With the Lapps Event Schedule around Puget Sound

Today is the official publication day for With the Lapps in the High Mountains by Emilie Demant Hatt, published by the University of Wisconsin Press. I'm thrilled to see this fantastic book finally available to an English-reading audience.

I'm heading off to San Francisco tomorrow for the Scandinavian Studies conference, where I'll present a paper on her: "My Nomad Year": From Tourist to Participant-Observer--Emilie Demant Hatt Among the Sami 1907-8.

Below is the schedule for readings from the book in the Puget Sound area. I'm especially looking forward to the launch May 21 at the Nordic Heritage Museum. If you live nearby, please join me in celebrating With the Lapps!

Seattle Book Launch

Nordic Heritage Museum

Tuesday, May 21, 7 pm

3014 NW 67th Street

Seattle, WA 98117

206-789-5707

www.nordicmuseum.org

Swedish Cultural Center

Friday, May 31, 7 pm

1920 Dexter Ave. N.
Seattle, WA 98109

(206) 283-1090

www.swedishculturalcenter.org

Elliott Bay Book Company

Saturday, June 1, 2 pm

1521 Tenth Avenue
Seattle WA 98122

(206) 624-6600

www.elliottbaybook.com

Village Books

Thursday, June 13, 7 pm

1200 11th Street
Bellingham, WA 98225
(360) 671-2626

www.villagebooks.com

The Writers’ Workshoppe

Wednesday, June 26, 7 pm

234 Taylor St.

Port Townsend, WA 98368

360-379-2617

www.writersworkshoppe.com

Stockholm Neon

I have a weakness for Stockholm's old and new neon signs. Here are two, observed on recent strolls.

This is a storied theater on Drottninggatan. It was designed by Erik Gunnar Asplund and originally opened in the 1920s.

From the 1970s is Kulturhuset at Sergels Torg, a center for performance and culture.

Matador

Although "Matador" evokes something other than a wildly popular  mini-series about Denmark's history 1929-1947, the name is the equivalent of Monopoly in English. When I first arrived in Copenhagen a friend suggested I watch some episodes as a way of improving my ear for Danish. Her collection of "Matador" DVDs had options for subtitles in Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish--I chose the Danish. This gave me the opportunity to both read and listen. It was far better than anything else I could have done to get better Danish pronunciation into my head.

In the end I watched all 24 episodes over a two-week period. "Matador" was originally shown on Danish TV beginning in the 1970s, but it has been shown repeatedly over the decades to huge audiences in Denmark and elsewhere in the world. It was created by Lise Nørgaard,  and included performances by many of Denmark's best known actors. The many story lines, involving several families in a small town, were expertly crafted to give the sense of changing times, for workers, women, and the bourgeois families who saw their power eroding. It was funny, heart-wrenching, and often tremendously exciting storytelling.

Not only did I get more of a feel for Danish history, but I found that everyone I knew in Denmark was very familiar with the series (and friends in Sweden too), so that made for another connection with this culture. 

Scenes from Copenhagen

A late spring.

The teachers in Denmark have been locked out of the schools for almost two weeks.

Construction on 18 new metro stations. Only 5 years until they open.

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How strange the spring

Printed on a window at the airport in Keflavik: a poem by Mattias Johannessen. I was between planes, en route from Seattle to Copenhagen. Red dawn from the east as we flew over Iceland's southern coastline. And there were the small lights of fishing boats below in the rocking sea.

Lovisa Negga

It's time for some music on this blog! Lovisa Negga is young French-Sami electropop singer from Linköping, in Sweden. I came across her when checking out the events at Umea University's Sami week, currently in progress. Program here.