The Play

When the Doves Disappeared

”Juudit is perhaps

Oksanen’s most

complex character to

date, one whom it is

difficult to like but

easy to understand.”

— sydsvenskan, amanda svensson (sweden, 2012)

T he play When the Doves Disappeared is based on Sofi Oksanen’s novel by the same name, which belongs to her Quartet series about Estonia’s recent past and the division of Europe in two parts. The

previous novels in the series are Stalin’s Cows and Purge.

The play differs from the novel both in structure and emphasis: the novel is written anachronically and portrays how historical truth is constructed with words. The play progresses chronologically and focuses on the image. The central figure, Edgar Parts, has been changed from the author in the novel into a photographer and director working for the KGB and the German security police.

In Edgar’s private life, conflict arises from his unhappy marriage, his wife Juudit’s affair with a German, and his resistance fighter cousin Roland, fighting for Estonian independence.

”The power of the two totalitarian systems, the Soviet Union and national socialist Germany, was based not only on terror but also on propaganda in which the image and the word were the most essential weapons. This meant harnessing an artist-armada for propaganda duties,” Oksanen says. “Because of today’s rapid information distribution we still have to be able to understand how news, truth and interpretations are constructed. The methods are the same as in Edgar Parts’s day. Through Edward Snowden’s disclosures we know that today, too, incriminating information useful for extortion is being gathered about people exactly the same way as in Parts’s world.” We saw all these tools used also in Ukraine, when Russia invaded the country.

The play premièred on the main stage of the Finnish National Theatre on November 27, 2013. It was directed by Raila Leppäkoski. The set was by Karmo Mende, and the music playing throughout the performance was Maija Kaunismaa’s. The music from the performance was recorded and is available in whole or in part for theatre use through a separate contract. Matleena Kuusniemi (Juudit), Janne Hyytiäinen (Roland) and Timo Tuominen (Edgar) shone in the main roles.

Before the opening night, the play was presented in a reading performance at Sweden’s Royal Dramatic Theatre (Dramaten) in Stockholm on November 23, 2013. It was directed by Nils Poletti and five actors took part. Edgar was played by impressively stonefaced Björn Granath.

The play will be performed at the Kuopio City Theatre in 2016 in an inter-pretation by legendary Estonian director Priit Pedajas.

GERDA, Juudit’s friend

LIUTENANTMARTA BARTELS

SCENE II

EDGAR PARTS JUUDIT PARTS ROLAND SIMSON MARTA BARTELS, Roland’s wife, Evelin’s foster mother

REIN, Evelin’s fiancé

PERSONSSCENE I

EDGAR PARTSJUUDIT PARTS, Edgar’s wife

ROLAND SIMSON, Rosalie’s fiancé and Edgar’s cousin

ROSALIE ARM, Roland’s fiancée

HELLMUTH HERTZ, SS-Hauptsturmführer

MENTZEL, SS-Untersturmführer

HANS AUMEIER, SS-Hauptsturmführer

SOFI OKSANEN Sofi Oksanen has won the most awards of any Finnish writer alive, in her home country and internationally. She has written four novels, of which two have become international best sellers, as well as two full-length plays and a collection of song lyrics, Too Short a Skirt (2011).Oksanen was born in Jyväskylä, lives in Helsinki, and has studied dramaturgy at Helsinki’s Theatre Academy and literature at the University of Helsinki.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING ABOUT DOVES:

About the Play:

”A significant event.” – eesti päevaleht, estonia

”The whole play is brilliantly constructed to depict the two-facedness of not just one man but of Estonian society of that time: the same actors are on stage the whole time, as is the same set. Only the flag flying over the backwoods changes.” – savon sanomat (nOVEMBER 28)

”With the play’s script, Oksanen did it again.” –aamulehti (nOVEMBER 29)

”Oksanen’s forte is depicting tragic intersection points that force people into cruel decisions humanized by circumstances.” – turun sanomat

”A complete and haunting whole.” ”Continually jolting the audience, the story progresses to its unforgiving close” – ilta-sanomat

”No one can be unaffected by this powerful story and its dark historical framework. The production’s extensive interweaving of multiple arts and media is another of its merits. Cruelties are exposed against a background of moving lyrical music, countless charcoal drawings propel the war – and the visual arts – forward in the audience’s minds, and when the weeds of evil run rampant, love unfolds its own flower, big and pure and fragrant. At the bottom of the pocket of inconsolable desolation, hope for a new tomorrow hides, waiting.” – länsi-uusimaa (DECEMBER 3)

”When the Doves Disappeared’, a play adapted from Sofi Oksanen’s own novel, serves as a healthy reminder of the hell and trampling the Estonian people endured. It also tells what kinds of scoundrels and heroes rose out of the long period of martial law that lasted until 1991. The play does not so much tell of war and its consequences on the political and state level as from the individual’s point of view. Seen from this perspective, the painful events hurt even more.” – demari (DECEMBER 2)

”Today the greatest marvel of theatre occurred. An invisible bridge grew from the performance to the audience. The message hit home. I saw again how the Estonians were deported or shot for reasons that have made me proud: the blue and white colours, and the national anthem of freedom.” – kulttuurilehti akku (NOVEMBER 30)

”Set in the time of the national socialist Germany occupation and Soviet Estonia, ‘When the Doves Disappeared’ is an impressive play. Despite the fact it lasts for almost three hours, the play has its own mysteri-ous power and atmosphere.” – lukeminen.fi (NOVEMBER 28)

”Neither the novel nor the play is simply political history. This is a movingly precise picture of human relationships and a love that remains unfulfilled.” – apu (NOVEMBER 28)

”It feels as if the interwoven stories, characters and themes have become tighter and clearer and to some extent even brighter once moved to the stage. At core is humankind’s desire to get recognition, to love, and, in the end, to pull through, no matter what it takes.” – turun sanomat (NOVEMBER 29)

About the Novel:

” ’When the Doves Disappeared’ portrays with merciless logic and perception what happens when a society has lost its morals. // Few if any Nordic authors are capable of constructing a tale with the pure and stunning artistry of Sofi Oksanen.” – arbetar-bladet, sweden

”With her dense, rich prose, magnificent Sofi Oksanen earns a place somewhere between Quentin Tarantino and Leo Tolstoi.” – klassekampen, norway

”Explosive text, with a black heart.” – le monde, france

”A new gem from Oksanen.” – el periòdico, spain

”Masterful dialogue combines with the work’s violent intensity and Oksanen’s ability to describe the internal turmoil of charac-ters who are hurled about by the winds of history. These qualities make her novels unforgettable.” – marianne, france

EVELIN, Roland’s daughter

CAPTAIN PORKOV LIEUTENANTDOCTOR The play takes place in Estonia under changing occupations, from the 1930s to 1966.

TRANSLATIONS OF THE PLAY CURRENTLY AVAILABLE: • Estonian• English• Swedish

MAJOR AWARDS:

Finlandia Prize (2008)Kalevi Jäntti Prize (2008)Mika Waltari Award (2008)Runeberg Prize (2009)Nordic Council Literature Prize (2010)Prix Femina Étranger (2010)The Europe Book Prize (2010)The FNAC Prize (Le Prix du Roman Fnac) (2010)Pro Finlandia, the Order of the Lion of Finland (2012)Swedish Academy Nordic Prize (2013)Budapest Grand Prize (2014)

WORKS:

Novels:Stalin’s Cows (2003)Baby Jane (2005)Purge (2008)When the Doves Disappeared (2012)

Plays:Purge, Première on the Willensauna Stage, 7 February 2007Tales from the Kitchen, Première in the Omapohja Studio, 1 September 2011When the Doves Disappeared, Première at the Finnish National Theatre, 27 November 2013

” In Edgar Parts

Oksanen has created

an unsparingly

charming, totally

unprincipled and

deeply frightening

character.”

— john sjögren, uppsala ny tidning (sweden, 2013)

” At hand is great

drama that draws

on the power of the

word and at the same

time an exciting

multi-layered story

about Estonia in

the 1940s and 1960s.”

When the Doves Disappeared

THIS IS HOW SOVIET PROPAGANDA WAS BORN

Performances in 12 language regions

Books in 44 language territories

”When the Doves Disappeared” appeared first as a novel, but the idea of a stage production was already there when the story’s

basics were taking shape in my mind. The tale takes place in a world with a façade built from happy energetic images of Soviet

realism and national socialist Germany. Behind the scenes, immeasurable camp networks spread out across Siberia

and all the territory of the Third Reich.

The story belongs on stage because it tells about lies presented as truth, about the totalitarian states’ public truths, which

were theatre in themselves.

In Finland the theatre audience can choose whether or not to clap and decide for themselves how long to applaud, and for whom, or whether not to applaud, without consequences. “When the Doves Disappeared” tells about a world where things were different and

where something as self-evident to us as a spectator’s freedom to choose was just a distant dream.”

- SOFI OKSANEN

Requests for theatre rights in Finland and Estonia:

Otava Publishing Company LtdMilla Palovaara

Uudenmaankatu 1000120 Helsinki

milla.palovaara@otava.fi+358 40 596 7973

sofioksanen.fi • sofioksanen.com • kyyhkyset.fi

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