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Tapio (Felix) Hiisivaara (1907-1971) |
Finnish novelist, travel writer, journalist, and translator who specialized on such authors as Fredric Brown, Carter Brown, Mickey Spillane, Ross MacDonald, Eric Ambler, and Leon Uris. Tapio Hiisivaara also translated non-fiction about the First World War, World War II and the Six-Days War of Israel. His own books Hiisivaara wrote with ease, he was a natural story teller, who moved without effort from one literary genre into another. Throughout his life, Hiisivaara maintained a passion for traveling. "Kun vieras saapuu taloon, jalan tai ratsain, niin hän kauniin tavan mukaan hiukan vitkastelee portin tienoilla ja ellei ketään näy, taputtaa käsiään tulonsa ilmoittamiseksi. Tavallisesti kuitenkin vieraan tulo on nähty jo kaukaa ja isäntä seisoo ulko-oven takana odottamassa vieraan kohteliasta viivyttelyä portin tienoilla astuakseen valkeaksirapatun talonsa kuistille ja huutaakseen "Saavu lähemmäksi!" Vieras otetaan vastaan syleilyllä, sillä tapa vaatii, että kädenpuristuksen tapahtuessa vasen käsi kierretään kevyesti tervehdittävän olkapään ympärille. Sitten seuraa meidänkin maassamme tavallinen keskustelu, mikä nimi, mistä tullaan, mihin mennään, miksi liikutaan, kaikki esitettynä hyvin kohteliaasti, sillä uteliaisuus ei saa olla tunkeileva." ('Gauchot - Etelä-Brasilian reipas ratsastajakansa' by Tapio Hiisivaara, Suomen Sosialidemokraatti, No. 56, 27.02.1938, p. 13) Tapio
Hiisivaara was born in Helsinki, the son of
Felix
Hjalmar Hiisivaara (1881-1911), a tinsmith, and Emilia Hiisivaara
(née Lindberg), who was active in the Finnish Social Democratic Women's
Union. She died in 1942. After
studies at a mixed secondary school, Hiisivaara made between the
years 1927 and 1930 several journeys in Europe, Africa, South America,
and North America as a seaman, reporter, and traveler. He then worked
as a journalist for the Social Democratic newspapers Pohjanmaan
Kansa (1931-32), Kansan lehti (1932-37), and Suomen
Sosialidemokraatti
(1937-44). Hiisivaara also lectured and spoke at the local party
meetings in Tampere and its surroundings. Taking a stand against
warmongering, he warned in 1933 of the oncoming war. After a speech in
1934 in Nokia on the independence day, Hiisivaara was sentenced to pay
a fine for political incitement. In 1936 Hiisivaara was court-martialed for insubordination
during reserve training – among others, he had criticized the food and
questioned the authority of the officers. ". . . on useassa eri
tilaisuudessa muiden reserviläisten läsnäollessa arvostellut ja
moittinut päällystön toimenpiteitä selittäen, ettei esimiehiä tarvitse
totella, ja moittinut reserviharjoituksissa annettua ruokaa ja nurkunut
palveluksen ankaruutta". ('Reserviläinen Hiisivaara .
. . ,' Helsingin Sanomat, No.
312, 17.11.1936, p. 8) During the Finnish Winter War (1939-40) and Continuation War (1941-44), Hiisivaara served in the army as a platoon commander and war correspondent in the Information Company (IC) of the Finnish Armed Forces. On a busy day in the Nuijamaa border station in the summer of 1941, he could send even four reports to the headquarters. While in Nurmoila, his roommate was the poet Yrjö Jylhä, who had served as an officer in the infernal fights in Taipaleenjoki (the Taipale river). Jylhä was silent for long periods, not speaking without necessity, but occasionally they had day-long discussions which continued late into the night. In 1941 Hiisivaara published his first book, Olinhan
siellä minäkin,
a war memoir from 1939-40. "Niin pitkälle kuin näemme, puolisen
kilometriä kumpaankin suuntaan puolustusasemien pituuteen päin ja
ylöspäin mäen laelle takanamme, kiehuu rinne kranaateista. Metsän puut
ryskyvät valittavasti kaatuessaan, paksuja runkoja pakkautuu poikittain
juoksuhaudan ylitse. Vihollinen ampuu vielä kranaatinheittimillä,
erotamme selvästi niiden kimeämmän vihellyksen ja terävämmän
räiskähdyksen. Jokin konekiväärisuihku hukkuu yleiseen meluun, mutta
silloin tällöin kuulemme sodan sinfonian piccoloääninä kimeitä
ujelluksia." (Olinhan siellä minäkin by Tapio
Hiisivaara, Porvoo: WSOY, 1941) Many of the 22 articles, which Hiisivaara wrote while serving in the Information Company, were censored; the most censored IC writers were Eero Kiviranta and Toivo V. Narva. Like a number of Finnish journalists, intellectuals and civil servants, he was a supporter of the nationalist Greater Finland ideology. He was a prolific and reliable reporter, whose social democratic background occasionally surfaced in his notions of the equality between soldiers and officers in combat. Hiisivaara married in 1942 Sirkka Liisa
Kokko, an employee at a publishing firm. They had four children.
After the war Hiisivaara's Narva 1700
(1944), published by WSOY, was banned and removed from libraries to
please the Allied Control Commission, in practice the Soviet members of
the ACC. The book gave an account of the battle of Narva in 1700, in
which King Karl XII of Sweden and his heroic Caroleans won the huge
Russian army, commanded by Tsar Peter I (Peter the Great). In his
translations of historical works, Hiisivaara concentrated on books
dealing with the European war scene. Geschichte des zweiten
Weltkriegs by Kurt von Tippelskirch came out in 1959-1960. It was
followed in 1962-63 by William L. Shirer's classic work, The Rise
and Fall of the Third Reich. Along with these histories Hiisivaara
translated Primo Levi's Se questo è
un uomo (If This Is a Man). As translator, Hiisivaara was faithful to the original work.
Usually he did not make changes in the source text but still managed to
capture its style and rhythm. In the translation of Battle Cry by Leon
Uris
(1953), Hiisivaara used the term "intiaani" instead of the original
"injun," at that time this word was neutral in Finland and used to
decribe Native Americans. THEY CALL ME MAC. The name's unimportant. You can best identify me by the six chevrons, three up and three down, and by that row of hashmarks. Thirty years in the United States Marine Corps. Hiisivaara became a full-time writer in 1945. Pälkäneen
miekka ja Izmirin huntu
(1948), a historical novel, was devoted to Erik Nystedt, a
dragoon, the author's forefather from the 17th-century. The story
follows the adventures of Pekka Ristonpoika Tuomaala and his friend
Topias and his horse, Musto, from Poltava to Turkey, and finally to
Finland. Myrkkynuolia, kahvia, banaaneja (1945) gave an
account of Hiisivaara's early journey from Montevideo to Rio de Janeiro
and his experiences in odd jobs, among others as a vacqueiro, a
cowboy, in Brazil. The journey took over a year. Hiisivaara used all
kinds of vehicles from canoe and raft to train, and he also walked long
distances. He spoke some Spanish and after five moths he read
Portuguese novels. "At a young age one learns quickly,"
Hiisivaara said – at that time he was
about 23. In 1949 Hiisivaara began to contribute to Suomen Kuvalehti and Finlandia Pictorail and from 1952 to 1953 he edited the magazine Viikkosanomat, publiashed by Sanoma Osakeyhtiö. During these Hiisivaara also traveled widely in Turkey, Spain and Sahara. Mostly he traveled alone. Often, when he went off route, his trips turned into adventures. Santa Clara (1949) was a sea novel, which focused on the exhausting everyday work on an old ship, the SS Santa Clara. Crew is shanghaied, accidents follow each other, there are murders and suicides – the ship is doomed like B. Traven's tramp steamer Yorikke in The Death Ship (1926). At the end of this salt scented sea experience, Santa Clara sinks and Iso Kotka (big eagle), the protagonist, swims ashore to an tropical island. Reviewers thanked the feeling of authenticity: "Kuvauksessaan on Hiisivaara varmaankin paljon käyttänyt aineksina merimiehiltä kuulemiaan tarinoita, mutta hänellä täytyy myös olla melko paljon omakohtaista merielämän ja merimiehen ammatin tuntemusta, jotta hän voisi niinkin virheettömästi käyttää ammattisanastoa kuin tässä teoksessa. Hänen kuvauksensa höyrylaivan lämmittäjän "helvetistä" tuntuu miltei itseoikeutetulta. ('Tuhoon kulkeva laiva' by M. P. [Martti Pernaja], Helsingin Sanomat, No. 325, 19.12.1949, p. 6) Like Mika Waltari, Hiisivaara was
very interested
in Turkey, not exactly Finland's neighborhood country – the distance
between Helsinki and Istanbul is some 2100 kilometers.
Contacts between Finland and Turkey were closest during the
Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78, when some thousand Finnish soldiers
participated in the campaign. Following a travel book about Spain, Hurja,
viehkeä
Espanja (1949), he went with his wife to Turkey. Their first impression
was sad, the windows in the houses were unlit and unwashed, the streets
were in bad shape; the scene resembled the East Karelia, but
"Istanbul is not Turkey". (Tarunhohtoinen Turkki by Tapio
Hiisivaara, Helsinki: Pellervo, 1950) As a former officer
Hiisivaara was
especially interested in war history, army, and military
bases. "The Turkish army is world famous for its discipline," said
Hiisivaara, "but at parades and marches the infantry gives
somewhat clumsy although strong and firm impression." In his later
works Hiisivaara dealt with American Indians and espionage. Intiaanit tulevat
(1950) – the title can be translated as "Indians are coming" –
published at the beginning of the Western boom of the 1950s in
Finland, was about the struggle between Native Americans and the
settlers. Hiisivaara demythologized the history of the western
frontier. His sympathies were not on the side of the Europeans.
Speaking of the Wounded Knee Massacre (or "Haavoittunut polvi" as
translated in the book), Hiisivaara sees it as a result of religious
intolerance. Polttavaa hiekkaa (1955) was Hiisivaara's
last travel book. After this work he focused more on translating novels
and non-fiction into Finnish for different publishers. "Tuhannenpa verran poikia
läksi…": Suomen kaarti
Balkanin sodassa 1877-1878
(1968) was about the Finnish Guard in the Balkans in the Russo-Turkish
War. This general history was based on books written by C. .F. Wahlberg
(Anteckningar från rysk-turkiska
kriget 1877-1878: vid lifgardets 3:dje finska skarpskyttebataljon och
ryska gardeskåren, 1878), Janne Jernvall (Vääpeli Lemminkäisen päiväkirja,
1899), and August von Alfthan (Från
Jassy till Konstantinopel, anteckningar från turkiska fälttåget
1877-1878, 1879). "Hiisivaara lienee ensimmäinen, joka totesi
suomalaisten möhlineen taistelussa." ('Tuhannen
verran poikia läksi. Kulttuuri ja historia Tapio Hiisivaaran
Venäjän-Turkin -sodan popularisoinnissa' by Jyrki Outinen, Avaintekstejä kulttuurihistoriaan,
edited by Hanna Järvinen & Kimi Kärki, Turku: Turun yliopisto,
kulttuurihistoria, 2005, p. 107) From 1966, Hiisivaara specialized in translating Carter Brown paperback novels, which were very popular in Finland and in many other countries. The books were published by Valpas-mainos. Mostly Hiisivaara translated from English. Possibly he met Curzio Malaparte, when the Italian journalist traveled in Finland during War II and stayed at the Hotel Torni in Helsinki. Hiisivaara's translation of Malaparte's La Pelle came out in 1969. Polttavaa hiekkaa depicted
mostly Hiisivaara's experiences in Algeria, after the outbreak of the
war for independence. His tactics in making
acquaintances was straightforward but effective: because he could speak
French, he went to the nearest a bar, and started to talk with local
people. Thus one day Hiisivaara drank with two Germans who had joined
the French Foreign Legion and complained that they did not have any
beer at their fortress, only vine. In 1954 the National Liberation
Front (FLN) had started its open warfare against French rule, but
Hiisivaara's sympathies were on French side – he argues that France is
fighting for European culture. "Jos
Pohjois-Afrikka lakkaa olemasta eurooppalainen maa, ihmiskunta
heilahtaa arvaamattoman vaarallisen lähelle todella pohjatonta kuilua,
jonka surkeutta ja synkkyyttä kammottaa ajatellakin. Siten Ranskan
taistelu Pohjois-Afrikassa on koko maanosan yhteinen asia." (Polttavaa hiekkaa
by Tapio Hiisivaara, Helsinki: Pellervo, 1955) According
to Hiisivaara – whose opinions are openly
racist – especially
the intolerant Islamic religion further complicates the building of the
atom-age world. Tapio Hiisivaara died on December 25, 1971, in
Helsinki. His
hobbies were stamp collecting and war history. Selected works:
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