Seven Brothers
SynopsisPlot
At first, the brothers are not a particularly peaceful lot and end up quarreling with the local constable, juryman, vicar, churchwarden, and teachers—not to mention their neighbors in the village of Toukola. No wonder young girls' mothers do not regard them as good suitors. When the brothers are required to learn to read before they can accept church confirmation and therefore official adulthood—and the right to marry—they decide to run away.
Story
About this book
Seven Brothers follows a group of siblings in rural nineteenth-century Finland who have trouble fitting into their community. The brothers clash with nearly every authority figure around them, from the local constable and vicar to the churchwarden and village teachers. Their disputes extend to neighbors in the village of Toukola, and the mothers of young women in the area see little promise in them as potential husbands.
A turning point arrives when the brothers face a requirement imposed by the Lutheran church: they must learn to read before they can be confirmed and, with confirmation, gain the legal status of adulthood and the right to marry. Rather than submit to this demand, they choose to flee into the Finnish wilderness. The novel traces what happens to them after that decision, as they try to live on their own terms outside the structures of village society.
Aleksis Kivi published Seven Brothers in 1870, making it one of the first novels written in Finnish rather than Swedish, which was then the dominant literary language in Finland. The book is often placed alongside The Kalevala as a foundational work of Finnish-language literature. Kivi drew on the rhythms of spoken Finnish and the realities of rural life to build his story.
