Sigrid Backman

Sigrid Backman was a Finland-Swedish writer born in Helsinki on December 1, 1880, and she died there on May 26, 1938. Several library records list her as 1886–1938, but major reference sources identify her birth year as 1880, and describe her as an author who worked somewhat apart from the main literary movements of her time.

She made her debut with Vindspel in 1913 and published fiction steadily through the 1910s, 1920s, and 1930s, with Under Häxböles sol appearing in 1935. Reference works note her gift for romanticized character portraits, unusual nature writing, and stories centered on dreamy yet independent women; they also point to recurring themes such as criticism of traditional marriage roles, the Finnish Civil War, Swedish-speaking working-class Helsinki, and currents in the women's movement of the 1920s and 1930s.

Backman lived a fairly withdrawn literary life in Helsinki, but her books reached deeply into the emotional and social tensions of her era. Today she is often remembered as an overlooked but singular voice in Finland-Swedish prose.