My RSS Feeds
Hando Runnel, Estonian poet
I have heard that Tallin, capital of Estonia is a beautiful place and I wanted to know a bit more as I would love to visit the Baltic states. It turns out that Tallin and Estonia are truly beautiful and filled with things to see, particularly if you're into cultural things. Photo taking will be easy, the city seems to do all the work.
I had never heard a word about Estonian literature, but it seems to be very alive and well, trying to cross borders. Hoping I'm giving a small help, I've chosen a poem by Hardo Runnel (to which I believe I've changed the ending):
ART IS SHORT, LIFE IS LONG
rest is short, war is long,
honor is short, shame is long,
the tether is short, pleasure is long,
fear is short, lust is long,
memory is short, thought is long,
the song is short, the tale is long,
art is short, life is long.
A good one page introduction to Estonian literature and the Estonian literature webpage. The Tallin photo above comes from a webpage with some other interesting photos of Tallin, but I'm afraid I have no idea what the page is about. As far as fiction, Jaan Kross seems to be the only one translated into English, check out his books at Amazon and his life here.
I visited there when I was studying in Leningrad for a semester in 1990.
It was definitely a nice break from the drab soviet cityscapes of the time,
and had much more of a European feel even then.