Suomalainen jälkirealistinen romaani 1960-luvulta 2000-luvulle

• Milla Peltonen Turun yliopisto

DOI: https://doi.org/10.30665/av.74775

Abstract

Finnish postrealist novel from the 1960s to the 2000s

This article surveys the Finnish postrealist novel and its reformed mimetic conventions. Postrealism is regarded as a literary trend of our postmodern era, arising from the tradition of social realism written by some working-class writers. The main representatives of this new trend are Hannu Salama, Jussi Kylätasku and Keijo Siekkinen, whose novels from the 1960s to the 2000s are examined in this article.

The analysis of the novels reveals the double-rooting of Finnish postrealism in both real time and space and in the theory of realism. The novels re-write the theory of realism, namely its mimetic terms and conventions. Postrealism is based on the realization that ”reality” is something else than what it has been considered to be. Consequently, some mimetic conventions of traditional realism turn out to be invalid. They lose their power in reflecting the new social and cultural situation, i.e. postmodernity. So, while still trying to capture reality, postrealism also updates the earlier conventions. It changes, exposes and even criticizes them, especially the ideas of ” omniscient” narrator and tense plot.

This article shows postrealism to be a typical phenomenon of our highly reflexive postmodern era, endlessly reflecting its own conditions. In other words, it is a metafictional trend that does not hide its own fictionality. Unlike postmodernism, however, it has not lost confidence in extra-textual reality and its mimesis. It only confutes the naive faith in a fully organized world by objectively mirroring it, thus exposing its naivety.