Kalevipoeg: Gay Epic Hero of Estonia

When I was visiting Estonia in the summer of 1998, I couldn't go anywhere without hearing about Kalevipoeg.  There were a dozen public statues of him, a naked, muscular god carrying small people.

There was a Kalevipoeg Sculpture Park in Tallinn.

There was a Kalevipoeg Museum near Kaapa, which became a full Theme Park in 2007.

There was a chain of Kalev Chocolate Shops.

Teenagers were filming adaptions of his adventures for  school projects.

Museums were crowded with sculptures, murals, and paintings, often emphasizing the god's superheroic endowment.
Bookstores were teeming with books that praise Kalevipoeg as "James Bond and Chuck Norris put together."

So who is this guy?

He's the son of the god Kalev in The Kalevipoeg,  the Estonian national epic, culled from ancient myths by Friedrich Kreutzwald and published in 1853.

The youngest of  Kalev's children, but the biggest, strongest, and most resourceful, Kalevipoeg has many adventures.  He:
1. Swims to Finland to rescue his mother from an evil wizard
2. Gets a cursed sword from the Finish god Ilmarin.
3. Wins the throne of Estonia in a stone-throwing contest.


From then on, his companion is Alevipoeg, with whom he:
4. Fights a water demon and a sorcerer.
5. Travels to Porgu (Hell) twice.
6. Seeks out the edge of the world.
7. Fights an apocalyptic battle with the demon Sarvik and his army.

When Alevipoeg is killed, Kalevipoeg is so grief-stricken that he gives up his kingdom and becomes a hermit.  When he dies, he goes to Heaven, but is deemed so valuable that he is tied to the gates of Porgu to keep the world safe.

Kreutzwald was inspired by the Finnish Kalevala, also compiled from ancient myths, and set to verse by Elias Lönnrot in 1849.

But there's a big difference: the Kalevala is all about the quest after the Eternal Feminine, the gods Ilmarin, Väinämöinen, and Lemminkäinen searching for wives.

But except for one short maiden-seduction early on (which, admittedly, gets a lot of attention), Kalevipoeg is oblivious to women.  When he rescues three maidens from Porgu, he busily tries to find them husbands, never attempting to seduce them himself.

He is all about masculine buddy-bonding, first with his brothers, and then with Alevipoeg.


A gay epic hero?


In addition to the many literary and artistic adaptations of The Kalevipoeg, there's been a ballet featuring the Kalevipoeg Suite, by Eugen Kapp, and a stage play, a "Cool Epic" starring Tanel Saar, that has toured Europe and the U.S.

See also: Kristjan Raud: Mesmerized by Male Beauty and Yuri and I Cruise in Estonia.

The Surrealistic Nudes of Lembit Sarapuu

This photo by Triinu Jurves is entitled A Homage to Lembit Sarapuu.  There are several other photos of semi-nude men flexing their muscles in rustic settings.

I'm interested in any artist who inspires semi-nude male photographs.  But who is this Lembit Sarapuu?

The Estonian version of Wikipedia just states that he was born in 1930, he's won several awards, he's interested in surrealism, and he's married to a sculptor.

The surrealism is obvious: Euro Referendum in Estonia depicts two Western Europeans in 1950s garb trying to interview Estonia, depicted as a wild man, naked,  fully aroused.

Kalevipoeg and the King of the Underworld, depicts a muscular, naked Kalevipoeg encountering a talking anus.

An interview with Eve Kask doesn't reveal much more: he likes women, he is interested in myth and nature, and if he could choose to live in another time, he would be a Cro-Magnon painting on a cave wall.

Thus, his frequent use of male nudity may not be a deliberate attempt to evoke the homoerotic, but an evocation of the pre-civilized wild man.

His work is sometimes criticized as sexist, depicting women only as objects of male conquest, as in A Walk Through the Park.

Of course, that doesn't explain his many nude men standing alone, raging against the modern world.

See also: Kristjan Raud; Kalervo Palsa.

Kristjan Raud: Male Nudity in Estonia

Kristjan Raud, the founder of Estonian art, memorialized the Estonian spirit through a series of paintings and drawings of nude, muscular men, leading one to wonder if he was gay.

Born in 1865, he studied art in St. Petersburg and Munich, then returned to Tallinn, where he became a schoolteacher.

When Estonia became independent in 1917, the 52-year old won a contest for the design of the new postage stamps with his drawing of a nude, muscular man sowing seeds, his bag extending outward as a phallic symbol (below).

The next year, he won the contest for the design of the new currency with a romantic picture of farmers and shepherds, and was commissioned to draw the new coat of arms.

From then on, Raud's career was established: he would promote Estonian culture for the rest of the world.  He produced a wide variety of paintings depicting traditional Estonian life, the villages, the landscapes, and the objects of every day life: costumes, tools, furniture.

Also busts and monuments devoted to important public figures, like wrestle Aleksander Aberg.  They, too, were often muscular and semi-nude.

Raud was particularly interested in Estonian folklore and mythology.  His various illustrations of the Estonian epic Kalevipoeg began the tradition of depicting the epic hero naked..

But even his non-patriotic art frequently depicts muscular, naked men, as in Inimene ja öö (Man of the Night).

Raud married late in life, and had three children.  He died in 1943, when people often lived and died without being aware of the existence of same-sex desire, in themselves or others. So there's no way to tell.

But his art is an inspiration, both to the Estonian people and to everyone mesmerized by male beauty.

See also: Lembit Sarapuu; Kalevipoeg, Gay Epic Hero of Estonia and Yuri and I Cruise in Estonia.