This bachelor thesis in history consists of a case study of Per Olov Enquist’s documentary novel

Legionärerna, which examines the Swedish extradition of Baltic soldiers after the Second

World War. The intent of the study is to survey the novel’s use of history from a literary

dimension. It does so by applying the typology of Hayden White, his poetics of history. This

conceptual framework historicizes the historical writing by clarifying how the historical dictum

is constructed in similar manner as fiction, and therefore dependent of its’ author. The result

shows that Enquist uses the history – is constructing it – to object how one earlier has talked

about the extradition by satire previous accounts and by reasoning contextual how one, instead,

should understand the same historical phenomenon. These two aspects are linked to a third, viz,

Enquist’s Maoist political stance.