Willy Kyrklund

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Willy Kyrklund

Willy Kyrklund , actually Paul Wilhelm Kyrklund (born February 27, 1921 in Helsinki , Finland , † June 27, 2009 in Danmark near Uppsala , Sweden ) was a Finnish-Swedish writer. As a member of the Finnish-Swedish minority, he wrote his literary work exclusively in Swedish.

biography

Kyrklund first grew up in Helsinki, at the age of 10 he moved with the family to Harlu in East Karelia . After graduating from high school in 1938, he began to study mathematics in Åbo (Finnish: Turku), but this was interrupted when he was drafted into military service in 1940. From 1944 Kyrklund lived in Sweden and initially worked as an office assistant at the building authority of the municipality of Lidingö near Stockholm. After the war he continued his university studies at Stockholm University, but with an emphasis on Semitic and Oriental languages. In 1953 he completed his studies with a master's degree. In 1945 Kyrklund had his first marriage (with Birgitta Ekwall), from 1982 he was married to Karin Kebbon for the second time.

plant

"Jag söker den fråga på vilkenmänniskolivet är ett svar."

"I'm looking for the question to which human life is an answer."

- Willy Kyrklund : Mästaren Ma (1952)

In the mid-1940s, Willy Kyrklund first emerged as an author. In 1948 he published his first volume of stories, Ångvälten . In 1951 one of his most popular works followed, the novel Solange . The fate of his main character, the young Solange, reflects the contradictions and dark sides of modern, de-individualized society - an important theme in the work of Kyrklund and the young generation of Swedish writers of the 1940s in general. The impossibility of an authentic and fulfilled life leads Solange to the edge of a lonely forest pond at the end of the novel. But her suicide at Kyrklund turns into an inconspicuous sedge .

Another basic feature of Kyrklund is heralded in Solange : the reference to the ancient myth, here to Ovid's Metamorphoses . This becomes the central theme in later works such as Polyfem förvandlad (1964) and Elpënor (1986) as well as in the drama Medea från Mbongo (1966). In general, the intertextual dimension is fundamental to Kyrklund's writing. His texts are often dialogical and thrive on the resistance they oppose to other, often canonical texts. This also applies to the story Mästaren Ma (1952, German: Master Ma ), which itself is designed as a dialogue of three voices and in which Kyrklund's knowledge of the oriental and especially Chinese literary heritage shows.

Parody and irony are the means with which Kyrklund pursues his literary educational work. The tragedy of human life is described in a distant but never callous manner, regardless of whether it is set in the Swedish people's home of the 1950s, in the archaic world of myth or in Confucian China. Rather, it reveals a spirit of resistance and pathetic defiance, which is also aware of its own ridiculousness - like Master Ma, the wisdom teacher from the story of the same name, who lets himself be shot into the sky with fireworks to escape human misery.

Works (selection)

Novels and short stories

  • Ångvälten (1948)
  • Tvåsam (1949)
  • As long as (1951)
  • Mästaren Ma (1952, German: Master Ma )
  • Polyfem förvandlad (1964)
  • Åtta variationer (1982)
  • Elpënor (1986)
  • Om godheten (1988, German: About the good )

Dramas

  • Från bröllopet till Medea (1967)

Awards

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Obituary in Svenska Dagbladet from June 27, 2009
  2. ↑ "Willy Kyrklund" Kindler's Literature Lexicon online  ( 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.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / web14.cedion.de  
  3. ↑ Herbert Kårlin "Willy Kyrklund and the existential philosophical literature of Sweden"
  4. ↑ "Willy Kyrklund. The narrative work" Kindler's Literature Lexicon online  ( 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.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / web14.cedion.de  
  5. ↑ Den svenska literatures, ed. v. Lars Lönnroth u. Sverker Göransson, Vol. 6, 1990, p. 37.
  6. ^ Scandinavian literary history, ed. v. Jürg Glauser, 2006, p. 286.
  7. ↑ Den svenska literatures, ed. v. Lars Lönnroth u. Sverker Göransson, Vol. 6, 1990, p. 37.
personal data
SURNAME Kyrklund, Willy
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kyrklund, Paul Wilhelm (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Finnish-Swedish writer
DATE OF BIRTH February 27, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH Helsinki
DATE OF DEATH June 27, 2009
Place of death Danmark near Uppsala , Sweden