Historia ja poetiikka Fredrika Runebergin ja Zacharias Topeliuksen historiallisissa romaaneissa

Abstract

Fredrika Runeberg ja Zacharias Topelius kirjoittivat Suomen kirjallisuuden ensimmäiset historialliset romaanit 1800-luvun puolivälissä. Historiallisessa romaanissa historiaa esitetään keinoin, jotka ovat ominaisia fiktiolle. Tutkimukseni keskeinen kysymys on, miten historiallisuus ja fiktiivisyys näkyvät tarkastelemissani historiallisissa romaaneissa ja vaikuttavat niiden kertomisen ja esittämisen tapoihin. Miten teoksissa vuorovaikuttavat historia, eli materiaalina oleva menneisyys, ja poetiikka, eli teoksen sisäiset säännönmukaisuudet?

Analyysi pureutuu historian fiktiivisen esittämisen tapoihin lähtökohtinaan narratologian oletukset kertovan tekstin rakenteesta. Tähän rakenteeseen kuuluu tarina­kerronta-suhteen sekä fiktion eri tasojen (kokeminen, kertominen, esittäminen) ja niitä vastaavien agenttien (henkilö, kertoja, sisäistekijä) tarkastelu. Kertomiseen ja esittämiseen liittyvät myös erilaiset diskursiiviset ja näkökulmia koskevat tarkastelut kuten vapaa epäsuora esitys. Yksittäisten teostulkintojen ohella tutkimuksella on kolme painoaluetta, jotka ovat historiallisen romaanin poetiikka, kertomuksen teorian käyttö ja testaaminen sekä teosten kirjoittamisajan estetiikan tarkastelu. Hahmottelen kirjoittamisajan estetiikkaa kirjallisuuskritiikeistä nähdäkseni, minkälaisia vaatimuksia ja rajoituksia se asetti historiallisille romaaneille.

Tutkimuksen keskeisenä periaatteena on dialogisuus, mikä tarkoittaa, että teosanalyysit ja teoria (teoria tarkoittaen sekä historiallisen romaanin teoriaa että narratologiaa) pyritään jatkuvasti asettamaan rinnakkain ja saattamaan keskusteluun keskenään. Tutkimuksen sisältöä ja rakennetta eivät yksin määrää teosten tarjoamat tulkintamahdollisuudet eivätkä myöskään teoreettiset kysymyksen, vaan ohjaavana periaatteena on niiden välisten yhtymäkohtien löytyminen.

Tutkimus osoittaa, että Runeberg ja Topelius jo historiallisen romaanin alkuaikoina löysivät sellaisia kerronnallisia ratkaisuja sekä erilaisten periaatteiden yhdistelmiä, joita myöhemmät teoreetikot eivät ole ottaneet huomioon. Jotkin kirjallisuushistorialliset tendenssit, kuten muutokset tietoisuuden esittämisen tavoissa teosten kirjoittamisen aikaan, toteutuvat ainakin osassa tarkasteltavia teoksia. Tutkimukseni perusteella näyttää siltä, että jotkin muodot, kuten vapaa epäsuora esitys, joita monet kirjallisuushistoriallisesti pitävät teosten kirjoittamisaikaan vielä melko uusina ja jopa poikkeuksellisina, olivat jo monipuolisessa käytössä suomalaisessa kirjallisuudessa.

Tutkittavat teokset käyttävät historiallista materiaalia monin eri tavoin, eivätkä nämä tavat tietenkään ole ainoat mahdolliset. Merkittävää on, että suhteessa historiallisuuteen ja eri aikatasoihin käsitellyt romaanit edustavat erilaisia näkemyksiä. Historia voi yhtä lailla olla sisäistekijän näkemyksen hallitsema, tiettyyn päätepisteeseen suuntautuva, ennalta määrätty kehityskulku kuin rinnakkaisina, verrannollisina ja ristiriitaisina olemisen tapoina näyttäytyvä tila. Menneisyyden suhde nykyisyyteen voi syntyä niin kertomuksellisen jatkumon kuin rinnastuksienkin kautta. Useat tutkimistani romaaneista reflektoivat historiankirjoittamisen kysymyksiä ja tuovat esiin myös historian uudelleen merkityksellistämisen mahdollisuuden. Siten ne kyseenalaistavat näkemyksen, jonka mukaan 1800-luvun historiallinen romaani pyrki häivyttämään historian esittämisen ongelmallisuuden sekä historian ja fiktion välisen suhteen kompleksisuuden.

Historiallisen romaanin erityisyys ­ jota voisi lajin poetiikaksikin kutsua ­ nousee tutkimuksessani esiin useissa esittämiseen ja kertomiseen liittyvissä tavoissa, joista narratologia on esittänyt oletuksia ­ toki usein ristiriitaisia myös ei-historiallisen fiktion suhteen. Historiallinen romaani on erityinen esimerkiksi kerronnan järjestykseen liittyvien kysymysten suhteen. Historiallisen romaanin kohdalla näyttää myös siltä, etteivät referentiaalinen ja poeettinen välttämättä ole ristiriidassa keskenään: yhtä hyvin kuin referentiaalisuus voi olla teoksen sisäisen rakenteen luomaa, voi poeettisuus syntyä juuri suhteesta historiaan pohjatekstinä.

History and Poetics in Fredrika Runeberg s and Zacharias Topelius Historical Novels

The historical novel is a borderline case between narrative fiction and historical narrative. Therefore, it is a fertile ground for examining the characteristics of narrative and the distinguishing characteristics of fiction. My research analyses the first historical novels in Finland in order to establish their character as narratives in which features of both fictional and historical presentation are present. The multilevel temporal structure of the historical novel has interesting effects on the narrative structure. It is in the temporal tensions between characters, a narrator, and an implied author, that the distinctive nature of the historical novel is to be found. The historical novels studied are those written by Fredrika Runeberg and Zacharias Topelius. Runeberg wrote two historical novels, Fru Catharina Boije och hennes döttrar ("Lady Catharina Boije and Her Daughters" 1858) and Sigrid Liljeholm (1862); both of them are included in the corpus. Zacharias Topelius published several historical novels, three of which have been chosen for analysis: Hertiginnan af Finland ("The Dutchess of Finland" 1850), Fältskärns berättelser (The Surgeon´s Stories 1853-1867) and Konungens handske ("The King´s Glove" 1863). Topelius has been regarded as one of the first and most influential writers to engage in the creation of Finnish history. Runeberg, on the one hand, can be connected with the tradition of strong female novelists, although she did indeed write in the male dominated genre of the historical novel. Neither Topelius' nor Runeberg's historical novels have previously been studied with a formal approach concentrating on the ways in which they narrate and represent history in fictional form. In each of the selected novels theoretical issues connected to their historical nature are analysed. The methods of the research come mainly from narratology, both classical and post-classical especially feminist, Bahtinian and rhetorical. Yet, narratology is not only a methodology used, but also an object of critical scrutiny. The theory of the historical novel as a genre is also discussed, likewise theories of historiography and the philosophy of history. In addition to analyses of the novels my research has three focal points: the poetics of the historical novel, the benefits and restrictions of narratology, and the aesthetics of the mid 19th century.

My research is based on the principle of dialogue, that is, the analyses of the novels and theoretical interests are constantly placed side by side and in dialogue with each other. The structure of the research is determined by the points of intersection between the novels and the theory. Poetics traditionally means studying the conditions and systematic features of literature, and creating a general model which individual texts are supposed to follow. I agree with some later views that consider any literary work to engage in a dialogue with the general model. In my research both narratology and poetics in general are considered to be systems open for the influence of the novels analysed. According to my research, the historical novel has a distinctive narrative structure that questions some of the classical narratological assumptions. The novels analysed also call into question the principal opposition between referentiality and fictionality. The referentiality of a story may be created within a novel by fictional means; also, a special poetics of a novel may be born out of history as a subtext. The narrator's relation to the story and the narratee may in historical novels come close to that of a historian, which is homodiegetic. This effect is created in Hertiginnan af Finland as the narrator assumes the same diegetic level with the historical characters depicted. Yet, the narrator is not restricted by rules normally governing homodiegetic narration. The narrator's retrospective look at the (historical) story-world populated by the characters allows him to penetrate the character's minds and also to move freely both in time and place. Still, the narrator is not "omniscient", as he is not the creator of the world depicted. The gaps in the narrator's knowledge of the historical story-world only add to the effect of referentiality, as a historical world is epistemologically restricted as opposed to a fictional world, which is ontologically restricted. Free indirect discourse (FID) is a narrative mode often discussed in connection with the fact/fiction-dichotomy. All the novels analysed in my research include passages of FID, and the mode is used in several ways. In some cases it is strongly contextualized by a narrator, other times not; some occurrences indicate sympathy, others irony between a narrator and a character. FID can moreover include two voices, or belong to just one agent (mockingly) imitating the other. In some novels, like Sigrid Liljeholm, FID is used in order to enable different voices to emerge and to make interpretations contradicting the narrator's view. In others, like Fältskärns berättelser, it is used in an environment that denies real polyphony.

With historical novels it is of particular interest that FID is often seen as a mode which makes it possible to present a fictional mind in an immediate present position. As the deictic indicators of time in FID belong to a character's discourse, but the tenses to a narrator's, the mode moves between these points of time and is able to mediate them. Fru Catharina Boije och hennes döttrar especially uses variable forms of depicting fictional and historical minds. The novel demonstrates the ability of an historical novel to mix different points of time and narrative positions as the heterodiegetic narrator not only moves in time and place but also observes the story-world individually. By using a paste tense but deictic adverbs pointing to the present the novel is able to approach the characters in the story-time, but at the same time maintain referentiality and a retrospective view by mentioning historical dates and details. The historical novel is also a special case also in regard to the order of narrative. For example, the distinction between internal and external prolepsis is obscured, as the reference might not be the story-world but the historical. Iterative passages, too, are not always generalizing in nature, as they may gain historical significance. The novels by the two authors studied represent different kinds of insights into historicity and ways of relating the narrative and temporal levels. History may be depicted equally well as solid, teleological and predestined as represent contradiction and parallel possibilities. Some connections between ideologies and form can be found. Topelius' Hertiginnan af Finland and Fältskärns berättelser use overt, authoritarian narrators and a monophonic rhetoric in order to represent a linear, coherent and teleological history. Runeberg's Fru Catharina Boije och hennes döttrar and Sigrid Liljeholm use indirect means of narrating and representing in order to depict history which includes interpretative conflicts and open questions. The same is also true of Topelius' Konungens handske. Aesthetics at the time of writing the novels made demands on literature, some of which the historical novel as a genre was able to meet. There was an aspiration towards depicting reality which in historical novels was easily met by the historical story material. At the same time, historical material offered an opportunity for exotic and adventurous happenings, thus avoiding the danger of being too close to the every-day life and becoming dull. Technically, critics favoured "showing" before "telling", as objectivity was a desirable impression. Yet, at the same time, literature was to teach a clear moral lesson. Topelius's novels with their strong authorial narrative voice responded to the demand for writing Finland a history of its own, and conveying a moral world view. Runeberg's novels with the implicit strategies used and controversial history depicted were not always understood by the contemporary critics.

The novels analysed in my research prove to be surprisingly modern in regard to narrative techniques. Runeberg's novels especially have several reflexive levels which produce interpretative metalevels. Some developments in literary history, for example the development of different modes of rendering consciousness in novels, are exemplified. It seems that some modes, like FID, which are regarded as having been new and exceptional at the time of writing, were already in versatile use in Finnish literature.