Internet breaks locks of personal diaries

Web diaries work as art, politics, and research material

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By Kaisa Alenius
     
      "Today was wonderful: I was able to sleep for 7.5 hours for the first time since the weekend. For that reason I have just been hanging on line today; I have not achieved anything particularly useful." Agrippa, the web diary of Kanerva Eskola, begins like any other diary.
      Eskola, who works as an editor at Atena Publishers, wrote her first entries into Agrippa in late November 1995.
      Eskola's diary would seem to be the longest-maintained Finnish language blog to have been actively maintained, and among aficionados, it is considered a forerunner from the age of the dinosaurs.
     
Agrippa is also mentioned in a book by Miia Vatka, which appeared this past autumn: Päiväkirjojen ominaispiirteiden tarkastelua ("Examination of the Basic Characteristics of Diaries"), in which Vatka has studied diaries as a specific genre.
      Vatka's main research material were the diaries of ordinary Finns that were stored in the literature archive of the Finnish Literature Society.
      The diaries of men, women, boys, and girls of different ages were written during the 20th century.
     
"Everyone thinks that studying diaries would be especially tantalising, and at first, it really was. However, diaries resemble each other, and when there were 300 of them, it started to be a bit numbing as well", Vatka says, and continues: "I thought that by reading, it would be possible to say what decade they were written in, but that was not the case."
      Vatka's observation is a surprising one; how could people writing in different decades write such similar books?
      What is it that teaches us to write into our ‘dear diary'?"
     
Certain aspects of diaries are always the same in principle.
      For instance, the diary is usually addressed directly, or at least it has a name.
      Eskola's diary was named Agrippa. The diary of Marja-Liisa Vartio was called Liebling, and Saima Harmaja wrote in her Maija.
      Vatka writes that during a whole century, the aim in writing diaries has been to preserve events, control everyday life, keep an inventory of life, analyse the self and the world, develop as a writer, and to offer therapy to, and to educate one's self.
      A diarist can never describe everything that he or she experiences, sees, and feels.
      "A person can live in the middle of a war, and not necessarily mention it at all in a diary", says Dr. Anna Makkonen, a literary archivist at the Finnish Literature Society.
     
More than a specific time, diarists are united by different reasons to write, which are repeated from one decade to another.
      Anna Makkonen's most recent work on diaries has just appeared: Kadonnut kangas. Retkiä Ida Digertin päiväkirjaan ("Lost Cloth. Travels into Ida Digert's diary").
      Makkonen's study goes into the diary as an image of the age. The diary of the seamstress who lived in Koski, in Turku Province, covers the years 1898-1899, and it forms the base that Makkonen examines from different angles.
      The micro-historical study links Ida, her family, and her village with the history of Finland and its civic society.
     
Also in Vatka's study, the diary is spoken of as a picture of its time. Sometimes the names of diaries indicate when they were written, because they contain references to literature, for instance. Likewise, pictures linked with the diaries, clippings, and even admission tickets tell very much.
      Matters that are revealed to diaries are also mirrors of the age. Although diaries are usually secret, people only write things in them that are generally accepted topics of conversation. In the 1950s, intimate matters were referred to in an apologetic manner, even in diaries.
      "At the end of the 1950s and into the ‘60s, descriptions of sexuality began to appear in diaries. In the early 20th century, there are some downright adorable parts describing shaking hands, for instance", Vatka says.
     
Diaries are usually addressed to a future self, for instance, an imaginary friend, or simply to the named diary, which is not separately personified, Vatka writes.
      In the late 19th century, diaries began appearing in Europe fairly soon after the death of the writer. This certainly had an effect on keeping diaries.
      "Certainly the young [Finnish author] Pentti Saarikoski was aware that future generations would be interested in his writings", Makkonen says.
      The diary of Aino Kallas from 1897-1906 was published in 1952 when the author herself was still alive.
      Diaries published over the century have piled up, and especially the diaries of politicians, heads of state, and writers are available for all of the people to read.
     
Diaries get published, and they are thought to have a special personal and revealing character. This is in spite of the fact that Suvi Ahola has calculated that former Finnish President J.K. Paasikivi mentioned his wife Alli just 35 times in his 443-page diary.
      Vatka writes in her study on a special format for leading men, which excludes personal material from diaries.
      This format has been broken since then, as exemplified by the diary Kolme kierrosta ("Three Rounds") by [former Centre Party leader and Presidential candidate] Esko Aho, which was published in 2000. In the book, Aho reveals his emotions from the Presidential campaign quite openly.
      "In general, a culture of revelation and peeking is in vogue. This is a line for reality TV. People are interested in ordinary everyday life", Vatka ponders.
      In her study, she visualised the borderline between the private and the public, which is nowadays seen as important for diaries today.
      At the other end lies the secretive and private diary kept in a drawer, and at the other end there could be the television programme Big Brother, where people speak openly about their emotions on television.
     
Opening up one's life to the public eye can be seen on the Internet, which is full of different kinds of diaries and blogs.
      The Internet diaries of artists and politicians are forums that are followed even in the press. It is common knowledge what people such as Parliamentarians Rosa Meriläinen, Timo Soini, and now even Heidi Hautala write on their own blogs.
     
When Kanerva Eskola started to write Agrippa on the Internet ten years ago, she had no forerunners.
      Nowadays, Internet diaries and blogs are used for taking a stand on political issues, writing about what is new in the lives of their children or animals, telling friends - and millions of others - about their travels, or discussing their illnesses.
      The culture of revelations and confessions can also be seen in literature. One possible pitfall cold be that fiction is no longer enough, and that art requires tragedies of real life.
      Still, Vatka does not want to believe that the culture of revelation and voyeurism would live forever.
      "It is everyone's own choice how much they want to reveal, and look. People must still have some secrets to keep in their drawers."
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 6.12.2004  

More on this subject:
 Square knots in cyberspace
 FACTFILE: From a log book to a trusted friend
 Movement on the fringes of the self

KAISA ALENIUS / Helsingin Sanomat
kaisa.alenius@sanoma.fi