Göran Schildt

Göran Schildt on S / Y Daphne around 1970.

Göran Gustav Ernst Schildt (born March 11, 1917 in Helsinki , † March 24, 2009 in Ekenäs ) was a Finnish-Swedish author and art historian . He was the son of the Swedish- speaking writer and the offspring of an officer family Runar Schildt (1888-1925).

Schildt was best known for his travel books translated into eight languages with a sailing boat in the Mediterranean , where he spent over 20 years. Another important life's work is the four-volume biography of the architect Alvar Aalto , published in 1970 .

Life

After he was seriously wounded as an infantryman during the Finnish Winter War and had to spend a year and a half in hospital, he was no longer able to participate in the war. Schildt went to Helsinki University . He received his doctorate in 1947 with a dissertation on the painter Paul Cézanne and then studied art history , aesthetics and psychology at the Sorbonne in Paris (1934–1935). In 1946 he moved to Sweden and was an editor for the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet from 1951 to 1990 . He turned down the offer for a professorship at the University of Helsinki in favor of his writing. In 1947 he bought the ketch- rigged, six and a half ton Daphne , built in Finland in 1935 , with which he sailed to Lavagne on the waterway through France in 1948 and traveled the Mediterranean every year until 1968. Also trips up the Nile to Wadi Halfa (1955) and to Odessa and Sevastopol (1963) were among them. Göran Schildt lived in Ekenäs in Finland and on Leros in Greece ever since .

"... I thought, if I can get around this to make my dream come true: I bought a boat to sail around the Mediterranean on every corner."

- Alvar Aalto was one of the guests on Daphne and their lifelong friendship, which had existed since 1952, was the basis for Schildt's main work, the biography of Aalto.

From 1941 to 1964 he was married to the glass artist Mona Morales-Schildt (1908-1999), the daughter of a Spanish father and a Swedish mother, and then married Christine (also: Kristina) Schildt.

In 1965 Goran Schildt bought a second home on the Greek island of Leros. Here he came into direct contact with Greek culture and Daphne got a new home port. Today the restored Daphne is on display in the Forum Marinum in Turku . Schildt's travel books were published by FA Brockhaus-Verlag, Wiesbaden .

Daphne

Schildt's boat Daphne is a ketch built by Jarl Lindblom in 1936 for Oscar Mustelin and his family at the Åbo shipyard . She was initially rigged as a gaff schooner . After a short time he sold the ship to Uno Tennberg, who had it converted into a ketch for easier handling.

It has a length over the stern of 10.7 m and 8.7 m length of the waterline . The ship is made entirely of Brazilian peroba wood ( Aspidosperma peroba ), which is similar to teak in terms of strength and value retention . The width is 2.75 m, the draft 1.55 m, the water displacement is 6.5 t . The motor glider was initially equipped with a 16 hp Olympic diesel engine made in Finland. It was later exchanged for a petroleum engine, as this fuel was available in every fishing village. It only needed a little diesel fuel for the start process. The total sail area is 46 m ² ; Schildt had 12 sails at his disposal. In addition to mizzen , mainsail and jib, a storm mainsail of the Ljungström type , a wide jib, genoa and a staysail that could be set from the mizzen top at the foot of the main mast. There was also a sun sail and several headsails .

The aft saloon last planned by Ericsson as the owner's salon was used by Schildts as a guest cabin for occasional guests traveling with them. They themselves lived in the foredeck, where the pantry is also located with a standing height of 1.90 m. In the middle between the two masts is the cockpit , below the engine room. In the foredeck with a separate entrance there is storage space for ropes, fenders , buckets etc. as well as the toilet.

Schildt acquired the boat from his friend Christoffer H. Ericsson , a Finnish writer and maritime historian, probably in 1947 with the inheritance of his grandmother - his father had died at the age of 36 at Göran's eighth year. Ericsson was also probably the most experienced ocean sailor in Finland. Göran Schildt was the fourth owner of the boat.

Schildt's illness forced him to sell Daphne in 1984. This marked the beginning of a difficult period in the history of the boat. In the Caribbean it was torn to shreds by a hurricane, in Florida it was crushed under a container and then mistaken for a high plank. It finally came back to Finland in an adventurous way, where it was extensively restored and is now on display in the Forum Marinum Museum.

Christine och Göran Schildts stiftelse

The positive experiences that Schildt had gained with Aalto's foundation encouraged him to set up a foundation himself with the fortune accumulated over the course of his life. It has the purpose of the Finnish-Greek cultural exchange. The main goal of the Christine and Göran Schildt Foundation is to strengthen cultural contacts between the Mediterranean and Finland and to secure the legacy of Alvar Aalto. These two topics were implemented by Göran Schildt. Today the foundation houses a large number of archaeological cultural objects from Greece as well as many exhibits of his friend Alvar Aalto.

The foundation's activities today are primarily exhibitions, publications, lectures and seminars, but also smaller research projects in collaboration with science. The archives of Göran Schildt, which are open to everyone, provide a basis for those interested. Exhibitions and programs are held in the yellow wooden house at 7 Östra strandgatan.

Honors

• 1981 Svenska Akademiens Finlandspris
• 1991 Tollanderska priset

Works (selection)

German translations

Travel literature

• 1954 In the wake of Odysseus, Brockhaus
• 1955 The dream trip, Brockhaus
• 1957 The Sun Boat, Brockhaus
• 1959 The Sea of ​​Ikaros, Brockhaus
• 1965 The golden fleece , FA Brockhaus, Wiesbaden
  • 1969 The golden fleece. On the trail of the Argonauts . Fischer paperback no.1022, Frankfurt am Main 1969
• 1971 "Sailing in the Mediterranean - 20 years on the road with Daphne" Wiesbaden, Brockhaus 1971.
• 1978 My life on Leros , FA Brockhaus, Wiesbaden 1978, ISBN 3-7653-0293-7 .

Non-fiction

• 1961 Finnish architecture, Porvoo, Söderström
• 1970 Finnish sculpture, Frankfurt am Main, Ullstein

Original editions

• 1946 Gide ochomanniskan, en study. Stockholm, Wahlström & Widstrand.
• 1954 Tre veckor i Sovjet. Helsingfors, Söderström.
• 1962 Alvar Aalto. Jyväskylä, KJ Gummerus.
• 1966 Loggbok. Stockholm-Rapallo, Stockholm, Wahlström & Widstrand.
• 1972 Luonnoksia, Aalto, Alvar . Helsinki, Otava.
  • 1978 English: Sketches. Alvar Aalto . The MIT Press, Cambridge Massachusetts, USA, ISBN 0-262-01053-4 .
• 1989 Alvar Aalto, the mature years, Volume 3. New York, Rizzoli.
• 1998 Alvar Aalto: master works. New York Universe Pub. (English edition), ISBN 0-78930131-8 .
• 2003 Vinterkriget som fars. En ung mans dagbok 1939–1945. Söderström, Helsingfors, ISBN 951-52-2120-X .
• 2007 Apollon i Daphnes famn Kruskopf, Erik. Helsingfors Söderström, ISBN 978-951-52-2479-8 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Göran Schildt in the catalog of the German National Library
• svenska.yle.fi/arkivet: Göran Schildt's biography (Swedish video)
• Christine och Göran Schildts stiftelse
• Detailed life report on Schildt by AC Antoniades
• Image of the Daphne in Turku

Individual evidence

1. ↑ randomhouse.de
2. ↑ Villa Schildt  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ^ Schildt, Göran (1917–2009). National biography of Finland.
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Villa Schildt, Schildts stiftelse
5. ↑ ^{a b} Göran Schildt: In the wake of Odysseus, Brockhaus 1954, p. 18f.
6. ↑ According to the drawing in the book, the toilet bowl is shown aft.
7. ↑ http://www.saunalahti.fi/~borgbros/artiklar/daphne.html
8. ↑ tarantella.fi (Swedish)
9. ↑ Benjamin Knopman: Balladen om Daphne  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. in Västra Nyland (Swedish)