| Eva Neander | |
| Birth Date: | 3 April 1921 |
| Birth Place: | Jukkasjärvi, Sweden |
| Death Place: | Tiveden, Vaasa, Gothenburg, Sweden |
| Resting Place: | Finnerödja Cemetery |
| Occupation: | Journalist, author and poet |
| Nationality: | Swedish |
| Education: | University of Gothenburg, Uppsala University |
| Period: | 1940s |
| Genres: | --> |
| Subjects: | --> |
| Spouses: | --> |
| Partners: | --> |
Eva Lydia Carolina Neander (3 April 1921, in Jukkasjärvi – 22 February 1950, in Tiveden) was a Swedish journalist as well as being one of the most eminent authors and poets of the 1940s.[1] On 22 February 1950, she disappeared and was found dead, frozen in ice in Lake Unden.
Neander grew up on the small island of Mellan Holmen in Härnösand.[2] Neander's mother was Emilia Karolina Neader née Svanberg and her father was school inspector and statistician Ernst Albin Neander.[1] Her father died when she was six years old.[2] Several years later her mother remarried, becoming Emilia Neander-Nyström and the family moved to Borås in 1932[1] Neander lived in Borås until 1939 when the family moved to Gothenburg.[2] In 1941, received her school-leaving certificate (Gymnasieexamen) in Gothenburg.[1]
Eva Neander never married.
In the winter of 1949, traveling alone, she visited her old house in Finnerödja. On 22 February 1950,[1] she disappeared and was subsequently found dead by her brother and brother-in-law, frozen in ice in Lake Unden.
After a study period at the University of Gothenburg and later Uppsala University that proved unsuccessful, Neander began her career at the Gothenburg non-fiction book reviewer Ny Tid, on the 2 February 1943,[3] followed by a position at social democratic newspaper Västgöta-Demokraten in Borås, where she worked as a proofreader.[4] It was at Västgöta-Demokraten that Neander began her writing career, writing poems, published under the name Eva-Caisa Neander as well as film reviews and short-stories[4] under the name Tonia. In 1945, Neander's story titled: Vilse, won a short story competition at Åhlén & Åkerlund publishers.[4] This was followed new position in 1946 at weekly magazine Vecko-Journalen.[3]
In the same year, Neander expanded her short story Vilse, into a debut novel, Dimman (The Fog).[4] It is her only novel.[3] The novel, whilst dark and angst-ridden,[3] is in the form of episodic prose poetry story, written in short and simple sentences[5] about a sensitive, thin-skinned and clumsy young girl named Bitte, who is desperate for intimacy but shies away from it.[4] As Bitte grows up, it brings her only new challenges. She seems to be separated from the rest of the world by a fog, which is both frightening and protective, and gradually Bitte finally sinks into it.[1]
In 1947, Eva Neander's poetry collection, Död idyll, was published. The collection channels the influence of Swedish poet and novelist Karin Boye[4] who in many ways was Neander's predecessor.[4] That was followed by two collections of short stories: Staden and Nattljus. In Staden, the environment where the stories characters exist is based on Härnösand, where Neander grew up as a child.[3] In Nattljus, the focus is on unhappy marriage.[4] The writer’s second novel, Vattnet (The Water) which was unfinished when she died,[4] is the only work by the writer in which the main character is a strong independent woman who wants to live and does not want to give up in the face of difficulties.[5]
Her work was known outside of Sweden during her lifetime.[6]
After Neander’s death, she was largely forgotten as was her work.[1] However, in the 2000s, Neander's writings were rediscovered and republished by the small publishers Eolit, Rosenlarv and Vendels förlag.[1] [7]