Darkness at noon

In the Observer, Andrew Anthony discusses the case of a retired Swedish police chief, Göran Lindberg, who last week was jailed for rape and assault.

In the course of the article he also interviews some Swedish writers and commentators who have some harsh things to say about their native country. Their views on the apparent agenda of left-wing Swedish crime authors are particularly noteworthy:

"I have always been suspicious and critical about people like Mankell and Larsson," says Lars Linder, "because I'm not a fan of this conspiracy theory. I'm an old leftist too, but I don't like when they pick out the old social democratic Sweden as paradise, and now the bad guys have taken over with all their hidden connections. It's simplistic and nostalgic. The kind of power abuse you see with Lindberg is much more interesting."

Shady characters?

In HUB - the magazine of Helsinki University - Janna Kantola takes a look at how Finns are portrayed in foreign literature. Starting with Tacitus, the profile of Finns is an obscure one, to say the least (Tacitus appears to have thought that Finns and Lapps were the same), and their image in 19th century Russian literature is also quite a shadowy one. But it's not until we reach the modern era, and especially the era of the thriller, that the picture begins to clarify, and not always in a positive direction:. in particular, it seems that Finns are not liked by their Nordic neighbours, and have reason to feel insulted:

The Finnish characters appearing in Nordic literature are in a class of their own. Finns are primarily drunkards and on the wrong side of the law.

The shady characters in Stieg Larsson's recent Millennium series of detective stories frequently have Finnish names. In the series, the heroine, Lisbeth Salander, finds herself being chased by characters such as the simple duo of Sonny Nieminen and Hans-Åke Waltari.

Read it all.

Hat tip: Soila Lehtonen

More crime

Back again - to find among the mail on my doormat an invitation to yet another Nordic crime novel-related event. This time it's a literary function at the residence of Sweden's UK ambassador, to which members of the translators' association SELTA  are automatically invited as part of their membership. My address on the envelope, after my name, begins with "SELTA", as if SELTA were housed at my home, which it's not - I'm just an ordinary member.

The evening, to be held on March 18, is called "Crimes of the Millennium - Stieg Larsson and the rise of Swedish Mystery Fiction", with Barry Forshaw, Eva Gedin, Lynda La Plante, Mark Lawson (chair) and Håkan Nesser.

Readers who've followed this blog over the past year will know that I'm not a fan of this form of fiction, and believe that the "Nordic Crime Wave" is likely to have negative consequences for the chances of non-mass-market Nordic literature in translation, which is steadily being crowded out of the picture by the serried ranks of detectives. It seems perverse of the Swedish embassy to be hosting this event - in effect, raising the profile of Mystery Fiction (an elevated name for thrillers) still further when really it needs no more raising. Is it churlish of me to react in this way?

The irresistible call of Scandiwegian crime

London's Mayor Boris Johnson explains in his Telegraph column why the British are so fond of Nordic crime novels:

It's like our joy in the Iris Robinson story. We wouldn't be so thrilled to discover her in bed with a 19 year-old if she hadn't spent all those years ranting drearily on about family values. Nordic crime writers profit from the fact that the blood is all the more vivid on the snow, the corpse more horrifying on the swish hygienic IKEA furniture. Scandinavia is still a mental landscape where crime is shocking, and that is a great compliment to Scandinavia.