author
Maria Kraftman
1812–1884
One of Finland’s earliest women novelists also built a remarkable career as an entrepreneur, moving between literature and business with unusual independence for her time. Writing in Swedish, she left behind a small but memorable place in Finnish literary history.
1 Audiobook
Så slutades min lek: En tafla ur lifvet
by Maria Kraftman
About the author
Born in Oulu in 1812, Maria Kraftman was a Finnish-Swedish writer and businesswoman who wrote in Swedish, her mother tongue. She is remembered as one of the earliest female novelists in Finland, and her 1848 novel Så slutades min lek is often noted among the country’s early novels.
Kraftman’s life was strikingly practical as well as literary. Sources describe her running a restaurant on a steamboat in the 1840s, later moving to Turku, where she founded the city’s first taxi business around the 1850s. She was also involved in export trade, including butter and grain.
She died in 1884 in Turku. Although she was long less well known as an author than as a businesswoman, her life now stands out for the unusual mix of literary ambition and entrepreneurial drive she brought to 19th-century Finland.