The Man Who Left Too Soon: The Life and Works of Stieg Larsson (9 page)

‘I hate crime novels where the protagonist can behave however he likes or do things that normal people can’t do without consequences. If Mikael Blomkvist shoots someone, even if he does it in self-defence, he ends up in court.

‘Lisbeth is an exception simply because she is a sociopath with psychotic traits and she doesn’t function like normal people. She therefore doesn’t have the same perception of what is “right” or “wrong” as normal people, but she also suffers the consequences.’

Larsson goes on to say that he wanted to fashion a realistic cast of characters surrounding his main protagonists, for instance by granting Dragan Armansky a lengthy introduction in
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
to establish that he will be a recurring figure. In
The Girl Who Played with Fire
, the cadre of coppers working around Bublanski and Sonja Modig are foregrounded. And in the final book, Blomkvist’s lawyer sister Annika Giannini and his colleague/lover Erika Berger are brought centre stage. It’s interesting to note the problems he mentions with Lisbeth’s sometime-lover Miriam Wu: ‘I don’t know exactly what to do with her,’ he writes – and it might be argued that she is one of the least successful characterisations in the sequence. Larsson is aware that his solitary heroine can’t have strong friendships and simultaneously maintain her marginalisation.

These valuable documents became available in English in 2010 as part of a handsome
Millennium Trilogy
box set (published by MacLehose Press). Gedin talks about Larsson’s ‘marvellous mix of humility and self-assurance’ – and confirms that the first three books he planned to write were always conceived as an organic trilogy. It was also clear, according to Gedin, that Larsson had every intention of becoming a successful crime writer, and that his publisher could expect much more such work from him. Gedin also provides a nicely balanced view of the much-rehearsed dispute between the author’s partner Eva Gabrielsson and his father and brother, and makes the telling comment that there is one voice signally missing from the continuing discussion of Larsson’s work and legacy: that of Stieg Larsson himself. Gedin reveals her thoughts about publishing the e-mails between herself and the late author, wondering if there might be something in them to interest readers – surely an unwarranted modesty on her part, given the immense and all-consuming interest in the author and his books since his sudden death. She explains that she had not looked at the e-mails even once since Larsson’s demise, but that looking at them again reminded her of his voice, his manner, and the enthusiasm they both shared when bringing to fruition the three projects that had so engaged them – and she notes how unusual it was for a three-book deal to be offered to a first-time writer. She also discusses how obdurate Larsson became when she expressed her reservations about his original title for the first book,
Men Who Hate Women
, pointing out how this sounded off-putting, resembling a dour non-fiction title. Larsson promised to think about changing the title, but decided to stick to his guns and claimed that several friends he had spoken to had agreed with him that the original was the perfect title. Larsson, as we now know, got his way in Sweden, but the title was changed elsewhere (and, frankly, few would argue with the fact that the change was a particularly perspicacious decision).

Gedin also notes that Larsson paid great attention to detail when discussing the minutiae of the books – something that will hardly come as a surprise to admirers of his habit of luxuriating in his infinitely detailed and information-packed narratives. But he also makes a point – in no uncertain terms – about how much he wishes to avoid all the paraphernalia involved in promoting a book (signings, television chat shows, etc) – and states that the idea of becoming a commodity to be sold in this fashion really does not appeal to him. Of course, the author’s precipitate death spared him this particular ordeal, but, nevertheless, it is clear that Larsson was not a writer who lived in an ivory tower, attempting to ignore the realities of selling a book in a crowded marketplace. He was well aware that specific ‘hooks’ needed to be found to exploit the commercial potentialities of his books; ironically, of course, he was not to know that one of those hooks would be his own mortality. Gedin ends her discussion of these now-celebrated e-mails with an especially poignant comment: Larsson had told her that he felt comfortable and nourished in the extremely sympathetic author/editor relationship he found at Norstedts, and confidently believed that his publishers would do their very best for him. But he fully realised that work needed to be done on the books. After their final exchange, Larsson wrote that he was waiting to hear Eva Gedin’s reservations about the manuscripts – reservations he was never to hear. Two weeks later, she was to receive the telephone call telling her that the author with whom she was enjoying working and for whom she foresaw such a shining future was dead. She knew that her job – to publish the books in a form that would have pleased him – was just beginning.

CHAPTER 6

STIEG LARSSON TODAY:

Developments and Discoveries

T
he books of such notable thriller writers as Ian Fleming and John le Carré have become highly collectable – particularly in good condition first editions – and it is salutary to note the speed with which Stieg Larsson has joined this august company. The Rare Book Guide states that by 2009 the British first edition of
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
was selling for about £400, while the relatively common US first edition could be obtained for a little under $100. UK first editions have apparently been changing hands on eBay, with a copy in near fine condition fetching £425 ($710). Already, internet sellers are pricing their books at £500 and more, promoting them heavily as investments. Leaving aside any discussion of simple evaluation versus exploitation, this sounds prescient – Larsson is showing every sign of becoming one of the most collectable of authors.

There is, intriguingly, another incentive for purchasing first editions – those copies signed by the translator ‘Reg Keeland’ (the
nom de plume
of Steven Murray) – are, as mentioned earlier, sought-after in their own right. And the auguries for future price hikes in the first edition market of Larsson are either good or bad, depending on your point of view: good if you’re a dealer, watching the value of your stock rise, and bad if you’re a Stieg Larsson aficionado wanting to replace your second edition paperback with a glossy, un-foxed first edition.

Inevitably, with any phenomenon such as the posthumous success of Stieg Larsson there is something of a backlash, and as sales records continue to be broken by the
Millennium Trilogy
on an almost daily basis, it was perhaps inevitable that the naysayers would become more vocal. In fact, almost from the beginning, that is to say, from the publication outside Sweden of
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
, there have been those who have opposed the enthusiastic chorus of approval the work of the late author has enjoyed. Interestingly, the bursts of negativity are very different from those accorded to other highly successful but not critically highly regarded authors such as Dan Brown and Jeffrey Archer; with these writers, it is almost a badge of honour among clued-in readers to bring up how maladroit the writing often is when discussing their impressive sales. No such knee-jerk reaction is to be found in most book club, or other literary conversations about Stieg Larsson. His reputation as a ‘literary’ writer – along with that as a popular thriller writer – persists, possibly due to two factors. First, most readers continue to regard translated Scandinavian fiction as being more worthwhile or ambitious than more obviously mass-market fare; and second, the fact that Larsson is published in the UK by the highly respected literary publisher Christopher MacLehose lends his work a certain cachet. Nevertheless, any admirer of Larsson will have found that discussions of the
Millennium Trilogy
often include a remark from at least one participant along the lines of: ‘But don’t you think he’s rather overrated?’ It is interesting that those looking to dent the late writer’s reputation rarely use his borrowings from other writers as ammunition for their campaigns. A few anti-Larsson bullets might be found from a perusal of Daniel Pennac’s
Write to Kill
(translated from the French in 1999 by Ian Monk and published by Harvill Press), which boasts a bushel of Larssonian central ideas: a protagonist with a bullet lodged in the brain, a coma, a publisher/journalist/writer character, a wizard with computers, malign and corrupt authorities – perhaps it’s a book that found its way onto Stieg’s bedside table. Other pre-echoes of the
Millennium Trilogy
include a female character using revamped passports, fake identity cards, wigs and make-up so that she can adopt a succession of different identities – a character, in fact, described as being ‘about as mortal as a hero in a comic book’. The superhuman survival abilities here may ring some bells for Larsson readers. She also boasts phenomenal Asperger’s syndrome-style skills at calculation, makes a fortune and exacts revenge on a slew of enemies.

Such dissenting voices, however, are showing not the slightest sign of diminishing the author’s ever-growing posthumous popularity, and certainly the details of his life and the disputes over his estate seem to throw up new stories and revelations at least once a week. What’s more, these stories are reported in the national press of most western countries – and on the news pages, rather than being consigned to the ghetto of the books pages.

One of the most intriguing stories to appear in 2010 concerned an aspect of the author’s life beyond the word processor: we were to learn about Larsson’s involvement with real-life revolutionaries – Eritrean guerrillas, no less. In the pages of the London newspaper
The Guardian
, journalist Homa Khaleeli filled in some fascinating information that had emerged via one of the author’s friends, John Henri Holmberg. Suggesting that Lisbeth Salander’s expertise with weaponry had some antecedents in her creator’s own life, readers were told that Larsson had instructed Eritrean women in how to use grenade launchers. The details concerning this (not widely known before 2010) were sketchy, but – according to Holmberg – in 1977 Larsson had travelled to Eritrea and had contacted individuals he knew in the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF), a revolutionary Marxist organisation that was using violent means to bring about their country’s independence from Ethiopia. Larsson’s hands-on engagement with the dispensing of death (in however laudable a cause) was abruptly cut short when he began to suffer from a kidney inflammation and was obliged to leave Eritrea. This startling story was corroborated by Graeme Atkinson, European editor of
Searchlight
magazine (for which, of course, Larsson had acted as Swedish correspondent) and a close friend of the author. Atkinson acknowledged that Larsson had indeed made this trip to Eritrea, saying: ‘Stieg was a revolutionary socialist and believed in a better life and equality for all.’ Atkinson went on to speak about how disturbed Stieg Larsson was by the continuing crushing poverty in Africa. Significantly, Atkinson added that Larsson had travelled the country to take part in the armed struggle – which meant becoming part of the fighting and even facing live bullets. The effect of the story was seismic, proving to some that Larsson was no armchair revolutionary but was prepared to put his beliefs to the test on the most dangerous of front lines. But others voiced the opinion that his passionate desire to change society throughout the world was best conducted through his pioneering investigative journalism, rather than by becoming directly involved in violent action. There was no doubting, however, that the story added some lustre to Larsson’s reputation, although the image of him handling a grenade launcher seemed a touch unlikely.

There were other revelations concerning Stieg Larsson in 2010. According to Susan Donaldson James of ABC News, one of the most unsettling incidents in
The Girl Who Played with Fire
had an equally disturbing real-life antecedent. Readers who remember the scene in which two men bind and rape a young prostitute who has been co-opted into a sex trafficking ring will have seen it as an example of the author’s rigorous and unsparing attitude towards a certain kind of male sexuality. But Kurdo Baksi (who worked with Larsson) revealed the fact that, at the age of 15, the author witnessed a gang rape committed by people he knew, and he failed to intervene. Sometime later, Larsson, suffering agonies of guilt, pleaded with the girl to forgive him for his inaction, but she declined. Larsson’s reading of American fiction was prodigious, and if this is a truthful recollection of an incident that really happened in the author’s life, it is nevertheless strongly reminiscent of a similarly gruelling scene in the classic novel by the American writer Nelson Algren,
Never Come Morning
, in which the too-pliable hero allows a gang rape by friends to take place without doing anything to stop it. The incident in which Larsson was involved has elements that were to leave a mark on him for the rest of his life. These elements begin with the fact that the girl was named Lisbeth. According to Baksi, Larsson’s moral cowardice over the incident scarred him psychologically, and was one of the reasons behind him writing the novels. Baksi has apparently been making attempts to track down the real victim of the rape and has his own passionate desire to avenge the incident in some way. He accounts for Larsson’s inability to act at the time by noting that he was both young and insecure, and believes that his loyalty to his friends was a key factor in stopping him from doing what he knew he should have done. Obviously, his shameful reluctance to intervene would come to be one of the most painful and guilt-inducing aspects of the whole incident.