Aednan: An Epic

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In Northern Smi, the word dnan means the land, the ground, the earth. In this majestic verse novel, Linnea Axelsson chronicles the fates of two Indigenous Smi families, telling of their struggle and persistence over a century of colonial displacement, loss and resistance.

It begins with Ristin and Ber-Jon, who are trying to care for their troubled young sons while migrating their reindeer herd in northernmost Scandinavia during the 1910s. The coming of the Swedes brings new borders that lay waste to Smi customs and migration paths - and mean devastating separation for this family.

In the 1970s, Lise grapples with how she was forced to adapt to Swedish society, haunted by her time in a 'nomad school' where she was deprived of her ancestors' language and history. Lise's daughter, Sandra, seeks to reclaim that heritage, becoming an activist struggling for reparations from the Swedish state.

As one generation succeeds another, their voices interweave and form a spellbinding hymn to lands and traditions lost and reclaimed. Written in sparse, glittering verse that flows like a current,dnan is a profound and moving epic of Smi life.

Reviews

'Crystalline... reads like poetry and myth at once. There are intricate layers of beauty and meaning here in sparse clusters across a vast new landscape as Ive never read before. The music of this book is old, and it is new, and it is old' - Tommy Orange, author of 'There, There'

'Vividly captures the plight of the Smi people... Lyrical and ambitious... AEdnan contains echoes of epic poems and Norse sagas but also feels contemporary and accessible... bold and original' - Guardian

'Remarkable... Like the best epics, Aednan is a story not just of a people but also of people, full of sonorous power yet shot through with an undeniable intimacy... Extraordinary' - Washington Post

'Mesmerising. A beautiful, poetic weaving of language, character and place... Evocative and heart-breaking' - Audrey Magee, author of 'The Colony'

'Moves as gracefully as a waterfall... This unique novel beautifully conjures losses and transitions within the flickering shadows of language' - Irish Times

Author Bio

Linnea Axelsson is a Smi-Swedish writer, born in the province of North Bothnia in Sweden. In 2009, she earned a Ph.D in art history from Ume University. In 2018, she was awarded the August Prize for dnan. She lives in Stockholm, Sweden.

Saskia Vogel is a writer and translator from Los Angeles, now living in Berlin. Her debut novel Permission was published in five languages, and she has translated over twenty books from Swedish into English.