Finnish playwright and journalist, who worked as the editor-in-chief in several major magazines. After establishing his fame as a sharp-penned conservative columnist, Ilmari Turja gained recognition with his plays with a strong political or historical message. Turja came from Ostrobothnia, a province in the Western Finland, which is known for its independent, outspoken, and more or less parochial people.

"Lehtimiehen ammatin paras puoli on se, että siinä pääsee matkustamaan – joko lehtensä, vieraan valtion tai molempien kustannuksella." (from Ei kukaa oo mikää, sanoo Rannanjärvi by Ilmari Turja, Porvoo: WSOY, 1975, p. 158)

Kaarlo Ilmari Turja was born in Isokyrö into a farmer/merchant family. His mother was Eveliina Turja and father Jaakkoo Turja, who moved to Vaasa from his family estate, after a fight with another son-in-law, Juha, who hit him with a knife in the chest and back. Jaakkoo survived and in Vaasa he started a succesfull career in lumber business.

At school Turja proved to be a good essayist, although he never learned punctuation rules. One teacher instructed him to strip away the first and last sentence, whereas another considered opening and finishing lines obligatory. Turja's favorite writers were James Fenimore Cooper, F. E. Sillanpää, and Victor Hugo. In 1922 he graduated from the lyceum of Vaasa. He served in the army and in 1923 he moved to Helsinki. There he studied law at the University of Helsinki.

From the mid-1920s Turja contibuted under the pseudonym 'Teini' to the student magazine Ylioppilaslehti. He opposed all kinds of elitism, and foreign influences and products too. "Että nuo lompakot ja kukkarot eivät ole mitään kamelin nahkaa eivätkä ne ole käsin tehtyjä, vaan ne ovat Saksassa tehtyä rihkamaa, roskaa ja että herraa on huiputdettu." ('Suveniiri' by Teini, in Suuri pakinakirja, toimittanut Tauno Karilas, Porvoo: Werner Söderström Osakeyhtiö, 1950, p. 699) The magazine was edited by Vilho Helanen, who was active in the right-wing Academic Karelia Society and later gained fame as a novelist. Helanen was followed by Urho Kekkonen, a rising politician also active at that time in AKS. Kekkonen's was elected President of Finland in 1956. In the newspaper Ilkka Turja published columns under the pseudonym 'Sameli'. During the summer of 1925 he was employed as a reporter at Ilkka. Turja received his Master of Laws degree in 1932, but he soon dropped his career in law and devoted himself to journalism.

From 1929 to 1934 Turja edited the magazine Kansan Kuvalehti. He was a staff member of Suomen Kuvalehti from 1934 to 1936 and its editor between the years 1936 and 1951. Turja did not tolerate poems but intellectually sound and clear argumentation. A noteworthy exception was Kaarlo Sarkia's translation of Rimbaud's Le Bateau ivre. Turja's editorial line was simple: "Täällä pitää kirjoittaa lyhyesti ja ytimekkäästi." (quoted in Turja: kriivari: reportaasi 1900-luvun Suomesta by Tapani Ruokanen, Helsingissä: Otava, 2001, p. 142)

While Suomen Kuvalehti was conservative, Turja opened Kansan Kuvalehti for leftist writers, such as Arvo Poika Tuominen, a former Communist, and Hella Wuolijoki. Erkki Tantu's comic strip Rymy-Eetu, about a pipe smoking strongman, became highly popular. During the war years, Rymy-Eetu fought against the Soviet Union in the Hakkapeliitta magazine. Financially – or with writings – Turja's magazine was supported by Martti Haavio, Kustaa Vilkuna, Urho Kekkonen, and Jalmari Jäntti from the publishing house WSOY.

At the age of fifty Turja left Suomen Kuvalehti more or less voluntarily and was followed by the writer Ensio Rislakki. From 1952 to 1963 Turja was the editor of Uusi Kuvalehti, a serious sensation magazine. It had among its contributors best writers of the time – Vilho Helanen, Olavi Paavolainen, Matti Kurjensaari, Yrjö Kivimies, Martti Wallenius, and Eino S. Repo, who became in the 1960s the managing director of YLE (the Finnish Broadcasting Company).

Under Turja's direction Uusi Kuvalehti did not hesitate to touch politically explosive subjects. It revealed among others the legally questionable execution of Emil Hytti in 1944 and embezzlement at the Mannerheim League for child welfare. However, the most famous story was the great margarine war about suspicious animal fats ("cats") used in the manufacture process. "Suurissa laitoksissa on tavallisesti asiat kunnossa, mutta miten lie pienten laita, joihin on päättynyt monen Heluna-vainaan, Musti-vainaan ja Mirri-vainaan matka. Tilapäisesti. Sieltä ne ovat reissanneet uudessa muodossa maailmalle." (from Uusi Kuvalehti, 17. February, 1961) The magazine won the margarine war in court but lost advertisers.

Ruijanrantaa ja Ruijanmerta (1928), Turja's first book, was based on his journey to the Northern Norway with Salli Alanen. Nudism had entered Finland and in one photo, not published in the book, Turja and Salli posed naked on a shore; they married in 1930. The book arose debade in Norway where the term Greater Finland, used in Finland's policy with the Soviet Union, was now interpreted from northern point of view, and was regarded as a threat. Ten years later Turja published his first novel, the autobiographical Johannes Renko, ylioppilas, set in the student world of Helsinki, and the play Tuomari Martta (Judge Martha), which takes stand on housewives having a paid job.

The central character is the female lawyer Martta, who puts her career before family and housework, but at the end she decides that her place is at home taking care of the children and her husband Juho, a civil servant: "Miksi minä sitten riistäisin itselleni tehtävän, jossa minua ei tarvita, johon on yhdeksänkymmentå yhdeksän muuta tulijaa, ja jättäisin tämän paikan, joka on ainoa paikka maailmassa, jonka minä yksin voin hyvin täyttää? Minä en muutamien setelien vuoksi riistä itseltäni ja lapsiltani näitä kultaisia vuosia." (Tuomari Martta, in Kahdeksan näytelmää by Ilmari Turja, Porvoo: WSOY, 1983, p. 106) The play was performed at the National Theatre in 1938. Helsingin Sanomat praised it as "exceptionally mature" for a first-timer. Tuomari Martta was adapted to screen in 1943 by Hannu Leminen, with the plea: "Mothers, do not leave your small children." Helena Kara acted in the title role. Raha ja sana (1949, The Money and the word), first staged at the Hämeenlinnan Työväen Teatteri, explored the problems of freedom of speech.

During the Winter War (1939-40) and the Continuation War (1941-44) Turja served in the army at the information department, where he was one of the key figures along with the radio reporter Pekka Tiilikainen, authors Mika Waltari and Olavi Paavolainen, and the director of Tampere City Theatre Arvi Kivimaa. In addition, he was the director of the half-official Finlandia News Bureau, which carried out propaganda campaings and was in practice an authority for film censorship. When Field Marshal Mannerheim, commander of the Finnish forces, offered Turja the post of the propaganda chief, he turned the offer down – he wanted to keep his freedom as a journalist.

The war years Turja recalled in his plays. Päämajassa (1966, In the headquarters), which criticized the decisions made in general headquarters in 1944, had a major success in the National Theatre. Sotamiehen kunnia (1971, The honor of a soldier) explored the legal aspects of a true incident from the Continuation War, when Major S.O. Lindgren shot in 1944 soldier Emil Hytti, accusing him of cowardice. The High Court dropped all charges against Lindgren. Turja wanted that the issue should be opened once again.

Turja's good connections and friendship with influential figures, among them President Urho Kekkonen, helped him to recruit high profile contributors for the magazine Suomen Kuvalehti, such as the writer Mika Waltari. Kekkonen began to publish columns under the pseudonym 'Pekka Peitsi' in 1942, first expressing his belief in a German victory, but then, after the Battle of Stalingrad, speaking of defeat. Peitsi's widely discussed texts were translated into German and sent to Berlin.

When Turja turned 60 in 1961, Kekkonen sent him a letter, saying: "Jos jaksat odottaa, niin kyllä minä lopuksi Sinua onnittelen merkkipäiväsi johdosta. Ja kiitän vuosikymmenien ajan jatkuneesta hyvästä ystävyydestä ja yhteistyöstä. Runnaa Sinä vain aikakauslehtiä, helppoahan se on, kun sait minulta hyvä koulutuksen, kun olit oppilaanani Ylioppilaslehdessä hyvällä palkalla." (Kirjeitä myllystäni. 1, 1956-1967 by Urho Kekkonen, Helsingissä: Otava, 1976, p. 124)

Mannerheim was featured several times on the cover of the magazine. However, it was not Mannerheim who became Turja's great hero after the war, but General A. F. Airo, the protagonist of the play Päämajassa and Matti Kassila's 1970 screen adaptation. After reading the manuscript Airo said that the play captured the spirit of the headquarters. ('En filmannut historiallista totuutta' by Matti Kassila, Helsingin Sanomat 30.12.1994) 

The film was broadcast on television in 1994. Taru Stenvall, a waiter who had served at the Mikkeli Clubi where Marshal's court dined, wrote in the newspaper Helsingin Sanomat, that Turja gave a false image of the leading officers: Mannerheim was not an indifferent Commander-in-Chief, who enjoyed pleasure riding and eating caviar. "The truth doesn't burn even in fire but only a know what it is." ('Turja antaa päämajasta väärän kuvan' by Taru Stenvall, Helsingin Sanomat, 24.12.1994)

Although Turja remembered Mannerheim as a fine person, he was not able to accept his Swedishness and Russianess. Mannerheim also appeared in the final scene of Turja's play about the jaeger-movement, Jääkäri Ståhl (1978, Jaeger Ståhl). The title character is a controversial figure. He shoots death a fellow jaeger, who don't obey his orders. The character was modelled after Kaarlo Armas Ståhlberg (died in the Civil War in 1918). Turja's play was performer 80 times in the National Theatre.

Uusi Kuvalehti was not financially successful – the magazine was closed in 1963. Turja then found work from the magazine Apu, where he wrote columns for 27 years. His encounters with high level politicians, civil servants, soldiers, and prominent persons Turja recorded in memoirs and numerous articles. Ilmari Turja Association was founded in 1992. Salli Turja died in 1993, and Turja spent his last years in an old-age home. Ilmari Turja died on January 6, 1998, in Helsinki, at the age of 96. His manuscripts are in the literature archives of The Finnish Literature Society.

Turja built his plays around contradictions and strong characters; he did not rely on plot. Särkelä itte (1944, Särkelä himself), originally made for the Finnish Broadcasting Company, was never broadcast, but it formed the basis for the comedy, commissioned by Eino Kalima, director of the National Theatre. (Write a comedy without a word about the war, he said.) Turja portrayed a stubborn Ostrobothnian brick manufacturer Julius Särkelä, who wants to dominate all the others and lives by his own principles.

"SÄRKELÄ: Maailmalle? Asia on nyt kerta kaikkiaan niin, että maailmalla ei ole mitään hyvää oppimista. Kyllä minä olen käynyt maailmanrannan kiertokoulua ja kyllä minä tiedän, mitä maailma antaa. Ja minä olen juuri sitä varten sen koulun käynyt, ettei lasten tarvitse. Kyllä se on nähty ja tiedetään, mitä nuoret maailmalla oppivat: turhaa kumartamista, itsensä piippaamista ja ruokottomia humoorivitsejä. Eikä mitää muuta." (from Särkelä itte, in Kahdeksan näytelmää, pp. 184-185) Partly the character drew on Turja's father-in-law Väinö Alanen, a larger-than-life figure just like Turja himself. Särkelä itte was filmed in 1947, starring the popular character actor Uuno Laakso. Turja was not happy with the adaptation by Orvo Saarikivi and Toivo Särkkä. Maija Karhi acted in the role of Emmi Särkelä in the 1989 National Theatre production, which went on to be a surprise success. It was Edwin Laine's last work as a theatre director.

For further reading: Sanan ja kuvan vuosisata: Suomen Kuvalehti 1916-2016 by Vesa Vares (2016); 'Turja, Ilmari,' in Kotimaisia pakinoitsijoita by Vesa Sisättö & Pekka Halme (2013); Ilmari Turja sodan ja rauhan töissä, by Ilmari Turjan seura (2002); Turja: kriivari: reportaasi 1900-luvun Suomesta by Tapani Ruokanen (2001); Kolmen Kuvalehden Turja by Kai Häggman (1996); Turja tutummaksi, Ilmari Turja Seuran julkaisuja 1 (1994); 'Naiskuvat todellisuuden heijastajina ja tuottajina. Tuomari Martan feministinen analyysi' by Anu Koivunen, in Elokuva ja analyysi, edited by Raimo Kinisjärvi et al. (1994); Turja jo eläessään, edited by Aino Räty Hämäläinen (1986); Arkisto auki by Ilmari Turja (1986); 'Ilmari Turjan näytelmistä' by Aino Räty-Hämäläinen, in Kahdeksan näytelmää by Ilmari Turja (1983); Ilmari Turjan näytelmät by Aino Räty-Hämäläinen (1981); Ei kukaa oo mikää by Ilmari Turja (1975); 'Kulosaaren talonpoika' in Kansakunnan kaapin päällä by Matti Kurjensaari (1969); 'Ilmari Turja,šin Uuno Kailaasta Aila Meriluotoon: Suomalaisten kirjailijain elämäkertoja, edited by Toivo Pekkanen & Reino Rauanheimo (1947) 

Selected works:

• Ruijanrantaa ja Ruijanmerta, 1928
• Ässä-Tee-Römperi ja Kee-Römperi, 1935 (play, with Ensio Rislakki)
• Lapatossu, 1937 (sceenplay with Ensio Rislakki)
  - film 1937, prod. Suomen Filmiteollisuus, dir. Yrjö Nortia and T.J. Särkkä, starring Aku Korhonen (as Lapatossu), Laila Rihte, Eino Kaipainen, Siiri Angerkoski, Jorma Nortimo
• Johannes Renko, ylioppilas: romaani, 1938 (novel, also adapted into play, prod. 1958)
• Tuomari Martta: näytelmä, 1938 (play)
  - film 1943, prod. Suomen Filmiteollisuus, dir. Hannu Leminen, screenplay by Martti Larni, starring Helena Kara, Uuno Laakso, Elsa Rantalainen, Aku Korhonen, Kaarlo Kartio
• Nokkosvihta, 1943 (radio play)
• Särkelä itte: nelinäytöksinen huvinäytelmä, 1944 (play)
  - film 1947, prod. Suomen Filmiteollisuus, directed by Orvo Saarikivi, screenplay Orvo Saarikivi, Toivo Särkkä, starring Uuno Laakso (as Julius Särkelä), Aku Korhonen, Hillevi Lagerstam, Aino Lohikoski, Siiri Angerkoski. "Sillä Suomen kansalle jo vallan rakkaaksi käynyt näytelmä olisi toki sietänyt muuntaa filmiksi arvonsa mukaisella tavalla ja ennen kaikkea niin, että Särkelän keskeinen hahmo olisi saanut sekä tilaa että tilaisuutta osoittaa filmin runsain keinoin luontonsa, minänsä mittaa ja kehitystä. Nyt tuntui miltei siltä kuin olisi koko ja menestys jätetty yksinomaan Turjan mehevien repliikkien varaan eikä vaivauduttu itse filmistä tekemään paljon mitään." (P. Ta-vi in Helsingin Sanomat)
• Maakunnan hartiat, 1946 (play)
• Lapikkaat, 1947-48 (play)
• Raha ja sana: näytelmä, 1949 (play)
• Se kuusi ja se kivi, 1951 (illustrated by Pauli Soisalo)
• Voi hyvät ihmiset, 1953
• Kuiva juusto, 1955
• Juttua piisaa: parhaita pakinoita, 1955
• Suuressa maassa ja pienessä, 1957 (illustrated by R. Westrén-Doll)
• Rintatasku, 1961 (play)
• Knalli kalliolla: pakinoita, 1964 (illustrated by Olavi Hurmerinta)
• Päämajassa, 1966 (play)
  - film: Päämaja, 1970, prod. Suomi-Filmi, dir. Matti Kassila, screenplay Matti Kassila and Risto Juhani, starring Joel Rinne (C.G. Mannerheim), Jussi Jurkka (Airo), Tamara Lund (Lotta Markovilla) and Matti Pihlaja (as chief editor; Turja?)
• Vakuutusyhtiö Pohjola 1891-1966, 1967
• Satayksi, 1970 (illustrated by Erkki Tanttu)
• Sotamiehen kunnia, 1971 (play)
• Ei kukaa oo mikää, sanoo Rannanjärvi, 1975
• Jääkäri Ståhl: näytelmä, 1978 (play)
• Matkojen pärskeitä, 1978
• Kahdeksan näytelmää, 1983 (plays)
• Tarinoita suuresta Urhosta, 1984
• Ilmari Turjan paremmat jutut, 1985
• Arkisto auki, 1986
• Kumuri: kahden everstin taistelu, 1989
• Satayksi, 1998 (3rd ed., illustrated by Erkki Tanttu)