Groups of people have chosen to live in communes of one kind or another for centuries. Their rationale has been diverse: discontent with governments or the ratrace, escapes from unpleasant situations, sharing to reduce the financial burdens, or shared spiritual or social goals. In The Colony, Annika Norlin has explored the origin and ongoing life at a fictional commune set in Sweden, one that came to be largely by chance.
This novel has several protagonists, as befits a commune. One is Emelie, a young woman who is suffering from workplace burnout and depression after years of temporary jobs. In 2023, she drives to a remote area where her grandmother used to live, and camps out with a sleeping bag and a tent. That’s when she sees the group:
There were seven of them in the group. [..] They wore functional trousers and shirts and T-shirts and old jeans. One of them was wearing a dress with a nineties cut: straight, cotton.
Emelie continues to watch them over the days that follow. The novel alternates between Emelie’s notebook observations, the legal-pad jottings of one of the commune members, and an omnipotent observer in chapters called The Ant Colony. Over the course of the novel, their backstories emerge.
Sara is the acknowledged leader. Always charismatic, back in the 1990s she led an animal-rights protest into a chicken factory and released all the chickens. While escaping, she sprayed a guard in the face, and ended up in jail, where she met Aagny, imprisoned for killing her husband. Sara has a short sentence, but Aagny only gets out in 2003. Jobs are hard to come by, given Aagny’s history, but eventually she takes up a job in a remote area looking after an elderly woman with a brain injury. The woman has a teenage son, Ersmo, and his mother beats and abuses him, until Aagny takes a stand.
Ersmo’s mother is not seen again, but Aagny continues to get paid by the state for her work, and on this money she and Ersmo survive in their cottage.
Sara meets József in 2007 at a church choir. The attraction between them is instantaneous and deep, and the two are driving to meet Sara’s parents when they happen to bump into Aagny, and end up staying the night with Aagny and Ersmo in the cottage.
This is the answer [Sara thought]. In the morning, her headache was gone.
The four of them are the core of the commune, but are soon joined by Sagne, an entomologist who has been raped and is now pregnant. She gives birth to Låke, but detests the sight of the baby who reminds her of her rapist, so he is brought up by the others. In drifts Zakaria, who is described as
an implausibly beautiful, tall man who looked almost Greek, like a movie star.
Zakaria has inadvertently killed a man during a fistfight, and is on the run.
So there’s the commune, who survive on Aagny’s wages earned by caring for Ersmo’s nonexistent mother, Sara and József’s and Sagne’s savings, and what they can grow and forage for.
Their peace is disturbed by the inevitable intrusions: Emelie, and the loggers who start ripping out the forest in which they live. Very little of it, it turns out, is owned by Ersmo and his late mother, and their idyllic surroundings are due to be destroyed.
Also predictable are the rifts caused by sex. In theory, only Sara and József are a couple, but in practice, only Sagne is completely asexual after her rape. Aagny wants to be desired and longs for a sexual companion. Everyone is captivated by the gorgeous (and bisexual) Zakaria, including Sara, causing deep jealousy from József. Ersmo longs to meet girls, but is terrified that the secrets of the commune will get out. Young Låke is now a teenager, masturbating to porn magazines. The commune is relaxed about nudity and sex, but only Sara is satisfied with her sex life, and this inevitably disrupts the dynamics within the colony.
The novel brings up many existential questions: while the adults chose to live off-grid, this was less so for Ersmo and Låke — at what point are they being forced into the lives chosen by the others? Låke has never been to school, but has been taught to read and write — is that enough to make up for his lack of choices? What constitutes a family? Polyamory, buddhist practices, fairness in the distribution of labour, what each person contributes to the commune and what they get out of it … the novel carefully examines society and culture through the lens of this commune.
Norlin’s writing is spare and elegant, but vivid. There are a lot of characters to keep track of, but they are all quite distinct, and she does an excellent job with their backstories.
While the novel was a good read, I did have a problem with the ending, which was all too pat. One character is conveniently removed, another is brought into the fold far too easily, which detracted from the realism of the novel until this point.
Still, that said, it is an original and thoughtful novel, well worth reading.
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