ABSTRACT
This chapter glimpses the mutable and nuanced nature of Finnish folk poetry when performed. It examines the aesthetic and thematic changes which arise when the literate author Elias Lonnrot incorporates his transcription of Arhippa's song into the Kakvcda. Romanticism, and nineteenth-century European literary narrative in general, shaped the author's aesthetic and organizational decisions. Fused in the act of creating the Kalevala, these forces produced a textual result strikingly different from the oral tradition which Lonnrot had sought to entextualize. Clearly, Lonnrot's penchant for the expansion and desire to create the stanzas of roughly even length led him to combine lines from different poets in the imperfect ways. Such overtly artificial textual flourishes replace the guiding voice and evaluations of the singer. In Arhippa's absence, Lonnrot provides instead a set of formal devices which constitute a surrogate guide in the literary convention.
