Book review: A time traveler from the future composes dreamy

Teodor Werelius is a poesidebutant born in 2048. The blurb states that ”he came here in 2018, and since then has been living in Malmö”. It is the new publisher of the Swedish Sci-Fi that gives the poems, in their bet on what they call ”speculative poetry”.

In times of revived ”Aniara”-a fever and a poesidebatt as with the various measuring devices are trying to take the temperature of the present – with different the outcome may well say, the whole range from ice cold to red hot has firmly attested – it fits nicely with a lyrical time traveler from the future.

Read more: So, was ”Harry” to a cautionary tale before the apocalypse

the youngest and the oldest step, therefore, Werelius into poesiscenen. With him he carries the sounds from the Harry Martinson, Lars Jakobson, Johannes Heldén and classic cyberpunk. But he also has something of their own. A kind of epic suction as expressed in the narrative loops that flutter in the air. A soft verse that rhymes sometimes, and a technocratic lingo with lines like ”Resonanseffekter in the diaphragm kvotuppdateringsfrekvens”.

And right of the membrane, the elastic membrane that produces the sound, and conveys information, could be Werelius poetic keywords. His poems create the moods and the fluctuations in the room, a dreamy music in which ”the Hours are counting themselves” and ”the Wind whistle melodies from the old times”.

On one page it says: ”Tidsresenären says that the reality is not important. Only the direction is important.” It is a statement that may sound strange in almost any context, but in poetry and art, it is obvious. A collection of poems can without problems move over time and space and build their own realms, it is as that is the thing.

Read more: So, DN wrote about Harry martinson's ”Aniara” in 1956

is the collection's most important figure, we also meet ”the Observer”, an old Russian man (of course), some green growling and running ”spots” and a couple who dream to have children. It feels as if a part diktrader is taken from a larger prosaberättelse which is only hinted at, but not really go together. It does nothing. On the contrary, I believe that the fragments in this case is preferable, in front of a whole that still do not allow themselves to be ruled. The scattered paragraphs to enable the reader's imagination and feeling. This can sound like:

”He wakes up from his dream, rises from its earthly bed, and wanders out into the dark corridors. He opens the doors, they lead nowhere. The fluorescent light flickers after life, one last spark of katodens discharge.”

Certainly, it is a quite all fun imagery such as ”Zero plus zero” paints, but presented like this, in the swirling of the flakes, is it right lovely to stay in.