JOHAN TURI –A PLAY

Gunnar Hauk Gjengset and Harald Gaski have managed to produce an interesting play about Johan Turi. The play is not limited to a presentation of the author and the owner of reindeers, John Turi alone. The content of the play is a conversation located in a railway compartment between Johan Turi, Emilie Demant, Elsa Laura Renberg and Hjalmar Lundbohm about the future of making a living as an owner of reindeers, about the hunting of wolves, about the publication of the first book written in the Sami language , about the exploitation of natural resources and about the development of the Sami language. But who are the persons mentioned? Let me give you a short presentation of the main characters of the play: JOHAN TURI was famous for having written the first book in the Sami language:” Muitalus samiid birra”. The book is about the life of the Sami people who made a living of running reindeers. He was a wolf hunter too. No formal education. The book contents also illustrations made by Johan Turi. He was born in 1854 in Kautokeino. In 1936, at an age of 82, he died in Jukkasjarvi in Kiruna in Sweden. “ Muitaulus samiid Birra” has been translated into Danish, English, German, Hungarian, Italian,Swedish, Japanese and Finnish. EMILIE DEMANT HATT made the translation of the book into Danish. She was born in 1873 and died in 1958. The life of the Sami people was of great interest for her. She was a Danish artist, painter, writer and ethnographer. Emilie Demant learned the Sami language at the University of Copenhagen. “ THE BOOK OF LAPPS” – written by Johan Turi was funded by the Swedish mining director, HJALMAR LUNDBOHM. The book was published in 1910 in a bilingual Sami-Danish edition and in 1913 as an English language edition. ELSA LAURA RENBERG was a owner of reindeers. She fought for the rights of the Sami people. She was born in 1877 and died in 1931. In 1904 she was among the founders of the unions of Lapps in Sweden: Lappernas Centralførbund- in Stockholm. HJALMAR LUNDBOHM was born in 1855 and died in 1926. He was a Swedish geologist, chemist and the first managing director of LKAB in Kiruna, Sweden and educated at Chalmers University of Technology. He is regarded as the founder of the town Kiruna. To maintain the future for LKAB, education was important for him.

The plot takes place in a railway compartment which was made in 1904. Sound and images from movies are used in different scenes.

Gjengset, Gunnar Hauk og Harald Gaski: JOHAN TURI. Hauk Forlag A/S. Oslo 2019. 95 pages.