Swedish Contemporary Fiction 1
Johannes Anyuru (b. 1979) Johannes Anyuru has bee
n a major name in Swedish contemporary literature ever since his debut in 2003 with the poetry collection Only The Gods Are New (‘Det är bara gudarna som är nya’). He updated the image of Sweden’s mid-20th-century planned suburbs from sleepy commuter towns to places where police lights flash across the sound of languages from all over the world. He invokes images from Homer’s The Iliad, its heroes and lost figures. After another two volumes of poetry, Anyuru’s first novel, If I Were to Die Under Other Skies (‘Skulle jag dö under andra himlar’) was published in 2010. It follows an easily distracted sculptor from a provincial Swedish town and the love affair that prompts him to piece together his past. Anyuru’s real breakthrough came with his novel Ixelles 400 p. 2022, Norstedts Rights: Norstedts Agency One day, Rut hears about a boy lying in a coma in hospital. He possesses a recording of her son Mio’s voice. Mio is supposed to be dead. He says, ‘There are rooftops here where you can see all the way to the sea. Here in the library over nothing.’ They Will Drown in Their Mothers’ Tears 294 p. 2017, Norstedts Rights: Norstedts Agency An intense story filled with sorrow at the state of the world today. It is a story about hope and hopelessness, about friendship and betrayal, and about the ugly theatre of terror and fascism. A Storm Blew in from Paradise 248 p. 2012, Norstedts Rights: Norstedts Agency Over a period of many years, we follow P’s struggles – as a refugee, as a military camp prisoner, as a man on the run. He never stops dreaming of a life as a pilot, but he will never get to fly again. They Will Drown in Their Mothers’ Tears (‘De kommer att drunkna i sina mödrars tårar’, 2017). The title sounds as if it could be a line from a terrorist’s self-filmed martyrdom video on YouTube – that’s the intention. The book portrays a dystopian future Sweden – at least if you believe one of the main characters, who claims to come from the year 2030. In that future, immigrants are forced to salute the Swedish flag and eat pork to prove that they belong in Sweden. It is a dark, bleak novel that begins with a terrorist attack on a bookshop. Nour, the protagonist, is tasked with filming a hostage. A controversial, explosive novel, it was chosen as the winner of the August Prize, the most prestigious award for Swedish literature, in 2017. Johannes Anyuru’s next book was published in 2018. Children of the Power Outage (‘Strömavbrottets barn’) is a collage of diverse texts: poems, articles, fragments and notes. It is the sort of book you can dip into, lingering to affirm subjects that feel familiar. Even on a small scale, Anyuru’s skill as a stylist is evident. He demonstrates the way to maintain a balance between apparently conflicting worlds that actually have more in common than they think. Personally, I rate this sort of firecracker bricolage more highly than some of Anyuru’s more restrained writing. Jonas Thente Rights sold to: 18 countries Swedish Contemporary Fiction 4 Foto: Andreas Rundberg