Andres Herkel: The tendency to borrow seems to be the main mechanism of culture. Therefore, every culture tends to borrow, and if a culture is not growing on fertile soil, or if it does not have a neighbour from whom to borrow, it will stagnate. We should, of course, add that small cultures seem to borrow more than large ones. A large culture is able to live for a longer time and more steadily on its own; a small culture is preconditioned to borrow more. The situation becomes bad when the borrowing is only in one direction, and when there are no balancing mechanisms that would invite or force borrowing from others. In the case of Estonia, the aspect of language is probably the most important feature - when pressure from one large language grows too strong, it may happen that the functional mechanisms of the Estonian language cannot cope any longer. But if it is possible to maintain versatility in contacts, other languages may have a fruitful effect on it.

andres herkel

Märt Väljataga: I can understand that underlying the problem - what is original in a culture and what is borrowed - is the question of self-esteem. It would be nice if we could find something in Estonian culture that was uniquely Estonian. Actually, if some phenomenon of Estonian culture that had been taken as genuinely Estonian suddenly proved to be a loan, this should not have too deep an effect on our self-esteem. We might ask - so what?

märt väljataga

A.H.: National awakenings and the birth of nations, initiated among small European peoples at about the same time, under the influence of the German philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder, were characteristically processes of borrowing. Herder appreciated the folklore of different Eastern European peoples of the period when the national self-awareness of these peoples had not yet appeared. But when this self-awareness finally sprang up, it was quite obvious that the whole tendency had been borrowed from German culture. Thus the development of the Estonian people into a nation is by no means a process unique to Estonians. However it is important that this movement laid the foundation for the development, resulting in the fact that the Estonian language is among about one hundred languages that have all the important functions characteristic of a cultured language. Taking into account that the number of languages in the world amounts to 6000-7000, this is quite impressive.
It seems to me that it is precisely in the language where we can see something that is unique to the Estonian people, something of a true Finno-Ugric nature. This is not expressed directly, but is rather hidden somewhere under the surface, for example, in Estonian poetry, related to the runosong, and in Estonian music. Or let us take Veljo Tormis; his work contains strong archaic elements, the roots of which reach much further back than the already mentioned time of the rise of self-awareness.

M.V.: It is altogether interesting to observe when and how the Estonians began to consciously regard themselves as Finno-Ugric. During the period of national awakening, the difference between Estonians and peoples speaking Indo-European languages was not well perceived. The comparative-historical linguistics that made it possible is about as old as the Estonian national awakening, originating in the first half of the 19th century, but its influence reached Estonia only some time later. In the mid-19th century, Estonians were already "building the bridge to Finland", and the first contacts were established with other Finno-Ugric peoples in Russia. However, the ideology of related peoples is generally a phenomenon that belongs to the 20th century.
One of the most amazing facts that foreigners notice immediately in Estonia is how deeply Estonians identify with their language and its uniqueness. I do not believe that, in everyday life, Estonian culture differs much from that of Latvia or, in some ways, from that of the Scandinavian countries. Such emphasis on the Finno-Ugric nature of the people is rather an ideology that marks one phase in the development of patriotism.
But if we wanted to search for something deeply unique to Estonians, I believe it would be very difficult to reconstruct a worldview that is based solely on language. Grammar does not offer many hints about the world picture of the ancient Estonians. Nor does folklore engage in abstract or philosophical subjects that would help to derive the unique worldview of Estonians. It could only give some negative hints - Estonian folklore does not contain any particular subject that can be found in the folklore of the Indo-European peoples. Research into phraseology could be one possible means of studying the effect of language on a way of thinking. But generally, I am sceptical about attempts to squeeze a kind of worldview out of the language and its grammar. If the attempts to create a national philosophy based on language were successful, the result would not differ much from poetry. As you have already said, it is poetry that bears the Estonian identity, and if the national philosophy of language were able to create something original, it would be quite indistinguishable from poetry.

A.H.: The language operates in very deep layers. I could say, based on my personal experience, that an Estonian can read works of some Finnish authors, such as Aleksis Kivi's Seven Brothers or Eino Leino's poetry, in their original language without necessarily knowing all the words. These works have a singular effect, resembling incantation, which differs from that of any Indo-European language.
Another subject related to the linguistic life of small nations is, naturally, language skills. To cope with the world, small nations, or at least their elite, have to know many different languages. This cannot, by any means, be reduced to the idea that earlier we had to know Russian and now we have to know English. Our scope must be wider.
An interesting feature concerning Estonia is that although we have retained our Finno-Ugric language, we very clearly copy the Western cultural models in our political and social culture.

M.V.: We seem to believe that Estonians and the whole of our Estonian society are very original mostly as long as they cause us to learn about other peoples and their experience. Nationalism, particularly Eastern European nationalism, has followed more or less similar models since its birth. One of these models was the imitating of a more prestigious neighbour. But in this process it was realised that simple imitation was not sufficient to maintain a similar level in economics, technology or culture. Thus, it was necessary to show the people something in which they could exceed the hegemonic nations. Now, too, a search is underway for the phenomena, products or keywords that will make Estonia culturally and economically attractive abroad. However, this time culture is clearly in the service of economics.
A connected theme is the search for roots. This search has had several different contexts and stages in Estonian culture. One such period was in the 1970s, when the thaw of the Khrushchev time was over and a new reaction was setting in. It was the time when Veljo Tormis, whom you have already mentioned, started to write his music. Friedebert Tuglas stated that reactionary times have always been favourable for mysticism, and that in the Estonian culture of the reactionary period of the late 19th century, the role of mysticism was filled by the collecting of folklore and by interest in archaeology. These are Tuglas's thoughts and we could question the common features of mysticism and folklore, but it is clear that during reactionary periods, the interest in both of them usually rises. We have experienced it ourselves, when in the recent past, in the 1970s, the "new pagan" movements again appeared in culture, aiming to delve still deeper into the past than through the acculturation of the time of the national awakening. But even this new pagan aspect cannot be considered to be uniquely Estonian in nature, since such movements have been noticed all over Europe. A characteristically Estonian feature is rather that here these movements are perceived aesthetically, not fanatically. These movements have been politically sterile and have not given rise to dangerous extremist national movements.

A.H.: That's right. Studies in mysticism had a different aura in the Soviet time than they have now, because then they could also acquire a certain air of freethinking, which is difficult to add to such activities now. Märt is referring here to the so-called "pagan", bearing in mind also the leanings towards Taaraism, which have, during the recent couple of decades, been popular among a certain group of the young intelligentsia, particularly in connection with its Finno-Ugric essence. This is one way of finding some support for one's culture. At the same time I think that one of the problems of Estonian culture is the lack of a common axis or support that would draw people together. Nor does the Lutheran Church offer such support; it does bring together a part of the nation, but it certainly does not have as deep a meaning as the Armenian Church or the Jewish religion have for their people. The whole Finno-Ugric movement seems to be an attempt to create such a support. As an attempt it is very original, but it does not dominate. Thus, we may really agree that such a strong and connective support can be found in the Estonian language, not in religion or in some connective worldview. It seems that in some sense, this feature shows the strength and adaptability of Estonian culture, but it may also prove to be its weakness.
I still feel sometimes that Estonian society is too secular, creating problems in values, which have become extremely pragmatic. On the one hand, Estonian society is indeed a society of achievements and therefore, it progresses rapidly. On the other hand, the lack of connective ethics is slightly frightening and makes us vulnerable in some sense.

M.V.: I agree that Estonian society really is very secular. I once read the Lonely Planet travel guide and found the same thing written there that I have perceived intuitively - Estonia is one of the most secular societies in the world; the number of church members is the smallest here. The Nordic countries are also known to be very secular, but their church membership has never been violently discontinued, and people routinely have their children christened and confirmed, and they pay their church fees. But since all this was interrupted in Estonia in the 1960s, the return to the church requires a clear act of will and is usually motivated by either snobbishness or religious awakening. The latter occurs much less frequently. On the other hand, even in those societies that lack a clearly organised religion, people still have some kind of feeling of sanctity. I don't know whether it touches everybody, but most people possess it.
Estonia could also be taken as a counter example to the thesis that social morale unconditionally depends on religion - in spite of its secularity, our society has not entirely broken apart and some behavioural criteria do exist. Even this could show the originality of Estonia, and in this sense Estonian society could be an interesting research laboratory for the possibility of life in a secular society.

A.H.: The subject of borrowing has still another aspect, namely which philosophical texts and works of fiction are translated. There is also the question of how these texts are adopted and what their effect on us is. It seems to me that the ability to translate that emerged after Estonia had regained its freedom has been quite awe-inspiring, considering the fact that we have had to fill a cultural gap of 50 years. I believe that we have been quite successful in doing this.

M.V.: We might, naturally, ask, what the sense in translating works of theoretical or philosophical thought into Estonian is. The majority of people with such specific interests read foreign languages ... but obviously, translation activities are inspired by the same nationalism, a surprisingly late phenomenon in itself, in which we are still living. One of the aims of translation programmes may lie in the desire of Estonian culture to make every important text accessible in the Estonian language. This is, of course, a utopian idea; such a situation will never occur.
As you have already mentioned, people in small nations must know foreign languages. It is imaginable that a Russian or American scholar of the humanities can achieve a quite high academic level without knowing any foreign languages. In Estonia this cannot be. But the educated public needs translations - a notion which, unfortunately, cannot be found in the cultural institutions, among academic circles and creative people engaged in the fine arts.

A.H.: The major problem in Estonia seems to be, not the inability to produce translated texts, but the smallness of the public. Estonian society has so far been able to imitate the models of democracy of the Western welfare society and to nourish its own culture by using outside sources, but we have failed in our third task: even if it sounds banal, we have not been able to guarantee a notable increase in our population. Even though these aims do not, essentially, cancel each other, Estonians have not been able to achieve them all. Estonian politicians have almost unanimously agreed that the greatest problem in Estonia is the small population and low birth rate. The birth rate is quite high in those societies that have not adopted Western models of democracy and social structures, where society is organised in a traditional way and where the development of science and high culture are not as highly valued as in Estonia.

M.V.: Translation activities have always come in waves in the history of Estonian culture. One such crest was at the turn of the 19th century, when very many works carrying theoretical, political and social thought were translated into Estonian. It is interesting to note that this translation boom did not coincide with a major awakening in other fields of culture, but rather was a preparation for the political awakening and the birth of statehood.

A.H.: We have been talking mostly about the philosophical literature of the West, but certainly Estonia needs a special translation programme for Oriental - Chinese, Indian, Buddhist, Islamic, etc. - cultures. Compared with larger European languages, our situation is still very poor. However, we need to get acquainted with this heritage, which is now accessible only through a few translations.
A separate question, stemming from the issues we have already discussed, and which now and then troubles me, is the arrogance of Estonians. What can we say about a situation in which Estonian literary culture is so young but Estonians still believe that their culture is better and more sophisticated than those cultures where the literary culture is maybe even thousands of years older than ours? How should we deal with this temporal and psychological problem?

M.V.: It is only too true that Estonians very often and quite unreasonably think that they are better than others. This can be noticed not so much in high culture - the fine arts - but in everyday culture. For example, the attitude that somehow we are very special and much above all other post-socialist countries is very widespread. Or, if we are not much better, then at least much more successful.

A.H.: Very often this attitude is not as justified as we want to believe ...

M.V.: Most probably, this attitude is caused by the fact that we are not familiar enough with other cultures. We do not know what riches we are missing.

Andres Herkel (1962) is an orientalist and a member of Estonia's Riigikogu (parliament). He has studied mythologies, ancient written texts and the history of psychology.

Märt Väljataga (1965) is a writer, translator, critic, philosopher, and the chief editor of the cultural magazine Vikerkaar.