20.09.2013 Rroma as a Projection of the Majority Society

Tuomas Kyrö’s novel “beggars and Hare” explores the ambivalent relationship of the majority towards Rroma. The protagonist, a Romanian Rrom named Vatanescu, experiences a variety of adventures during his stay in Finland. He was – as Brüns (2013) – primarily a projection of the desires and fears of the people he encounters. He himself remains shapeless as a person: “Vatanescu was referred to as the Bulgarian concrete reinforcing bars Ivan, sometimes as the Polish Miroslaw, son of Bronislaw or as yhe Albanian Fox. On the sides, a lot happens, which leads him into a high office. You get to know the other characters of the novel in biographical breaks, one learns, however, until the end very little about the Roma: He is what the others make of him.”