Hajamuistelmia pakolaiselämästä by Aatto Sirén
Hajamuistelmia pakolaiselämästä by Aatto Sirén is a collection of memoir sketches written in the early 20th century. The work offers impressionistic vignettes of a Finnish Red refugee’s flight into Russia and his everyday life among exile communities, blending personal observation with social critique and travel notes from revolutionary Russia. Its likely focus is the Finnish Civil War’s aftermath, the journey to places like Petrograd and Bui, and the improvised institutions, barter, and
morale of refugees. The opening of this memoir presents the pieces as personal impressions rather than formal history, then drops into the charged atmosphere on the eve of the Finnish Civil War, the narrator’s surprise at how quickly conflict erupted, and a debate over whether the “catastrophe” could have been averted. It traces his hazardous, roundabout travel east as rail lines are cut and German forces advance, his reach to Viipuri and onward to Petrograd, and a stark contrast between the gaudy opulence of tsarist palaces and their new life as museums and people’s parks. The narrative then follows a refugee train to Bui, sketches the disease-ravaged legacy of a former POW camp, and depicts a Finnish settlement mired in quarrels over rations, idleness, and petty profiteering—offset by competent medical care and the communal balm of the sauna. Finally, it portrays a self-contained factory community (“Salama”) with committees, its own services, and a barter economy, lists the narrator’s multiple roles from feldsher to supply chief, and closes with a reverie linking the Kostroma region to ancient Finnic migrations. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
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About this eBook
| Author | Sirén, Aatto, 1873-1955 |
|---|---|
| Title | Hajamuistelmia pakolaiselämästä |
| Original Publication | Helsinki: Työväen Sanomalehti Osakeyhtiö, 1923. |
| Credits | Anna Siren and Tapio Riikonen |
| Language | Finnish |
| LoC Class | DK: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: Russia, Former Soviet Republics, Poland |
| Subject | Finland -- History -- Civil War, 1918 -- Refugees |
| Category | Text |
| EBook-No. | 78096 |
| Release Date | Mar 2, 2026 |
| Copyright Status | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 4749 downloads in the last 30 days. |
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