Traumbach
By
Joel Haahtela
The virtuoso of fine-tuned prose plucks at the delicate strings that bridge remembering and forgetting.
A young man arrives in a strange city to conduct an interview with a man named Traumbach. But who is this mysterious Traumbach, and why does he always seem to be fleeing from his interviewer?
The protagonist’s task proves difficult because it feels as if, not only the interviewee, but everything around him is retreating and shifting. The city comes across as a collection of facades that everyone besides him knows how to navigate. Both the mellow coffee-house barista and Traumbach’s secretary have turned into someone else by the time he next sees them.
Gradually, the enigma called Traumbach begins to transform into a question about the protagonist’s own persona.
About the author
Joel Haahtela (b. 1972) is an author and psychiatrist. He was inspired to specialise in psychiatry after reading Oliver Sacks’ book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat.The author has been recognized with two Finlandia Prize nominations and has also been nominated for the Runeberg Prize for literature two times. People’s stories are important to him in both of his professions, and the self is a key theme in his writing. Haahtela aspires to understand the human condition and the meaning of people’s own decisions in their lives. His parallel careers complement each other very well and Haahtela believes he will never stop writing. When he was still a student, Joel Haahtela published a collection of short stories titled Unicum Zwack together with friends. These short stories gave him the impetus to write a novel during his studies. His debut novel, Twice Disappeared, was published in the spring of 1999.In 2023, Joel Haahtela was awarded the Veijo Meri prize, a recognition by the Otava Literary Foundation for significant efforts in Finnish literature.
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