Scandinavian literature

Scandinavian literature, the body of works, both oral and written, produced within Scandinavia in the North Germanic group of languages, in the Finnish language, and, during the Middle Ages, in the Latin language.

Scandinavian literature traditionally consists of works in modern Swedish, Norwegian, Icelandic, Danish, and Faroese, all members of the North Germanic group of languages. The literary works written in these languages show deep-seated common linguistic ties. The Finnish language is unrelated to the North Germanic languages; it belongs instead to the Baltic-Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric language family and is most closely related to Estonian and Karelian. Because Sweden ruled Finland for more than six centuries, Finnish literature, despite its linguistic differences, became closely intertwined with Swedish literature.

The term Scandinavia traditionally designates the two countries of the Scandinavian Peninsula—Norway and Sweden—and Denmark. Finland and Iceland are frequently called Scandinavian countries on geographic, political, and cultural grounds. The term Nordic is often used today to refer collectively to the Åland Islands, Denmark, Finland, the Faroe Islands, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden.

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Although the Scandinavian literatures exhibit similarities stemming from close cultural ties, they manifest differences reflective of distinct national institutions and historical and geographic conditions. They are therefore discussed separately under Danish literature, Faroese literature, Icelandic literature, Norwegian literature, and Swedish literature. Works written in Finland in the Swedish language (Finland-Swedish literature) and in the Finnish language are discussed under Finnish literature.