„Mo südda ligob mo sees.” Kirjakeelest kirjanduskeeleks

Although Estonian written languages had existed since at least the first half of the 17th century, for a long time they were not used by native speakers either as writers or as readers. It was only with the arrival of the Moravian Brethren movement that a new attitude toward the written word emerged, making it easier for both writers and readers to adopt Estonian as a written language – previously perceived mainly as an instrument of colonization. The origins of Estonian narrative literature lie in the Moravian movement. On the initiative of the Brethren in Urvaste, the first Estonian-language storybook intended for an Estonian readership was published in 1737: the South Estonian Kolm kaunist Waggausse Eenkojut (“Three Beautiful Examples of Piety”), written by the local pastor Johann Christian Quandt. The book contained three stories: the lives of the shepherd Henning Kuuse, the small craftsman Jörgel, and the maiden Armelle Nikolas. This work introduced into Estonian literature a new kind of narrative scheme – the life story or conversion narrative – in which the central event was an awakening: through the impact of a certain experience, a person re-evaluates their former life and embarks on a new, transformed life in Christ. The protagonists were people of humble origin with whom the Estonian reader could easily identify. The literary-historical value of the collection lies in its recognition of emotional life and in its search for new stylistic means to express it – in other words, in the development of a literary language. The awakening narrative model proved remarkably durable, offering a model for depicting human destiny even outside a strictly religious teleology. In the first half of the 19th century, during a new wave of devotional literature in Estonian and Latvian writing, pietistic religiosity was fused with sentimentalism, and biblical stories were interwoven with traditional (hagiographic) legends and literary narrative plots. For example, the fate of Genoveva, daughter of the King of Brabant, is presented in line with the pietistic life-story model, though the heroine’s transformation stems not from an inner awakening but from external circumstances. Sentimentalist stories appealed to the reader’s compassion and touched the heart, often proving more persuasive than the competing popular-educational storybooks that conveyed rationalist teachings and promoted a hierarchical view of the world order. The pietistic-sentimentalist narrative carried a more democratic message: those who follow their hearts attain salvation – at least in the world to come – and before the law of the heart all people are equal.