The Almost Nearly Perfect People by Michael Booth

Author:Michael Booth
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2014-02-05T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7

Butter

AS WE’VE HEARD, Norway has always been a somewhat peripheral, isolated, inward-looking place. In a sense, the geopolitical turbulence the region has seen over the centuries has played a lesser role in determining the psyche of the modern Norwegian than its beautiful, savage landscape has.

Denmark built, then lost, an empire, has always been the bridge with continental Europe, and wrangled ceaselessly with Sweden. Sweden ruled and lost Finland, waged wars deep into Europe, and, post-Second World War, has seen its manufacturing corporations conquer the world. Though it shares Norway’s geographical isolation, in its own cursed way, Finland has also been forced to engage more with regional geopolitics thanks to its role as the rope in a tug-of-war between east and west, ruled first by Sweden, then Russia, bloodied yet defiant after countless conflicts, and it is the only Nordic country to have embraced the euro. You could argue that Iceland has also existed on the edges of Nordic history, although it was Icelanders who discovered America, and they have, of course, recently enjoyed a second rampage, this time out among the money markets of the world.

As for the Norwegians, they have always tended to keep themselves to themselves. Even within their own borders they spread themselves out as if they are trying to put as much space as possible between one another. And even on those justly celebrated occasions when the Norwegians have displayed immense courage and ingenuity in venturing out into the world – your Roald Amundsens, Fridtjof Nansens and Thor Heyerdals – they still appear to have taken great care to ensure that the venturing took place where there were likely to be few, if any, people.

The outside world can sometimes appear to be of little consequence to the Norwegians. They had their fish and their timber, and now they also have their oil and their dairy monopoly. They don’t really need anyone else, except perhaps for a few Swedes to peel their bananas. My impression from a brief attempt once to seek help from the Norwegian tourist board for research on a magazine article seemed to suggest that visitors are politely welcomed rather than overtly encouraged, but they’d probably prefer it if you stayed on your cruise ship if you don’t mind.

Why are the Norwegians so closed? Throughout the Danish and Swedish occupations they lacked not only self-determination, but to a large extent any sense of self or nationhood. After a long, drawn-out but not especially fiercely fought campaign for independence, self-rule finally came in 1905. What happened next presents us with a telling difference between the Norwegians and the Swedes, and their progress over the following century. The Swedes made a conscious, unified push towards the light, embracing technological and industrial progress, modernism, secularism and socially progressive politics, in the process becoming one of the most successful industrial nations of the post-war years, a manufacturing colossus, a paragon of what a modern, multicultural nation should be – and with great pop music and sexy tennis players to boot.

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