When I was a small boy growing up in Tampere, I helped my father by delivering short news items to the editorial offices of the newspapers Aamulehti and Kansan Lehti. The smell of printing ink in the publishing houses was so wonderful that it determined the course of my future career.

As a young literary critic for Helsingin Sanomat, I was enthralled by Finnish modernism and did my best to attract more readers to it. I praised the early poems of my friend Pentti Saarikoski.

At the end of my studies, I discussed the required reading for the final examination of my master’s degree with Professor Erik Allardt. When he listed some books on the sociology of literature, he put a mark next to Mimesis by Erich Auerbach and said “read this and write a concise summary of it in the exam so also I can find out what’s in it.

As a cultural journalist at a newspaper, I aspired to maintain my contacts at the university. Academic expertise was long valued at Uusi Suomi, but the political conflicts of the 1960s stifled collaboration.

My boss and teacher, Annamari Sarajas, was head of culture at Uusi Suomi and a professor of Finnish Literature. She said that “a newspaper is the best school for a literature scholar.” I have come to agree with her. The benefits of this interaction go both ways.

The age of Gutenberg is coming to a close, the digital age is dawning.