Learn from Scandinavia’s cool edge
As the sun starts to slip from view across Scandinavia and an icy cold winter advances its grip, it’s perhaps not the best time to go there. It is, however, a good time to take a look there – after a week of political heat across the Atlantic, a touch of the cool north may be the kind of antidote we need just now.
We were once part of the north-lands, our original and dramatic first experience of “Scandi noir”. Until the end of the first millennium, the Norsemen or Vikings regularly frightened our ancestors to death. King Cnut held most of the British Isles as a vassal state. For some the Vikings held sway much longer, with the Shetland Isles a part of the Norwegian Kingdom until the 15th century. Traces of our Norse inheritance can be found in archaeological sites and museums across the northern England and in Scotland. Names of places and of families are witnesses to this ancient past, as is our deep literary memory. “Beowulf”, the challenging Old English text encountered in University English courses, is not set in Britain but in faraway Geatland on the coast south-east of Stockholm. We were reluctant participants in the Norse world but perhaps our collective antennae can sense the connection still.
That said, the Norse people of modern Scandinavia know far more about us than we do about them. Among the lands bordering the North Sea, Britain remains a big player and English a global language familiar to most Scandinavians. We are in the centre of their field of sight whereas they sit at the edge of our peripheral vision. Ironically perhaps, as we leave the EU we may need to get to know Europe better, not least our neighbours to the north.
We know the Scandinavian countries mainly in tangents, touching them incompletely. We would claim to like them, even if in a slightly patronising way. We sit on “Scandi” chairs and sofas made by IKEA. We favour their cool aesthetic, lights shining on pared-down interiors. Some of us still drive Volvo cars. A low-level domestic philosophy from Denmark and Norway, “hygge”, points the way to contentment through versions of cosiness. Somewhat surprisingly (at least for those of us who have lived in parts of Scandinavia) Scandinavian cooking is on the up with Michelin stars aplenty. It is getting a foothold in our kitchens (with courses online) and drawing us to local Nordic-style bakeries for a taste of cinnamon and cardamom buns.
Most conspicuously of all, Scandinavian thrillers and films – the new “Scandi noir” – are crossing over to frighten us, and with great commercial success. These contemporary cultural “raids” along our shores are re-shaping our image of modern Scandinavia. They are darkening that image; less “hygge”, more mystery and terror. At their best – Henning Mankell’s Wallander series – they expose some of the real societal challenges affecting Sweden in particular (where crime rates are higher than in neighbouring countries). In the massively successful thrillers of the Norwegian, Jo Nesbø, the genre has provided an opportunity to explore environmental issues and geopolitics. Not even tiny Iceland has escaped the wave of fictional crime as Rike Jokela in print and film wedges fear into our quiet minds. All of this is rather odd given that the Scandinavian countries enjoy some of the lowest crime rates in the world.
Indeed, the Scandinavians have become notable (and notably successful) purveyors of “soft power” internationally. They are not soft-headed however. There is an edge to their histories which has taught them hard lessons. Scandinavia is a medley of countries not a monolith, though they have much in common geographically, culturally, and (with the exception of Finland), linguistically. They each learned, if in different ways, in the Second World War and in the Cold War, that neutrality is not a soft option and may come at a high price. Norway, Denmark and Iceland (pre-emptively by Britain in the latter case) all suffered occupation in the war and opted to join NATO after it. Sweden developed and still maintains (defence budgets are rising there once more) an armed neutrality which has hitherto seen-off Russian submarines getting too close their shores. Finland fought its own Winter war and thereafter pursued a subtle and complex relationship with the Soviet Union. While three of them lined up for EU membership, two (Iceland and Norway) stayed apart. Scandinavians have their own minds and, as Sweden has shown during the Covid pandemic, they do not have a herd mentality or approach.
In fiction too, the region’s past has been a preoccupation. Writers of real quality such as the Norwegian, Lars Mytting, (The Sixteen Trees of the Somme and The Bell in the Lake) and the Finn, Kjell Westö (The Wednesday Club), have used their countries’ rich histories and experience of “failed” neutrality to explore their self-understanding and place in Europe. There is a toughness and integrity to Scandinavians’ reflections about themselves,
We have much to learn and perhaps to gain from a new and clearer look at Scandinavia. Sofas and chairs, “hygge” and buns, thrillers and “Scandi noir” films are all cool and pleasurable in their different ways; but there is a larger political picture to consider. As Britain heads out of the EU and tries to forge new-style relationships across Europe, the Nordic group of countries, some of which are inside and some outside the EU, may help us see better how to engage productively in Europe post-Brexit. The Scandinavians have a generally clear perspective on today’s Europe and an historically informed and hard-edged commitment to security. We may have more in common with them than we realise.