I don’t usually judge critics for the simple reason that I strongly believe that to like or dislike a piece of art is a totally personal decision and I have often doubted expressions, such as, "This is a classic!" After all, as the German conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler said, “It is a mistake to believe that a critic is there to be right. It exists for one and only reason: to start a conversation about a piece of art. Without conversation you can not shape an opinion.”

However, after reading a small article in the last issue of the Finnish magazine SixDegrees, the ignorance of the writer, which I hoped had naïve motives, has forced me to write about an unfair expression of opinion regarding Finnish literature. The article is written by Mrs. Anna Shepherd and dealt with the difficulty of translating Finnish literature into other languages, plus the way some books have been brought to foreign readers.

She uses examples, such as Väinö Linna’s The Unknown Soldier, improvising - I cannot think for a better word - that the book ‘exists as an English-language action thriller, even though the Finnish original is known for its realistic characters and critical views of war’. As a multilingual myself, I have had the chance to read the book in three different languages – Finnish not included, since I’m not a Finn – and I was introduced to the book as a hymn to the anti-war movement; 'action thriller' was not included as one of its characteristics. Actually, I first read the book long before I ever discovered where Finland sits on the map.

Obviously the writer of this article did not have enough with Väinö Linna because in the very same article she continues, 'Translators of Finnish fiction are faced with an array of unpredictable problems, such as the curt declaration of love stated by Akseli, a character in Under the North Star by Väinö Linna. This may be deeply moving for the Finns but readers from cultures, perhaps used to more rosy and sentimental declarations, may not even notice that it is there.' Amazing, if you are a foreigner you cannot understand when somebody expresses love.

I’m afraid that Mrs. Anna Shepherd of SixDegrees never actually read any of the above translations otherwise she would be aware of the superb work Mr. Richard Impola did for Väinö Linna’s books and that the translation of the book Under the North Star is his life work. To translate any work of literature is not an easy thing and the person who does this work, as T. S. Eliot often said, is writing a new book.

Mr. Impola, in his translation, shows not only his love for the book but his excellent understanding of the English reader often using phrases and sentences that come from English language literature. In this way the English reader becomes familiar even when it comes to Akseli’s ‘curt declaration of love’ - Mrs. Anna Shepherd definitely needs to improve her English when she writes something like that.

Furthermore, her declaration that, “readers from cultures, perhaps used to more rosy and sentimental declarations, may not even notice that it is there,” is prejudice and I would suggest she avoids characterising people from ‘other cultures’ and be more careful with the words she’s using.

Living in Finland and reading a great deal of translated Finnish literature, I have often encountered the translator’s excuse that there are certain words that cannot be translated and the most often used example is the word 'sisu'. To a certain point they are correct, but the excuse is very poor since it is pure semantics. The Greek word ‘τσαμπουκάς’ cannot be translated in any language as a word but it can be explained as an idea and, oddly enough, the meaning is exactly the same with the word ‘sisu’. Mr. Impola very successfully accomplished that by describing the meaning of the words using a language familiar to the reader.

Before I suggest to Mrs. Anna Shepherd that the next time she decides to write anything about translations to make sure that she has read and understood a translated book and familiarised herself with language and the people for whom the book is translated, I would like to emphasize something more important: with articles such has this the only thing you manage to do is alienate foreigners from Finnish culture, especially those living in Finland.

However, this is something SixDegrees magazine has managed pretty well in its current issue. For example, one of the main articles of the magazine has the title 'Immigrant votes' and it seems that the editor of the magazine hasn’t realized that only nationals can vote despite their origin. By calling them ‘immigrant votes’ it alienates and discriminates against them from the population they actually belong - these people have rights and obligations equal to any other Finnish citizen and voting is one of their supreme rights and obligations, proof of a democratic society.

It is pity when a magazine that supposedly promotes equality provokes discrimination instead.