In accordance with our meta agreement to have topic challenges, and since the list of suggestions has a single highest-voted entry at the start of this month, it's time to announce the next topic challenge! Throughout November 2018, our topic challenge, proposed by heather, will be
The Kalevala.
What's a topic challenge?
See the meta posts linked above, and also this main meta post. In short, during November we should all try to read at least some part of the Kalevala and post thoughtful and interesting questions about it.
Participation is not obligatory in any sense, but those who participate will be forever remembered in the annals of our history. And of course it goes without saying that questions on other works are more than welcome during November too; they just won't count as part of this topic challenge.
How can I take part?
By getting hold of the Kalevala, in whatever language you prefer, and asking good questions about it. These questions should be tagged with the-kalevala and finnish-literature, and other tags if applicable. We'll keep a list of all such questions in an answer to this meta post.
- The best English version I've found freely available online is Crawford's translation at the Sacred Texts site. The same website also has the text in the original Finnish.
- Wikipedia has a decent list of translations, retellings, and further reading relevant to the Kalevala. At least some of this material is also freely available online.
What's next?
- Vote here for the next topic challenge, or propose your own!
