What does Estonia become when it is told not through the history of the state and its cities, but through forests, wetlands, rivers, gardens around the home, and summer houses in remote places?

In Leśtonia, Valdur Mikita creates a mythogeography of his country, exploring the connections between landscape and language, memory, and ways of experiencing the world. In these essays, the Estonian forest is a place for gathering mushrooms and herbs, a space where ancient beliefs, family stories, and traces of Finno-Ugric culture have survived, but also a refuge from wars and a framework for the imagination. The author moves freely from childhood memories to linguistics, ethnology, neuroscience, geology, and palaeontology. He combines erudition with humour and imagination, creating a portrait of Estonia as a country where the modern still exists alongside the archaic and the untamed.

The Polish edition brings together essays and sketches drawn from several of the author’s books. The selection was made and translated from Estonian by Anna Michalczuk-Podlecki.

The fourth volume in the Ister series, edited by Paulina Małochleb and Bartosz Sadulski.