ABSTRACT
The Republic of Karelia in the Russian North has been an important location in the symbolic universe of the Russian and Soviet imaginaries of nature. As a popular Soviet song that got a lot of radioplay starting in 1963, called ‘Long will you dream of Karelia’ went: In different places we leave a piece of our hearts In our memory we treasure it carefully And so, now we could not help falling in love How could one not love this incomparable place … The white night silently settled onto the cliffs The white night is alight, it glows And you cannot tell if the sky has fallen into the lake And you cannot tell if the lake is sailing through the sky And long you will dream of Karelia From now on The eyelashes of the spruce trees over the blue eyes of the lakes.
