Annika Idström (12 November 1947,

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

— 20 September 2011, Helsinki) was a

Finnish Finnish may refer to: * Something or someone from, or related to Finland * Culture of Finland * Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland * Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people * Finnish cuisine See also ...

author,

dramaturg A dramaturge or dramaturg is a literary adviser or editor in a theatre, opera, or film company who researches, selects, adapts, edits, and interprets scripts, libretti, texts, and printed programmes (or helps others with these tasks), consults auth ...

, and translator.

Early life and education

Ilse Annika Idström was born to a Swedish-speaking family in Helsinki, and went to school at the private,

Swedish language Swedish ( ) is a North Germanic language spoken predominantly in Sweden and in parts of Finland. It has at least 10 million native speakers, the fourth most spoken Germanic language and the first among any other of its type in the Nordic countr ...

''Laguska Skolan'', graduating in 1968. Afterwards, she studied scriptwriting at the University of Art and Design Helsinki (now part of the

Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture Aalto is a Finnish surname meaning "wave". Notable people with the surname include: * Aino Aalto (1894–1949), Finnish architect and designer * Alec Aalto (1942–2018), Finnish diplomat * Alvar Aalto (1898–1976), Finnish architect and design ...

), graduating in 1974.

Literary works

Despite being a

Swedish-speaking Finn The Swedish-speaking population of Finland (whose members are called by many names; fi, suomenruotsalainen) can be used as an attribute., group=Note—see below; sv, finlandssvenskar; fi, suomenruotsalaiset) is a linguistic minority in Finl ...

by background, Idström wrote mostly in the

Finnish language Finnish ( endonym: or ) is a Uralic language of the Finnic branch, spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. Finnish is one of the two official languages of Finland (the other being Swedish ...

, due to her strong relationship with her Finnish-speaking grandmother. Her debut novel was ''Sinitaivas'' (1980) ( 'Blue Sky'). Idström's breakthrough work is considered to be ''Veljeni Sebastian'' ('My Brother Sebastian') (1985). That, along with another notable novel of hers, ''Kirjeitä Trinidadiin'' (1989) ('Letters to Trinidad'), were nominated for the

Finlandia Prize The Finlandia Prize ( fi, Finlandia-palkinto; sv, Finlandiaprisen) is a set of Finnish literary prizes awarded by the Finnish Book Foundation to "celebrate reading and highlight new Finnish first-rate literature." Considered the most prestigious ...

literary award. She wrote five novels, several TV and radio dramas, as well as translating

prose Prose is a form of written or spoken language that follows the natural flow of speech, uses a language's ordinary grammatical structures, or follows the conventions of formal academic writing. It differs from most traditional poetry, where the f ...

and poetry from

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and

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into Finnish. Often writing in the

voice The human voice consists of sound made by a human being using the vocal tract, including talking, singing, laughing, crying, screaming, shouting, humming or yelling. The human voice frequency is specifically a part of human sound production in ...

of a child, Idström's output centred on strong emotions such as hatred and violence, as well as family relations. Her works were unconventional in approach, dealing with dark and difficult themes, and blurring the boundary between internal and external observations.

Non-writing career

In 1976–1977, Idström ran the ' literary association. From 1984 to 1986, she lectured in Finnish language and literature at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

. She also worked as a freelance director in the drama department of the Finnish

public broadcaster Public broadcasting involves radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. Public broadcasters receive funding from diverse sources including license fees, individual contributions, public financing ...

Yle Yleisradio Oy (Finnish, literally "General Radio Ltd." or "General Broadcast Ltd."; abbr. Yle ; sv, Rundradion Ab, italics=no), translated to English as the Finnish Broadcasting Company, is Finland's national public broadcasting company, founde ...

Honours and awards

In 1985, Idström received the Finnish State Literature Prize ('). In 1996, she was awarded the ' medal of the

Order of the Lion of Finland The Order of the Lion of Finland ( fi, Suomen Leijonan ritarikunta; sv, Finlands Lejons orden) is one of three official orders in Finland, along with the Order of the Cross of Liberty and the Order of the White Rose of Finland. The President o ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Idström, Annika Finnish writers Finnish women writers Finnish dramatists and playwrights Finnish women dramatists and playwrights Finnish translators Swedish-speaking Finns Writers from Helsinki 1947 births 2011 deaths Pro Finlandia Medals of the Order of the Lion of Finland