Jotuni, Maria

Born Apr. 9, 1880, in Kuopio; died Sept. 30, 1943, in Helsinki. Finnish author.

Jotuni created a “portrait gallery” of different social groups of the city and countryside in the collections of short stories Relationships (1905), Love (1907), and When There Are Feelings (1913) and in the novella Humdrum Life (1909). Her comedies contrast the world of the well-to-do and their deceitful ethics with the world of honest laborers (Man’s Rib, 1914). In the comedies Golden Calf (1918) and Under His Wife’s Thumb (1924) she sharply criticizes social relations. The tragedy Klaus, the Master of Louhikko (1942, published 1946) was written on a folkloric subject, and the tragedy I Am Guilty (1929), which is devoted to the theme of war and peace, deals with a biblical topic. Jotuni raises problems of love and marriage in the novel A Shaky House (published 1963).