HOMO sapienne follows the lives of five young people in the “little big city” of Nuuk, the capitol of Greenland. Each one is given a chapter in the book to narrate their feelings and experiences at a time in their lives, when they all experience profound changes.
In the first chapter we meet Fia. Fia has a plan. She is trying to fit in, to do the right thing, and has consequently moved in with her boyfriend Peter – but she is unhappy. She makes up excused to be away from their appartment, to not be touched by him, until she finally calls it off. But she doesn’t find happiness even after she leaves Peter – not untill she meets Sara. It is ‘love at first sight’, or at least obsession, lust, when she sees Sara at a party. Fia thinks up a new plan: No more sausage. But Sara already has a girlfriend…In the novel’s second chapter, we follow Fia’s brother Inuk who flees to Denmark after he involuntary has been outed. He has had an affair with a member of the Greenland parliament, who is married with children. The small-town community starts to boil with gossip and Schadenfreude. From far away, hiding in Denmark, he reflects on what it means to be Greenlandic for better or worse. In the third chapter, we meet Arnaq, who is the gossipmonger; someone who constantly throws turmoil into other people’s lives but never takes responsibility in her own life. She is the victim – the daughter of a sexually and emotional abusive father – a role and identity she clings to as well as hides behind. At the same time she can’t cope with her own acceptance of the horrors of the past, and Arnaq is therefore slowly but surely adopting the lifestyle of a wretched alcoholic. In the third chapter Ivinnguaq has to charge of her own life, by accepting that she is a man. She has a girlfriend, Sara, that she loves but will not sleep with her. It takes its toll in the relationship until they finally break it off, both realising that Ivinnguaq has to become Ivik.
… thus Sara, who is the main character in the final chapter, is free to accept and return Fia’s passionate desire for her. The circle is completed.
Through the five voices, the novel expresses different views on identity, sexuality and on being young in a modern Greenland where tabus are slowly broken down. As is the language which in the novel originally is a modern Greenlandic saturated with English slang and Danish frases.
 
Greenlandic and Danish only
 
Niviaq Korneliusen, Milik Publishing, 170 pages