When the wind was right, could Elsie sit in the garden and hear the rumble from the Casinovale artilleriduellerna on the western Front, thirty miles away. She thought of her friends from the dance club, which now crouched in the trenches. But she had the same migrantens skeptical about the double vision. Was she Swedish or German? The war was not so simple.
Elsie Jollasse grew up in Östermalm. But when her father died they moved to Germany. The home of the mother. Away for her. Fourteen years old, she started writing letters to his best friend in Stockholm. They became like a diary of a puzzled teenager on the road to becoming an adult. I have read a few each evening throughout the fall. As she wrote! Omärkvärdigt but solid, and with a sense of life’s fleeting essentials. I have been completely fixed.
Englund
the Author Marianne Stenstedt is Elsies grandchildren. She has chosen among the letters, rätat out the language and conjured up a nice cartoon story about a circle of young women. A natural alternative or complement to Peter Englund, » the large krigsepos.
Elsie followed the war. But letters by benefit is another. They are reports from one of the krigsårens most remote border, where they passed from girl to woman. She met her girlfriends at the syföreningen where they gossiped, talked philosophy and was concerned about the future. Which they would marry when the city emptied of all the hot men? Some began to educate themselves. Others have a professional career. Elsie took a job at a day care center, dreaming of ”social work” and became interested in politics.
READ MORE: When the first world war finally came to an end
Borgarvåning in Stockholm, sweden
the Family’s social journey went continuously down. For each move was the dwelling less. From borgarvåning in Stockholm, inherent in the three rooms of the granny, with tom kokskällare and low fat food.
With peace came the really serious despair. But she continued to write, write, write. Around her staggered, the entire German middle class. Life seemed unprotected. The future was unpredictable. And no one knew what was coming.
BREVSAMLING
MARIANNE STENSTEDT
Elsie Jolasses letter to Sweden, 1911-1920.
Ristrands publishers, 327 p.
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Per. is the author and coworkers in the Swedish newspaper Expressen kultursida. His latest book is « Are we there yet? The dream of a united states of Europe ».
In tv-the player above is the latest episode of the Culture-Expressen.
