Please don’t hesitate to join us at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Arkadia-International-Bookshop-Ian-Bourgeot/114962855198875?fref=ts!

Dear friend of Arkadia,

You are invited to ‘Reading from and discussion of Citizen Kekkonen: Urho Kekkonen and his times,’ a work-in-progress by journalist and historian Gordon F. Sander on Tuesday 2.6 at 6pm at Arkadia (Nervanderinkatu 11)

www.gordonsander.com

Welcome!

Warm regards,

Ian
www.arkadiabookshop.fi

– A donation of €3 (or more!) to fund the bookshop is suggested and would be most welcome. Arkadia wouldn’t exist without this act of generosity. If you have no loose change or coins we gladly accept payment via Visa Electron or Mastercard etc. !

You are cordially invited to a reading from and discussion of Citizen Kekkonen: Urho Kekkonen and his times, a work-in-progress by noted Fennophile American journalist and historian Gordon F. Sander at 18:00 on 2.6 at Arkadia International Bookshop.

The third and most ambitious of his so-called “Finnish trilogy,” Kekkonen, which makes use of interviews with several dozen of the late president’s closest associates and friends and other new material, is a sweeping portrait of the formidable—and still controversial–politician whose 25 year long presidency (1956-1981) paralleled, and played a role in the frostiest period of the Cold War (as well as, some critics say, the dismantling of Finnish democracy).

Historians agree that one can’t understand post-war Finland without understanding Urho Kekkonen. But who was Kekkonen? And what was his Rosebud? Come and find out at this reading from the author’s already much-buzzed about masterwork, modelled, in part after the film “Citizen Kane,” and help Finland’s greatest champion in the international press celebrate his 25th year of writing about Suomi.

Gordon F. Sander has been writing about Finland for the American, British, and Finnish presssince 1990. His articles about Finnish politics and culture have appeared in “The New York Times,” “Financial Times,” Image, and numerous other publications. He is also the author of “The Battle of Finland,” his best-selling 2010 history of the Winter War, and “Off the Map: A Personal History of Finland” (2012).