Nordic noir: The story of Scandinavian crime fiction

Notes on the video linked below

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiwObVhyoc8


  • over the last decade, it has become a global phenomenon
  • grey, gloomy and cold
  • everything goes wrong in Scandinavian crime fiction
  • stockholm - clean, safe
  • Steig Larsson - the girl with the dragon tattoo
  • 45 million readers
  • he knew thriller genre in and out
  • didn't see success as he died at 50
  • in the book, she digs deep into a family and finds nazi relations
  • Stieg Larsson was an investigative journalist who was very brave
  • he wrote for expo magazine
  • one day a group of boys waited outside his workplace for him with a baseball bat
  • he used journalism to dramatise the prejudice in Sweden. he puts his views in books
  • Pippi Longstockings was his main inspirations for the main character in 'the girl with the dragon tattoo'
  • abusive violence is a theme in his book
  • The girl is damaged and abused but her revenge is appalling
  • some would argue the abuse towards women in 'the girl with the dragon tattoo' is there for us to enjoy (sexual exploitation)

  • Peter Hoeg - Miss Smilas feelings for snow
  • book info: a researcher who researches into the snow. sees a dead boy who jumped of an apartment block. doesn't think its an accident.
  • the setting is like a Scandinavian crime fiction - bleak backdrops.
  • 'you need to be from the Nordic country to alive happily here' - Hakan Nesser

  • Arnaldur Indridason
  • looks at danger of places in Iceland - people disappear 
  • 'Jar city' (book turned to a movie) - dark humour
  • the first bit of light is a blessing

  • sweden - country of 'free love' (1950/60)
  • welfare state failed to live up to expectations

  • Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo
  • put Marxist perceptions in their work
  • there were no realistic police novels so they made one
  • in 1965 they wrote crime stories about Stockholm police
  • taxes were high - failed welfare state

  • Olof Palme (Swedish prime minister)
  • 1986 he was murdered
  • sweden lost innocence
  • the case was never solved

  • Henning Mankell
  • 1988 - wanted to write about the problem with xenophobia and racism growing in Sweden
  • how difficult it is to be a good police officer
  • 'Wallander'

  • Karin Fossum - 'Don't look back'
  • Ibsen says the social environment can create social outcasts 
  • Karin understood the connection between killer and victim
  • she tries to make you feel something in work
  • someone she knew for 18 years killed a child
  • writes about how death affects us

  • Jo Nesbo - The Redbreast
  • norway became rich when they found oil 
  • wealth took the city by storm
  • fascinated by what goes on in the human mind
  • 'the snowman'
  • go into more blood and violence

  • satanic rock music/black metal





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