Nordic literary salon online: The Truth About Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania

The time has come for some Scandinavian classics! Julie Minaříková and Martin Mokrý will tell us about the unique reportage about the Baltic countries of the 1930s-1940s, The Truth About Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, written by nobody else than one of the most famous Finns of all time: Mika Waltari!

The event will be streamed on Thursday, May 5, on our Facebook page. The recording will afterwards be available on our YouTube channel.

Free admission, no registration needed.


The Truth About Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (translated into Czech in 2022), originally published in Sweden by Förlaget Baltikum during the Continuation War is a historically fascinating work. Aside from his writing career, Mika Waltari worked for Finland’s State information office during World War II. During the war, as he wrote political propaganda, he was given access to classified material by the state’s police and military intelligence. The theme of the propaganda centred on Russian espionage in Finland and the occupation of the Baltic states. During the Interim Peace he wrote The Truth about Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, under the pseudonym ‘Nauticus’. The work was prohibited after the war and later became one of the most sought-after books in the antiquarian bookstores. A reprint was issued for the centenary of Mika Waltari’s birth in 2009 by WSOY.

Mika Waltari (1908-1979) is the most popular 20th century Finnish writer who is best known for his magnum opus The Egyptian. Over a career that spanned five decades, Waltari published well over 100 works, of which 200 translations have been made. His works include at least 30 novels, 20 plays and 15 novellas, as well as short stories, poems, screenplays and essays. In 1957 he was appointed to the Academy of Finland, having previously won the state literature award five times. Waltari’s works have been translated into over 40 languages.

Source: https://www.bonnierrights.fi/books/the-truth-about-estonia-latvia-and-lithuania/

The partner of the event are the Czech translators of the North – an organisation uniting Czech translators from Nordic languages. The event is a part of a year-long project of the Scandinavian House: “Nordic literature in the heart of Europe 2022”, which has been supported by Prague municipality and the Czech Ministry of Culture.