Edith Irene Södergran (4 April 1892 – 24 June 1923) was a Swedish-speaking Finnish poet. One of the first modernists within Swedish-language literature, her influences came from French Symbolism, German expressionism, and Russian futurism. She was fluent in French, English and Russian. At the age of 24 she released her first collection of poetry entitled Dikter ("Poems"). Södergran died at the age of 31, having contracted tuberculosis as a teenager. She did not live to experience the worldwide appreciation of her poetry, which has influenced many lyrical poets. Södergran is considered to have been one of the greatest modern Swedish-language poets, and her work continues to influence Swedish-language poetry and musical lyrics, for example, in the works of Mare Kandre, Gunnar Harding, Eva Runefelt, Heidi Sundblad-Halme, and Eva Dahlgren.
Edith Irene Södergran was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia, into a middle-class Swedish speaking family. Her father, Mats Södergran hailed from Ostrobothnia while her mother, Helena Södergran, née Holmroos, was born and raised in Saint Petersburg. Edith grew up as an only child. Her mother had earlier become pregnant by a Russian soldier and given birth to an illegitimate son, but the child died after only two days. Her father had been a widower after the death of his wife and two small children. The sorrow united her parents, who were also both considered less suitable in marriage due to their past.
Edith's mother came from a well-positioned family, and the status of women within the family is thought to have been strong. It is apparent that Edith and her mother shared a strong bond. Considerably less is known about her relationship to her father, who died when Edith was only 15.
When Edith was just a few months old, the Södergran family moved to the village of Raivola on the Karelian Isthmus where her grandfather, Gabriel Holmroos, bought a house for them. A short time afterward, Mats acquired a job as a superintendent at a sawmill. Three years later, the company went into bankruptcy, and the family struggled to make ends meet. Helena's father died a few months later, and the inheritance was shared between her and her mother. With the money from the inheritance, Helena was able to pay the family's debts and get them back on their feet. The rest of the money disappeared quickly, however, due to Mats' unsuccessful businesses. Helena managed to arrange for the family to receive a part of the proceeds from her mother's share of the inheritance, making the family debt-free once more.
Edith attended the girls school at Petrischule in St. Petersburg. Petrischule was rich in tradition and created an interesting and highly intellectual surrounding for Edith. The school was situated opposite The Winter Palace, which enabled Edith to experience the troubles in Tsarist Russia at close range. She was almost certainly in the city on Bloody Sunday in January 1905 when the Tsarist guards opened fire on thousands of starving citizens who had gathered to protest the lack of food.
In 1904, her father was diagnosed with tuberculosis, and in May 1906 he was admitted to Nummela sanatorium in Uusimaa. He was later sent home, incurably ill. Mats Södergran died in October 1907, only a year before Edith would herself be diagnosed with the disease.
Under these complicated circumstances, Edith's mother was responsible for the well-being of the family, especially as Mats Södergran's health deteriorated. This is believed to have been an early influence on Edith's belief in women and feminism. Though her first real encounter with a more structured questioning of the gender dynamics and the 'new woman' is believed to have taken place during her time in a sanatorium in Switzerland.
Edith was a keen photographer, and there are many pictures of her mother, albeit few of her father. Helena Södergran was a robust, petite and intelligent woman with a broad and captivating smile. Helena may have seemed stable, but was often nervous, shaken and restless. Edith enjoyed a close bond with her mother, and Helena supported her daughter's wish to become a poet. Edith and her mother spent a lot more time together than Edith and her father. Edith and Helena would move into St. Petersburg during the school terms, living in the Wiborgska part of the city. Edith's father only lived with them in the city for short periods of time.
Edith had made a few friends, but Helena feared her daughter might be lonely. Some biographers, including Gunnar Tideström, have claimed that Helena had found a foster sister of a similar age to Edith, named Singa. Singa is believed to have lived with the Södergrans during school terms, but moved back to her biological family during the holidays. On one visit, Singa supposedly ran away back to her biological family, but while walking along the train tracks she was run over by a train, and Helena later found the mutilated body. However, other biographers, such as Ebba Witt-Brattström, have disputed the story of Singa, claiming there is no real evidence she ever existed.
In 1902, Edith began her schooling in Die deutsche Hauptschule zu St. Petri (Russian: Петришуле) where she studied until 1909. These school years were characterized by worries and strong social tensions which likely affected her worldview. Amongst the poems in Vaxdukshäftet that depict Edith's school years, there are poems with political themes. At school there were pupils of many nationalities, including German, Russian, Finnish and Scandinavian. Her studies focused on modern languages, and she learned German, French, English and Russian; however, she received no instruction in her mother tongue of Swedish, and her knowledge of Swedish grammar and spelling was somewhat faltering. German was the language she spoke most both in school and with her friends. It was in German that she wrote her first poems. She improved her German during her stay in Davos, Switzerland as a patient during 1912-1913 and from 1913 to 1914 for the second time.
Edith was an intelligent pupil with the ability to assimilate knowledge quickly, needing to spend little time revising. One of her classmates described her as the class' most gifted pupil. More and more she became interested in the French lessons she received. To a certain extent, this was due to her teacher, Henri Cottier, to whom she directed a large proportion of the love poems that appear in Vaxdukshäftet.
During 1908, Edith appears to have made a decision to make Swedish the main language of her writings and her poems in German suddenly stopped. This was not a self-evident decision. She had no close contact with Swedish literature, and Finland-Swedish poetry was in a depression. An important impulse to the decision might have come from one of her relatives, the Finland-Swedish language researcher Hugo Bergroth. Some years earlier she had published a poem, Hoppet ("The Hope"), in a membership newsletter for the Swedish Liberal Party in Helsingfors and began to come into contact with Finland-Swedish authors. The transition to Swedish seemed also to mark a clear decision to focus on poetry.
One day in November 1908, Edith came home from school saying that she was restless and that she did not feel well. Helena called for a doctor, who diagnosed that Edith had an inflammation of the lungs. According to the mother, the girl understood what it was as she asked several times if she had got "lung soot". Edith had guessed correctly. On New Year's Day 1909, it was established and Edith tested positive for tuberculosis. Barely a month after the result, she was admitted to Nummela sanatorium, the same hospital where her father had been a patient before he passed on, meaning that Edith was never entirely comfortable there. At the time, the chances of recovering entirely from tuberculosis were not especially good. 70–80% of cases died within ten years of diagnosis.
Edith was unhappy at Nummela. The place was altogether too strongly associated with her father's death. She lost weight, her mood was low, and she was described afterwards as unkempt and "strange". She was even thought to have a mild mental illness after she proposed to one of the doctors. It is apparent that she did not get on well at Nummela and felt that the place resembled more closely a prison. During the long days, Edith daydreamed of other lands and exotic places. She willingly shared her dreams, which made her seem even more peculiar. During the following year, her condition worsened, and the family looked for help abroad. The obvious choice was Switzerland, which was at the time the centre for tuberculosis treatment within Europe.