From: "a.c. fick"  <ANG-AT-beattie.uct.ac.za>
Date:         1 Mar 95 11:00:47 SAST-2
Subject:      Re: Bodies, Territories, Renegotiating History


Dear Birgit

You ask:
>
> How does Peter Hoeg's book fit into that list?
> (just curious - found it highly irrelevant in any possible
> understanding...)
>
Well, my initial reading of it led to a couple of interesting
questions in my own mind regarding Hoeg's representation of the
Denmark-Greenland relations, and especially the way/s in which this
tension/interstitial moment is "embodied" in Smilla, with her
position as the daughter of a Danish scientist and a mother from
Greenland.  I found it interesting to note that Smilla relates to her
physical presence differently when she is in Denmark (and when she is
in Greenland/or approaching it).  The whole colonial enterprise and
its sexual connotations (yes, I know, you're asking yourself where
you've heard that before!) is also interesting, especially when the
narrator describes Smilla's sexual act with Peter, the mechanic-cum-
military intelligence super soldier fundi.

Finally, I find the whole act of writing from Denmark (as Hoeg does)
about the Danish "exploitation" of Greenland interesting, and it also
ties up nicely with what Swedish writer Lennart Hagerfors does with
his renegotiation of the African connection in "The Whales in Lake
Tanganyika".

But I can see that the connection is vague.  Your question was
useful.  It made me start to rethink the enterprise a little, since I
would have to "justify" the marginality in Hoeg's writing.

Angelo


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