New Swedish Books, Spring 2020 1
3 Spring 2020 Turbulence and tradition Swedish li
terature in 2020 Jonas Thente, Literary Editor at the newspaper Dagens Nyheter, is both frustrated and happy when he reflects on Swedish books and a revived literary subculture. There is something deeply frustrating about reading books in a marginal mother tongue. All these novels and short stories, essays and poems, limited by language and unable to reach out to an unknowing surrounding world. On the other hand, I suppose there is something deeply frustrating about reading books at all – regardless of language. There is so much that so many people miss out on because they do not read. In recent years, increasing numbers of Swedes have begun to listen to books instead of reading them. When it comes to technology, Sweden has always been at the cutting edge but we never really bought into the e-reader revolution that the book industry predicted would change reading habits around the world. Digital reading is now holding steady, internationally accounting for around 20 per cent of readers: the majority of users are pensioners and use e-readers because they can control the typeface and font size, while younger readers prefer traditional paper. The industry is beginning to glance furtively at the opportunities offered by audiobooks for attracting listeners. In this area, Sweden is a pioneering country – for better or worse. While simpler, more streamlined genre fiction wins listeners, the new growth in the traditional book world is outstanding. New, top quality presses are being established on a monthly basis, and the major publishers are losing high profile editors who are departing in protest at the overlycommercial focus of their employers and starting their own publishing companies. Publications are maintaining a very high standard, among both the new and established firms. So what has happened to Swedish literature in recent years? Science fiction and its latest generation of authors have become a natural reference point – particularly those sci-fi books featuring dystopian, ideally post-apocalyptic elements. The climate and refugee crises are both also recurring themes. We also see that literature has increasingly become a subculture, with all the trappings that entails, including deep commitment and tremendous enthusiasm. People are keen to delve into Swedish literature of the past, rediscovering modernist minor classics and looking across borders to our Nordic neighbours. Postcolonial trends have also led to a substantial increase in interest in writers who are not necessarily from the Western world. New authors with roots in other countries look back and incorporate those experiences. If we go into detail, we can identify an interesting trend from last year that will become even clearer this spring. While female writers are happy to write about sex – as rage, power play, existential provocation or life crisis – male writers are retreating to a cerebral, almost celibate murmur. Female debut authors who have been released this year so far are dripping with multidimensional lust, while the male writers are retreating from the flesh. This is an intriguing ongoing development that researchers will have to examine in future. By tradition, we see the heavy-weight authors coming out in the autumn, but the spring will also bring us some long-awaited new releases. Works by Lars Jakobson, Eva Runefelt, Kjell Espmark, Magnus Dahlström, Malin Lindroth and newly-elected member of the Swedish Academy Anne Swärd are among their number. We are heading into what promises to be an exciting spring.