Voices of War

In Scandinavia, contemporary war poetry consists of poems from established and award-winning poets: Göran Sonnevi, one of Sweden’s most renowned poets, also well-known for his anti Vietnam-war poem, recently published the collection Där allt är kontrapunkt tid, a collection among others about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine; Marie Silkeberg, another celebrated Swedish poet, has for years published poetry collections (i.e. Till Damaskus in 2016) and produced poetry films about the war in Syria and Palestine, also in collaboration with the Syrian-Palestinian poet Ghayath Almadhoun, who lives in exile in Stockholm and Berlin. In Norway, Gunnar Wærness, Paal Bjelke-Andersen, Monica Aaspring and new voices like Priya Bains (Med restene av mine hender) and Bendik Vada write poetry about the war in Ukraine and in Palestine, collaborate in translating and distributing poetry from these countries, and organize and take part in poetry readings. Young poets with minority background has entered the poetry scene with their new voice and new mode of writing.War poetry in Scandinavia also includes poets in exile: The abovementioned Ghayath Almadhoun writes his war poetry in Arabic, and publishes and distributes his poems in books, in poetry films, and on social media. His poems have been swiftly translated to many languages, including Scandinavian languages, and distributed into other networks and across national, cultural, and language boarders; Fatemeh Ekhtesari too writes poems on war and oppression in Vi overlever ikke (2020), a bilingual collection with poems in Arabic and Norwegian.Poetry from precarious poets in the war zone enters Scandinavia more or less as they write. I.e. the poems of the Palestinian writer Hiba Abu Nada, who was killed during Israeli’s bombing of Gaza October 10 2023, has been translated into Scandinavian languages by activist translators and distributed by small publishers. Further on, war poetry is written in and performed as song poetry. The Danish artists Kiosk, perform poetry and music about the ongoing wars, as in the song poem “Paloma”: “Der findes ingen klarere følelse end frygt” (“there is no feeling more clear than fear”). At all, protest songs about war is a subgenre with long tradition in Scandinavia.
Another vital platform for writing and distributing war poetry is Instagram, where instapoets like ?? combine activism and poetry and reach thousands of readers, offer them a place to read poetry, to comments on the poems, and to be part of poetic-activistic networks.