Korpi nukkuu : $b Yksinäytöksinen näytelmä

by Kaarle Halme

Korpi nukkuu : Yksinäytöksinen näytelmä by Kaarle Halme is a one-act play written in the early 20th century. Set in rural Finland in the late 19th century, it examines moonshining, youthful bravado, and the clash between traditional village life and encroaching modernization. The likely topic is the moral and social costs of illegal drink and communal complicity just as industrial money begins to reach the backwoods. One autumn evening in Mäkipää’s cottage, Martta and her friend Elina worry over household hardships and their men’s drinking while Elina’s father, the steady farmer Simuna, brings news: city “engineers” want to lease the Korvenkoski rapids for a wood‑pulp venture, promising rich rents. The moonshiner Perttu arrives with a keg, boasting he escaped conviction because village youths lied for him in court. When the boisterous Heikki (Simuna’s son) and Mikko (Martta’s brother) return, they revel, joke about their false oaths, and plan more revelry. Law officers, who have been listening outside the window, burst in with a lantern, bind Perttu, Mikko, and Heikki, and announce all will go to prison, having heard their own admissions. Simuna laments the “devil of drink” that has ensnared them, and the curtain falls on a community caught between easy money, law, and a deadened conscience.