THE GREAT EXHIBITION

Author: Marie Hermanson
Year: 2018
Publisher: Albert Bonniers Förlag
Language: Swedish 

By 1923, Gothenburg on the Swedish west coast had established itself as the second city of the realm and following the success of the Stockholm Expo of 1897 and the Baltic Expo in Malmö 1914, the political leadership in this port city was eager to show that their city was ready to play in the big league.  The 300 year anniversary of Gothenburg two years earlier coincided with the Nobel Prize in physics being awarded to Albert Einstein and it was decided that Einstein, who had been prevented from collecting his prize money until then, would give his Nobel lecture in Gothenburg during the exhibition. He arrived in the spring of 1923 amid political unrest, economic distress, and a sharp rise of anti-semitic sentiments raging in his native Germany.

This sets the stage for Marie Hermanson’s latest suspense novel “Den stora utställningen” (not available in English but a verbatim translation would be “The Great Exhibition”). It is a composite story of historical facts mixed with the spawn of the author’s imagination seamlessly sewn together to what ends up being a rather satisfying tale. From the angles of four different observers who are all in one way or another involved with the exhibition, the fabric is woven in an accessible, entertaining, and interesting way. Otto, who is the only person who tells his story from the first perspective, reminisces about his childhood in the 1920s. Einstein himself is another voice, engulfed in what turns out to be a fight for survival. The last two, Ellen the journalist and Nils the police constable, are fictitious characters.  

Similar to how it is sometimes liberating to squeeze in an odd pizza or chocolate bar between elaborate culinary masterpieces it is sometimes liberating to squeeze in an odd pizza or chocolate bar or how the emotional depths probed by Mahler’s symphonies or Mozart’s Requiem occasionally benefit from being interrupted by the less demanding tunes of Ariana Grande or Robbie Williams, the world of literature, too, has plenty of room for folksy entertainment. Shelves at bookstores around the world buckle under the weight of crime fiction, fantasy, up lit, and romance. As in all other genres, the quality is highly uneven and chances are that more often than not the book you pick at random will turn out to be a dud.

Last time I read a book written for entertainment purposes only was in October 2018 where I allowed myself to suffer through the agony of making acquaintance with one of Britain’s most celebrated scribbler, whose name I will graciously omit. This time around, I had been more scrupulous in my selection when I cuddled up on the sofa in my snuggery to read Hermanson.

It paid off. Even though “Den stora utställningen” is probably best characterised as suspense fiction, the plot is neither novel nor unpredictable and as suspense goes, it was far from spine-chilling. Still, this is exactly part of the charm of this book. It chugs along at a moderate pace which allows the reader to enjoy the scenery comfortably seated as if in a railway car during a soothing ride through the comely vastness of a countryside landscape. There are no sudden stops or sharp turns, and although a modest degree of acceleration can be felt toward the climax of the book the experience is still closer to a Ferris wheel than a rollercoaster.

Particular accolade is due for Hermanson’s research in preparation of this book. Geographical accuracy and historical events are smartly anchored in the story. Gorgeous little details such as the latest music hits playing in the background contribute to my trust in the author and I have no hesitation to splash into the polished and temperate authenticity of the novel’s universe.  

As much as I regretted my choice in 2018, I am equally satisfied with having read Hermanson in 2020. Hers is not a production that will be remembered by posterity, but in the moment it is deliciously gratifying.  Her place in the history of literature is that of a chocolate bar’s at a World Exhibition.

 

A TICKING BOMB

Author: Linnéa Lindquist
Year: 2020
Publisher: Books on Demand
Language: Swedish 

Public education is arguably the most crucial issue for Western society right now; not least for Sweden. How is it possible that a 15-year-old can graduate primary school without knowing the difference between the government and the parliament? Why do we teach our children to question but not to analyse? How come the terms fact and opinion have been conflated? Who benefits from education being biased toward the mediocre rich at the expense of the brilliant poor?

Anybody who has spent ten minutes discussing political issues on social media will have suffered the bastard monstrosity that is generated from the fusion between ignorance and misguided fortitude. The right to question without a corresponding obligation to understand, interbred with obtuseness and misbegotten loquacity is cute in a five-year-old, embarrassing in a 25-year-old, and calamitous in thousands and thousands of grown-ups in all spheres of our community. If you wish to see the failure of the educational system for yourself, log in to Twitter and in seconds you will be engulfed by it.  

In my personal analysis, which I have mentioned on earlier occasions but do not have enough data to firmly support, society’s ongoing alienation from knowledge is at the core of the matter. The gap between the accumulated knowledge as produced by our science and research institutions on the one hand and the average Joe on the other has expanded to unbridgeable proportions. In simple terms, people no longer know how little they know. We are all capable to comprehend the complexity of a car engine and we have a reasonable understanding of the ratio of our knowledge to that of a trained mechanic. When it comes to social science, pharmacology, evo-devo, geology, and many other scholarly disciplines, however, the rift between what we know, what we think there is to know, and what humanity actually knows, has widened to a virtual canyon. The segregation between those who know and those who do not know is widening daily at the same pace as science makes progress. And, not surprisingly, the asymmetric distribution of knowledge seems to follow the ancient and essentially indelible boundaries of the distribution of wealth, i.e. social class.

An increasing number of observers in the Kingdom of Sweden argue that this problem is exacerbated by the rapidly growing presence of publicly funded private schools. One of the most vocal of these observers and one who has received a considerable amount of attention in the last months is Linnéa Lindquist who, besides being a close personal friend of mine, is a Swedish primary school principal, recognised pundit, and tireless activist. In her recently published book, she calls the ballooning educational segregation “a ticking bomb”, which is also the title.

From the vantage point in her vast experience as a teacher and principal in socially disadvantaged areas around Stockholm and Gothenburg, she has written a devastating testimony about the Swedish school system. This short read of a mere 102 pages takes a few hours to read but is rife with insights and observations from half a lifetime in the service to education. The book covers all aspects of the reality of the modern school such as financing, recruitments, language didactics, and free school meals. Lindquist connects the dots which all lead to the centre-right government’s 1992 decision to open the publicly funded school system up for private entrepreneurs. A decision whose effects were exacerbated by the centre-left government’s decision two years later to even out the funding per student for all types of schools.

Much of the debate from the left so far has been focused on the ethics of allowing private investors to profit from a publicly funded welfare institution that furthermore is mandatory for all residents until the age of 15. Lindquist, however, puts the purpose of the school in the centre of her argument and pokes her finger in all the wounds the current school system has inflicted on education: how instead of students choosing their schools, the schools choose their students; how the high turnover of students at municipal schools depresses the school’s funding and increases its costs. There are many other examples.  

One of the most touching episodes is where Lindquist writes how provoking it is to her each time a sports club or cultural association approaches her with proposals of coming to her school in the suburbs to offer the students pro bono workshops in dance or graffiti painting as if that is what youngsters in “da hood” (my term, not the author’s) really crave, rather than proper Swedish language skills. “I wonder if headmasters in Östermalm [a well-to-do borough of Stockholm, my remark] receive as many propositions about graffiti and dancing for their pupils”, Lindquist quips. My thoughts go to the community or writers and novelists. How often do they avail themselves to schools to help nudge the youth in the general direction of the written and spoken word.

I agree with what I understand to be Lindquist’s argument that it is irrelevant who runs the schools: be it the state, the municipalities, associations, congregations, or private investors as long as the outcome of the schooling system as a nationwide whole is not compromised. Hers is a holistic view and, despite frequently citing examples from her own schools and students, is little concerned with anecdotal evidence or local issues. “En tickande bomb” is not a critique of individual schools, but of the system that allows or forces schools to act in one way or another.

At present, the reaction to the current market-driven school system in Sweden is snowballing and even some of its architects are beginning to doubt the efficacy of putting money ahead of children. “En tickande bomb” is one of those books that are born from a movement but it is also powerful enough to help steer the direction of the debate. No matter where you are on the political left-right spectrum, this book will give you access to the wisdom of an education professional. What you do with it and what your priorities are may depend on your political persuasions, but I strongly suggest that we leave disregarding reality to the incorrigibly asinine clodpates on Twitter