For
a couple of years or more I have been formulating in my mind a basic storyline
for a novel. I must say that, among types of literature, the novel is not my
preference. However, there are some things that you can say in a novel that you
are not able to say in another type of writing.
At
first, I wanted this novel to be loosely based on my ancestor’s lives in Sweden
leading up to their emigration to America; then including their early lives in Wisconsin. There are some wonderful stories of my mother’s family’s lives
that should be told.
However, since I have wanted the story to be mostly an
allegory, it could not be tied too closely to the actual history of these
folks. I would have to take too many liberties with the actual facts to make it
fair to them.
Because
of this, I will make no claims to the family history aspect of the story,
although I will say that it is their history that is inspiring me in this task.
The allegory aspect is the most important to me, since there is a story that I
want to tell through it.
From
time to time, I may include on this blog a portion of this first manuscript attempt,
as I am doing this week; or perhaps some interesting historical fact I have
learned in researching this project.
I am also asking your help in this. Even
though the family history may be far from correct, I do wish to keep the actual
history of national and cultural events as accurate as possible. If you see a
mistake or an anachronism, I would appreciate your input.
Thanks.
Here then, is the first part of the very first chapter.
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introduction to ANDERS JOHANSSON
It
was almost startling how early in the day the darkness came. The time was only about 2:30 in the afternoon, but already it was difficult for the man walking
in the failing light of evening to make out the trail back to his cabin. As the
man picked his way through the dark shadows of nightfall, he stumbled once on a
limb that had broken off of a tree and was lying in the darkness across the
path. He slipped a bit in the snow and it was only with some difficulty that he managed to regain his balance and
keep himself from falling all the way to the ground.
The
walker was named Anders Johansson, and the place was the midlands of Sweden. More
specifically, it was in the province of Värmland, and the year was 1874.
The
darkness at this hour of the day had taken Anders almost by surprise, as if it were
something out of the ordinary. But Anders knew that the early sunset should not
have been unexpected. It was winter, and at these latitudes, the daylight hours
were always fleeting at this time of the year.
Nevertheless,
even though he knew this fact, it was every year that Anders seemed to be taken
aback by the early sunset. He was caught unawares by this because of
the stark contrast that there was between the winter and the summer months. In
the summer, the situation was just the reverse. The sun barely even set below
the horizon in the summer; and true darkness only lasted a couple of hours. But
now, in the winter, there were a mere five or six hours of daylight, making
the day seem almost over as soon as it had begun.
Anders
reached the front step of his little cabin and stomped his boots to get rid of
as much snow as he could before opening the door. He lived alone, so there was
no warming and cheering fire waiting for him in the hearth. No smoke coming out
of the chimney. The inside of the cabin would be cold. In fact, once he stepped
inside, it seemed to him colder inside the cabin than it did outside. It wasn’t
really, but when one enters a house in the winter, almost instinctively he
expects it to be warm. When it is not, the coldness seems all the more intense.
Every
evening this winter, when Anders returned to his cabin and felt the coldness
even inside his home, his memory returned to another specific winter, just a
few years ago. In this region of Sweden, that
winter of the past was now remembered as the Winter of the Great Hunger. He had
barely survived that year. Many people he knew did not. Even some of his own
family had succumbed to the starvation of that time.
Anders
shivered inside of his cold cabin, but it was not only the temperature that
made him tremble. Despite the fact that that winter of hunger was some years in
the past, the memory of it still made him shudder.
Just
as the early darkness caught him a bit unawares, so did these nagging and
distressing remembrances of that frigid winter of starvation. Anders had not
thought much about it in the winters that immediately had followed that one,
only in that he was glad that it was over. However, this year, he was haunted by
the memories. He did not know why those thoughts suddenly made a return, nor
could he shake the visions of the past that came to him.
In
his mind he saw the emaciated bodies of his family, their eyes bereft of hope.
In the village he had even seen a child sitting pitilessly in the snow by the edge
of the road. His fingers were raw and red. The child had been so hungry that he
had been gnawing on his own hands.
Anders
quickly busied himself with getting a fire started in the large, open fireplace
that dominated one end of his cabin. He did this mostly, of course, because he
wanted to warm up his cabin as quickly as possible. However, if he were
completely honest with himself, he knew that hurrying himself in the task would
occupy his mind and let him put out of mind those harsh remembrances.