Nordic Folktales Can Be Funny!

 

The podcast Nordic on Tap, created by Eric Stavney, a print and radio journalist and enthusiast for all things Nordic, evolved from his role as a co-host on the Scandinavian Hour Radio Show on station KKNW in Seattle, an institution here in the Pacific Northwest. Eric now produces a podcast of interviews and readings, especially of Nordic folktales.

Recently he put together a podcast episode with the intriguing title, When Nordic Folktales Are Funny: Is That Even Possible?

For me, having decades ago encountered a small book of stories in Norway about the Molbo people, that wasn't a question. I have always appreciated the lively humor of Nordic folklore that balances out the dark and scary parts. The Molbo folk, said to live in a small town on the Jutland Peninsula of Denmark, are silly while pretending (and hoping) to be logical and wise. Every time I encounter the Molbo folk I have to smile.

Eric reads a few hilarious Molbo stories aloud on the podcast before sharing other humorous folktales from Finland and Norway. He includes one (about twenty minutes into the podcast) from my recent translation, Sámi Folktales From the Near and Far Worlds, “The Fox Frightens the Wild Animals.” It was originally told by Erik Persen Trollvik from Kåfjord in 1879.

The folktales in my translation can be pretty spooky at times, what with tales about ghosts, drowned people, and omens, not to mention the stories of violent encounters between the Sámi and various fiends like the robbing Chudes and the cannibalistic ogre Stállu in his many incarnations. But many of the stories are also amusing in a witty, dead-pan way. There are some with sillies—numbskulls lacking all sense—but in a number of tales the humor comes from the way the Sámi are able to outsmart their enemies. Over and over, the Sámi—and animals in their tales—are shown to be clever survivors.

Here’s the story from Sámi Folktales From the Near and Far Worlds,that Eric read aloud. For the full sound effects, check out his podcast!

The Fox Frightens the Wild Animals

The cat, the ram, and the fox built themselves a house in the countryside where they lived. The lion, the bear, and the wolf built themselves another house nearby. One day the fox went by their house and heard the bear say that they were going to chase away all three of them, the cat, the ram, and the fox. The fox heard this and went home to tell his companions.

“How are we going to protect ourselves against them? They are three champions.”

The fox said, “I know how to deal with that.”

The fox suggested to the ram that it go into the house and into a room there and bang on an empty barrel so it reverberated. And to the cat the fox said, “You go and sit up on the stove and hiss and show your claws.”

The fox himself lay down on the living room floor and pretended he was terribly tired.

The wolf came to the fox’s house and asked, “Who is that banging inside the room?”

“My servant boy is in the midst of salting wolf meat,” said the fox.

“What is that man doing sleeping on the stove?” asked the wolf.

“A big fellow is lying there resting a little,” answered the fox. “He’s a light sleeper and can be easily woken up,” said the fox.

Then the wolf was afraid, and he didn’t dare drive them out into the mountainside. The wolf returned home. The bear asked, “Well, did you get them to go?”

“No, I didn’t,” said the wolf.

The bear said, “Voi, you stupid animal! You’re timid, even though you have a big mouth and big teeth. Didn’t you manage to say a word to them?”

So the bear went to the house.

The fox said to the ram, “You must bang hard on the barrel.”

To the cat he said, “You must hiss and purr loudly and pull your claws in and out.”

When the bear arrived, he asked the fox, “Who is banging inside that room?”

“My servant boy is in the midst of salting bear meat,” said the fox.

Then the bear didn’t dare say anything either but went home. The bear went home, and the lion asked, “Did they leave?”

“I didn’t manage to get them to leave. I didn’t dare say anything when I heard that the three of them had already killed a bear,” said the bear.

So the lion went off to drive them away. The fox asked the ram to bang on the barrel for all he was worth. He asked the cat to hiss as much as he possibly could.

The lion came to the fox’s farm and asked, “What kind of person is that banging in the room?”

“My servant boy is in the midst of salting lion meat,” said the fox.

Then the lion grew afraid and thought, “It’s not worth it for me either, speaking to them. They have already killed a lion, and they’ll probably kill me too.”

So the lion went back to the same house where the bear and the wolf were.

Then the fox said to his companions, “We’re going to drive those three out into the countryside.”

The cat went first, the ram in the middle, and the fox at the end. The fox said to the ram, “Bleat when you come near their house.”

The cat came to the threshold. The bear caught a glimpse of it.

“Now they have come,” said the bear to his companions.

They hid, each in its place. The bear went under the bed. There was a little hay there. The wolf went up into the loft. The lion went behind the stove. Then the cat padded calmly in. It was so uncomfortable for the bear to lie quietly. He couldn’t help moving. He had to move. Then the cat dashed under the bed and clawed one of the bear’s eyes out. The bear was scared and came out and began to hop around in the middle of the floor. The cat was scared and jumped up onto a beam in the roof, and the lion believed the cat had come to kill him. The wolf escaped out the window, and the bear took the door post with him when he left. The frightened lion tore down one of the walls as he ran into the countryside. And so the three of them got the house.

 

 

 

 

Áilu Valle Raps about Consent in Sápmi

 

Áilu Valle, Sámi rapper

The other week I happened across an article in the sometimes staid British newspaper, The Times, about a Sámi rapper who, on the urging of well-known Sámi scholar Rauna Kuokkanen, came up with a way of reaching more Sámi people, particularly young folks, about the important idea of consent, or lohpi. The track was released as a single a few weeks ago on Midsummer.

The concept of consent is widespread in certain circles in Sápmi when it comes to the current mania for extraction of natural resources in the Nordic countries, especially dams, logging, mining, wind farms, and all the infrastructure that comes with these projects, such as roads and power stations, so many of which despoil the landscape and interfere with reindeer herding and fishing, not to mention the sense of space. Consent—that is, informed consent, not manufactured or coerced consent—is a crucial aspect of negotiations between the Sámi and state and local governments and corporations around development.

Kuokkanen, from her perch at the University of Lapland in Finland, is a major voice for Indigenous self-determination and feminist theory in the academy. Her 2019 book from Oxford University Press, Restructuring Relations: Indigenous Self-Determination, Governance and Gender is a text I read and quoted from in my own book, From Lapland to Sápmi in the chapter “Returning.”

She’s written many papers as well, but this time around, according to David Mac Dougall in The Times, she thought, Why write a paper when a Sami musician could rap about it instead?

This led her to Áilu Valle, a rap artist based in the town of Inari, in the north of Finland. Valle apparently thought for quite a while how to approach the subject before deciding that he not only had to talk about consent being given by the Sámi, but about consent being required from everything and everyone who lives on the land and air and waters of that place. As Mac Dougall writes:

Instead of simply explaining the definition of consent, Valle described a scenario where consent did not come only from people, but also from the animals, trees and landscapes of Sapmi, the traditional Sami homeland area. 

 “Oh, you are interested in coming to this place? First show it to the mosquito, the tern and the woodpecker, the eagle and the bear, the trout and the grayling, the rapids, quiet waters, the rocks and hills,” he raps. 

And Valle tells the listener in no uncertain terms, “If we haven’t given permission, you don’t have consent. And with no consent, there’s no pipeline…If you didn’t ask, you’re not even allowed to be here.”

The whole mesmerizing performance of Lohpi in North Sámi with English  is on YouTube.

 

Just Published: Sámi Folktales from the Near and Far Worlds

 

I'm thrilled beyond measure to see the first copies of this landmark translation of 300 Sámi folktales hit the bookshelves. It's a handsome volume, hefty but not overwhelming, and a pleasure to leaf through. I'm really pleased when people tell me how funny some of the stories are--as well as subversive, strange, unexpected, and generally delightful. Of course my introduction makes a case for the cultural and historical importance of the collection as a work of traditional Indigenous knowledge and a look at the politics of the main collectors, the philologist Just Knud Qvigstad and the Sámi politician and folklorist Isak Saba, but it must be said that the stories themselves are just plain wonderful. 

On the occasion of the English translation, the University of Minnesota Press has posted an interview on their website, available as a podcast, of a wide-ranging discussion that I had with Lise Lunge-Larsen earlier this year on Zoom. We talk about the differences and similarities of storytelling in Norway/Sápmi, about the many characters in the tales, and about translation itself. 

Lise is a well-known storyteller originally from Oslo and now living in Duluth. She specializes in Norwegian folktales, especially stories about trolls. She is the author of numerous books, including Seven Ways to Trick a Troll. 

 

 

 

 

 

"Truth and reconciliation commissions test the Nordic ideal"

 As a follow-up to my last post about the Swedish Truth Commission, the Barents Observer has published an excellent article by Laurel Colless, "Truth and reconciliation commissions test the Nordic ideal." The article highlights a roundtable held recently in Copenhagen among members of the truth and reconciliation commissions from Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark. They included researchers and members of the different historical minority groups in the Nordic countries--though, in the case of Greenland and Denmark, the Greenlanders are the majority in their country. 

Members of Finnish TRC

The article is worth reading for its succinct exploration of what comes next for the Nordic countries in terms of recognition and implementation of necessary changes. As the journalist Colless notes: "Now, with reports on Sámi relations delivered in Norway and Finland and the final report of the Swedish Truth Commission for the Sámi People expected in October, attention is turning to how the investigations were carried out, the challenges encountered and perhaps the most difficult question of all: whether the findings will lead to meaningful change." 

One aspect I found interesting is how the Nordic states are grappling with how to accept a difficult history that has been self-evident to groups such as the Sami and the Inuit for many decades. For minority groups there has never been a Nordic ideal, at least one that they could be part of. 

The issue of how to speak of these difficult and complicated histories in ways that are both narrative and document-based is also challenging. Colless writes, quoting several participants:

"At the core of the discussion was a recognition of the challenge related to documenting and describing these past injustices. As Andersen observed, “Part of the role of the commissions has been seeking to find a shared language in which to understand and speak about injustices committed in the Nordic states.”

"But even as the commissions work towards a shared language, they are not necessarily working towards a single version of the truth. Much of the work rests on gathering lived experiences, including personal testimonies that don’t always align neatly with official records or even from one to another, making it difficult to reconcile.

"As Swedish commissioner Krister Stoor put it, this raises a fundamental question: “How can you build the truth on narratives or stories? Whose truth is it? It is the people who are telling their stories, and it is their truth.”

"This tension runs through many of the processes, with truth commissions on one level, seeking to verify events, but also tasked with giving space to memory and emotion. “These individual accounts cannot simply be dismissed,” said Norwegian commissioner Ketil Zachariassen. “This is what happened for them, and that’s important to have in mind.”

"For commissions, in practice, this means acknowledging that different experiences of the same government policies can coexist. For example, children taken from their homes and placed in school homes – often far from their families and unable to understand the language of the classroom – experienced these policies in different ways. In their testimonials, some recall this as an opportunity that led to education or employment. Others remember only pain and loss.

"'There are different voices and different experiences, and we need to acknowledge that,' Arvidsson said. 'But even when experiences differ, we can still understand them as part of a broader assimilation policy and its long-term consequences.'

 

 

 

Truth Commission for the Sámi People

 

Today, in the northern university city of Umeå/ Ubmeje, Sweden, the Truth Commission for the Sami People made public its report on the history and consequences of state policies over the past centuries on the Sámi population living within the borders of Sweden. The Commission was inspired by Canada’s truth and reconciliation commission, specifically focused on the painful legacy of the residential schools, which aimed to suppress the languages and culture of Indigenous populations. Two other Nordic countries have also interviewed Sámi people and published their own reports, Norway in 2024 and Finland in 2025.

Now Sweden joins them, though there is no mention of reconciliation in the title of the report: The land, the water, the thoughts: Consequences for the Sami of Swedish policies (Marken, vattnet, tankarna. Konsekvenser för samer av statens politik). 

 

Presentation of the Truth Commission for the Sámi People 

According to the website, the research has been going for around five years and includes the results of two hundred interviews with Sámi people. The website states that “A narrative volume will be written based on the interviews, the written testimonies and thoughts that emerged during conversation meetings.” This narrative volume is not complete yet, but the first two volumes, almost 1200 pages in Swedish, have been made available as pdfs as of March 4. The comprehensive anthology includes dozens of contributions by Sámi researchers, activists, and writers and by Swedish scholars who publish widely in the field. The topics of the articles include colonialist history and resistance; natural resources and industrialization; state discrimination against the Sámi; language suppression and boarding schools; reindeer husbandry; health; ethnography and museums. Unlike the Norwegian version of its Truth and Reconciliation report, there is as yet no English summary.

The ambitious scope of the documentation process has meant that the Truth Commission project has been extended through most of 2026. But today, a ceremony took place in Umeå/Ubmeje along with a panel discussion by the editors of the two volumes and some of the contributors.

 Krister Stoor, scholar and joiker in Umeå/ Ubmeje

 

The attitude and practices of the Swedish state toward its Sámi population has not gone unnoticed by the United Nations, which in 2025 called on Sweden to do better in two separate human rights reports. As the Saami Council noted, “both the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) and the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) highlight persistent shortcomings and call for concrete action, echoing concerns raised by the Saami Council in its submissions to both bodies.”