Talk:Edith Södergran

Rewriting and translations
I've rewritten the "Childhood" part of the Biography. I think a lot of the information in this article is a bit outdated, largely consisting of 'facts' put forward by Gunnar Tideström, who has actually been disputed by many later researchers. Some of his findings are invaluable, but a lot of this article seems to convey the traditionalist, somewhat anti-feminist, views Tideström also expressed. (This is probably due to the whole article being a translation of the Swedish article - which is also very biased.) There needs to be more footnotes, especially to all the non-scientific claims in the article. I'll try to rummage through some biographies on Södergran to see what I can find. Given that this is an English language page, it might also be useful to quote the translations by George C. Schoolfield, rather than make up our own. I'll see what I can do. Great effort in doing a basic translation of the original page though! Josefinast (talk) 14:45, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Translation from Swedish FA article
I've translated the whole of the article, which is FA on the Swedish Wikipedia, into English. It needs someone to go through it and make it pretty. I will come back to it shortly but I need a break from it for a day or so. I might have been a bit literal in some of my translations so they need tidying up and there might be a lot of red links as there were people mentioned who might not have articles on the English WP. Anyway, I thought I'd release what I'd done so if anyone fancies having a crack at it they can do. &#618;nt&#601; sv&#603;nsk''  12:17, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Oh, and I translated all the names of her poems myself. The canonical names for them might be different so they too need changing. &#618;nt&#601; sv&#603;nsk''  12:19, 12 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks, it looks like good work. I wrote the bulk of the Swedish article - some early parts about her Petersburg years, written before I came on board, borrow a tad too openly and directly from Eva Ström's Södergran biography. I made some corrections to your translated take and added a bit more about Hagar Olsson and about Södergran's poetic roles and her use of the ego at the end. The translation from "Den stora trädgården" is my own and makes no claim to match Södergran's amazingly dignified original (and the letter to Hagar where it was included really is unforgettable). I'll revisit both this one and the original Swedish article. Strausszek (talk) 14:32, 6 March 2010 (UTC)


 * It was a great rough translation. I've changed the translations of the titles to the translations used in George C. Schoolfield's book on Södergran. Also changed a few minor spelling and formatting mistakes. I've also re-written parts of the biography (mainly "Childhood"). Someone still needs to look over most of the text though.Josefinast (talk) 19:54, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Her mother was born in Saint Petersburg, not in Finland. Swedish article is correct (at least today). https://www.geni.com/people/Helena-Södergran/6000000049515421917 Finninpoika (talk) 18:15, 26 July 2019 (UTC)finninpoika

Photo
The photo, which is by far the most common pic of Södergran to be found in books in Swedish or Finnish, is definitely not 1918, more likely around 1914 after she returned from Davos. There are no surviving pics of Södergran at all later than 1917. The latest ones we have were taken by Edith herself in Raivola in 1915-17; she was a talented photographer and a selection of her own photos appeared some years back in Sweden. This one is clearly of a well-dressed young lady in decent health, and it looks like an atelier photo; people who knew her at the time told Gunnar Tideström (her first real biographer and still an indispensable one) that she surprised her friends in Petersburg with her new, elegant looks, so the picture would fit the bill. By 1918, after semi-starvation, deteriorating health, blood spitting and poverty, she would definitely have looked a bit more rugged, and the last pics which we know are from around 1917 also seem to show a slightly older woman. I tried to correct the caption at the Swedish WP but apparently they take it for granted there that it's from 1918, because they have seen that date to the pic somewhere. Strausszek (talk) 12:18, 7 March 2010 (UTC)

Inline citations
I have afterwards looked for citations in other sources which match the translated Swedish text. --Tappinen (talk) 06:43, 7 May 2016 (UTC)