NOTE ON THE INFLUENCE OF FINNISH POETRY IN ENGLISH LITERATURE

The subject of Finnish poetry ought to have a special interest for the Japanese student, if only for the reason that Finnish poetry comes more closely in many respects to Japanese poetry than any other form of Western poetry.  Indeed it is supposed that the Finnish race is more akin to the Tartar races, and therefore probably to the Japanese, than the races of Europe proper.  Again, through Longfellow, the value of Finnish poetry to English poetry was first suggested, and I think you know that Longfellow’s Indian epic, “The Song of Hiawatha,” was modelled entirely upon the Finnish “Kalevala.”

But a word about the “Kalevala,” which has a very interesting history.  I believe you know that at the beginning of the nineteenth century, the “Kalevala” was not known to exist.  During the first half of the century, Finnish scholars in the University of Helsingfors (where there is now a great and flourishing university) began to take literary interest in the popular songs of Finland.  For years the people had been singing extraordinary songs full of a strange beauty and weirdness quite unlike any other popular songs of Europe; and for centuries professional singers had been wandering about the country teaching these songs to the accompaniment of a kind of biwa called Kantela.  The scholars of the University began to collect these songs from the mouths of the peasants and musicians—­at first with great difficulty, afterwards with much success.  The difficulty was a very curious one.  In Finland the ancient pagan religion had really never died; the songs of the peasants were full of allusions to the old faith and the old gods, and the orthodox church had often attempted in vain to prevent the singing of these songs, because they were not Christian.  So the peasants at first thought that the scholars who wanted to copy the songs were government spies or church spies who wanted evidence to justify punishments.  When the fears of the people had been removed and when they came to understand that the questioners were only scholars interested in literary beauty, all the secret stores of songs were generously opened, and an immense collection of oral literature was amassed in the University at Helsingfors.

The greatest of the scholars engaged in the subsequent work of arranging and classifying was Doctor Loennrot.  While examining the manuscript of these poems he was struck by the fact that, put together in a particular order, they naturally made one great continuous story or epic.  Was it possible that the Finnish people had had during all these centuries an epic unknown to the world of literature?  Many persons would have ridiculed the idea.  But Loennrot followed up that idea, and after some years’ study he disengaged from all that mass of song something in the shape of a wonderful epic, the epic of the “Kalevala.”  Loennrot was probably, almost certainly, the only