Goodbye to Summer

Sixty or seventy years ago the King and the Lutheran Faith represented the sum of human values for the vast majority of Swedes. But neither the King nor the faith—nor the State Church which taught it—seemed to have much relevance to the new Sweden; so they have been abandoned as values, but retained as useful relics—the King as a master of public ceremony, the Church as a dispenser of socially useful private ceremonies and as a bureaucratic device for keeping the live register of population.

Though a small country, Sweden has acquired the material appanages of the great nations—a world-wide market for her industry, a worldwide airline, deluxe railways, a television network, an important film industry, big operatic and ballet ensembles, well-equipped armed forces, an underground railway more modern than Moscow’s in the capital. Industrial productivity has nearly quadrupled since 1900. Since 1913 real wages have trebled. There is a car for every six people—only America can beat that. The consumption of coffee has increased 30 per cent in the last five years. Though the Swedish television license is unusually dear, the first million licenses were acquired much faster in Sweden than in any other country and no less than ten years sooner than had been estimated. Swedes even have a double-leaf lavatory-paper for luxury lavatories. The outer leaf is coarse, enabling the fingers to get a grip; the inner leaf is of fine tissue for contact with the softer skin. Swedes consider themselves (with justice) to have outclassed Europe; their statistics and economic writings normally compare Swedish conditions with those of America. But America has not eliminated unemployment; Sweden has.

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Desmond Fennell

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Sixty or seventy years ago the King and the Lutheran Faith represented the sum of human values for the vast majority of Swedes. But neither the King nor the faith—nor the State Church which taught it—seemed to have much relevance to the new Sweden; so they have been abandoned as values, but retained as useful relics—the King as a master of public ceremony, the Church as a dispenser of socially useful private ceremonies and as a bureaucratic device for keeping the live register of population.

Though a small country, Sweden has acquired the material appanages of the great nations—a world-wide market for her industry, a worldwide airline, deluxe railways, a television network, an important film industry, big operatic and ballet ensembles, well-equipped armed forces, an underground railway more modern than Moscow’s in the capital. Industrial productivity has nearly quadrupled since 1900. Since 1913 real wages have trebled. There is a car for every six people—only America can beat that. The consumption of coffee has increased 30 per cent in the last five years. Though the Swedish television license is unusually dear, the first million licenses were acquired much faster in Sweden than in any other country and no less than ten years sooner than had been estimated. Swedes even have a double-leaf lavatory-paper for luxury lavatories. The outer leaf is coarse, enabling the fingers to get a grip; the inner leaf is of fine tissue for contact with the softer skin. Swedes consider themselves (with justice) to have outclassed Europe; their statistics and economic writings normally compare Swedish conditions with those of America. But America has not eliminated unemployment; Sweden has.