Citizens and Nomads

The Literary Works of Matti Aikio with Emphasis on Bygden på elvenesset

Abstract

The Sami author Matti Aikio from Karasjok made his debut in 1904 in Copenhagen with Kong Akab [‘King Akab’]. He was one of the world’s earliest indigenous authors, and presented his first novel to the Norwegian public with I dyreskind [‘In Hide’] in 1906. The last of a total of six novels was Bygden på elvenesset [The Parish on the Riverbank], launched posthumously in 1929.

In this article I present a post-colonial reading of this last novel of his. My hypothesis is that he wrote his first Norwegian novel anew, but this time social success amongst the Sami population is dependent upon the conduct of Sami culture. All of his novels reflect upon different strategies at hand for members of an ethnic minority in times of an advancing European industry, economy and culture, heavily influenced by a social-Darwinist political and anthropological cosmology.

Being the first registered Sami student of Norway, while writing his novels in Norwegian, Matti Aikio developed skills as a master of mimicry. Having experienced the importance of hybridity, he studies the limits of mimicry in his novels. This is the main project of his literary work, and with tools from post-colonial literary theories, this essay discusses the author’s attitudes to the possibilities of his own ethnic culture’s survival in the future.