations. The focus rests on rhythm and sound and the poems become stagings or tableaux whose themes are underpinned by a consistent curiosity about what it means to be human. The poems are palpably theatrical but steeped, too, in realism, as their abstract intellectual content encounters an embodied reality. With her assured tone, Frostenson has produced a fascinating collection of poems. Poem from Joner on page 37. Selected Collections of Poetry: Rena land (1980) I det gula (1985) Joner (1991) Korallen (1999) Karkas (2004) Sånger och formler (2015) JOHAN JÖNSON Efter arbetsschema (After Work Schedule, 2008) The enormously prodigious Johan Jönson has surpassed even himself in his most recent publications to produce a set of truly voluminous books. This suite begins with Efter arbetsschema, which is intended as a structural critique of the precariat, based on his own experience as an employee in lowwage jobs. The book consists of a montage of diary-like reports based on private confessions and fantasies. This is a long poem without a beginning or end that brings one of those Chinese boxes to mind, with several books stacked inside the first. Reading it is as exhausting as it is rewarding, given the force of the insights mediated through a unique human existence. The thousands ATHENA FARROKHZAD Vitsvit (White Blight, 2013) Athena Farrokhzad has previously worked as an editor and also published books in collaboration with other writers. This is a new approach to literature and a new role for the writer. Her debut Vitsvit launched one of contemporary Swedish poetry’s most unique collections. One reason for this is the book’s external form: it has a reflective cover that confronts the reader with his or her own image. The text has also been printed in white ink against a black background in strips that run over the page. Another source of its originality is that it offers us an account of growing up in which the poet focuses more on the shared experiences of the family SWEDISH POETRY than her own. It is only indirectly that we are invited to share the narrator’s life. Vitsvit may be read as a compressed autobiography, but also as a political text that shows what it is like to be made invisible in a new society. The writer was born in Iran, and the family discuss the war from which they have fled. This is a confrontational book in a language that is underpinned by a great longing for consensus. Collections of Poetry: Vitsvit (2013) Trado (Together with Svetlana Cârstean, 2016) of pages in Jönson’s five most recent books make up a synthesis of autobiography and political poetry as part of an ongoing work that is linked to the Swedish tradition of working-class literature. Poem from Efter arbetsschema on page 39. Collections of Poetry: Som samplingsdikter (1992) Näst sista våldet (1994) Virus (2004) Collobert Orbital (2006) Efter arbetsschema (2008) Livdikt (2010) dit. dit. hään (2016) 58