Book review
Swede Hollow by Ola Larsmo
Never judge a book by the first chapter. When I first started reading this novel, I thought it was just another predictable story about Swedish immigrants in the style of Wilhelm Moberg ’s epic novels on the same subject. The Klar family, consisting of husband, wife and three children, decides to leave their untenable situation in Sweden and start a new life in America. The year is 1897. Their journey across the Atlantic in the bowels of a steamship is a nightmare characterized by over-crowding, seasickness and bad food. They arrive exhausted in New York with no knowledge of English and very little money. Work is difficult to find in the big, noisy city, so they take the train to Minnesota in a renewed attempt to improve their lot.
In Ola Larsmo’s novel, the Klar family joins other Swedish immigrants in Saint Paul, MN. In a shanty-town lining the slopes of a ravine called Swede Hollow, the Swedish settlers live alongside close-knit Irish and Italian communities, but there is minimal interaction between them due to cultural, religious and language barriers.
From here onwards the story takes off, and I found it difficult to put the book down. The men hire on as poorly paid day laborers, while the women clean houses, work at laundries or sew clothing in stifling factories. The Klars endure hard-ships, indignities, accidents and death, but also experience loyalty, kindness and moments of joy. This haunting story of plausible charac-ters in a real place echoes the huge challenges of immigration in the 20th century, and even today.
Due to their lack of education and marketable skills, the Klars are doomed to remain poor. Over time, poverty becomes almost a virtue. When one of the Klar daughters marries a lawyer and joins the middle class, it only leads to mutual embarrassment and alienation within the family.
The story spans the period from 1897 to 2007. By the early 1930s many of the older settlers had died, and the younger ones moved to other neighborhoods. In 1956 the Saint Paul authorities deemed the shantytown in Swede Hollow to be so unsanitary that they had it burned down. After the demolition, the area became a dumping ground and gathering place for the homeless. In the 1970s the ravine was cleaned up, and it was designated a nature center in 1976. Nowadays it a recreation area known as Swede Hollow Park.
