News about STiNA and its members

Strindberg in New York: Easter just in time for Easter
The August Strindberg Repertory Theatre will present Easter (Påsk) by August Strindberg at the Gene Frankel Theatre in New York City, directed by Robert Greer with Elizabeth Flax.
    Previews are March 8 and 9 and Sunday, March 10 at 2 pm. The play will then run Thurs.-Sat. at 8 pm, with a Sunday matinee at 2 pm, through Easter Sunday, March 31.
    Future productions planned by the August Strindberg Repertory Theatre include the chamber plays and To Damascus in its entirety.

New Åke Edwardson
Room no. 10, the latest in the Erik Winter series of crime novels by Åke Edwardson, translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles, will be published by Simon & Schuster in March.

Swedish stories from a master humorist
Favorite Swedish Stories of Hasse Zetterström, translated by STiNA member Paul Goldsman, has been published by Penfield Books in Iowa City. Zetterström (1877-1946), known as “Hasse Z.” was a beloved writer in Sweden, and his stories have a characteristic charm. For more information or to order a copy, see here.

Mollisan Town Quartet Now Complete
The fourth volume of the fantasy series by Tim Davys, featuring the stuffed animals of Mollisan Town, has now been published by HarperCollins. Yok presents four freestanding stories, some of which bring back characters from the previous volumes (Amberville, Lanceheim and Tourquai). Kirkus Reviews called it “An intriguing mix of fable, philosophy and witty fun” and Library Journal dubbed it an “intense tragicomic examination of the problems of living: Watership Down meets Rabbit, Run. Highly recommended.” More information is available here.

International interest in Swedish crime fiction and thrillers continues to be strong. Here are three new titles, translated by STiNA members:

Sail of Stone by Åke Edwardson, translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles. Simon & Schuster, March 2012. Sail of Stone is the sixth book in the Erik Winter series. It is the story of two family mysteries. Chief Inspector Erik Winter must follow his case from Gothenburg to Scotland to find a man who's gone missing while searching for his missing father; while in Scotland he is aided by an old friend and colleague. Back in Gothenburg, Aneta Djanali is on the case of another missing person—the police suspect a woman is being abused, but no one seems to know where the woman is. As Winter and Djanali hunt for the missing, they discover that nothing is quite as it seems in either family.

Strindberg's Star by Jan Wallentin, translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles. Viking, May 2012. This international thriller combines the Andrée expedition to the North Pole, memories of horrific experiments on prisoners in Nazi Germany, a mysterious body found by a spelunker, and an epic journey by train and icebreaker into one complex mystery. Expert on religious symbols (and prescription drug addict) Don Titelman goes to investigate an ankh—an ancient Egyptian symbol of life—found by a cave diver and is accidentally swept up in a series of events that takes him from Sweden to Belgium, Germany, and Russia as he tries to find the ankh's missing counterpart while evading the strange group that is pursuing him. Along the way he meets a lawyer who is also keenly interested in the ankh. The story builds to a final, dramatic confrontation deep in the Arctic, where Titelman must finally face all of his fears and weaknesses.

Some Kind of Peace by Camilla Grebe & Åsa Träff, translated by Paul Norlen. Free Press, July 2012. The first crime novel co-authored by Swedish sisters Camilla Grebe and Åsa Träff has an unusual protagonist: clinical psychologist Siri Bergman. Living in an isolated cottage in the Stockholm archipelago, Bergman begins to suspect that someone is pursuing her. When one of her patients is found dead in the water near her cottage, events begin to escalate, and everyone around her, including her patients, could potentially be the killer. The book received a starred review in Publishers Weekly

Why not learn Swedish yourself? For anyone interested in learning Swedish through self-study or for use as part of an evening course in the language, Laura Wideburg has created a textbook, Swedish: The Basics. For more information about the book and how to order copies, see her website

American Scandinavian Foundation Program on Selma Lagerlöf. Another in a series of panel discussions, “Northern Influences: Americans Look at Great Nordic Writers" will feature Selma Lagerlöf’s The Saga of Gösta Berling. Introduced by Manu Sareen, Danish Minister for Nordic Co-operation and Minister for Gender Equality, the panel will include Jennifer Watson, associate professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Paul Norlen, translator of The Saga of Gösta Berling (Penguin Classics). Selections from the 1891 novel will be read by professional actors. This free event will take place on Monday, February 27 starting at 6:30 p.m. at Scandinavia House in New York City, and is a joint presentation of the Consulate General of Sweden in New York and the American Scandinavian Society of New York. For more information, see the ASF program listing.

Batchelder Honor Award to The Lily Pond translated by Linda Schenck. The Batchelder Award (Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association) is given to the “most outstanding children’s book originally published in a language other than English in a country other than the United States, and subsequently translated into English for publication in the United States.” This year’s Honor Award goes to The Lily Pond, a sequel to A Faraway Island, by Swedish author Annika Thor. Both books were translated by Linda Schenck and published by Delacorte Press. The Lily Pond continues the story of thirteen-year-old Stephie Steiner, a Jewish refugee sent by her parents from Nazi-occupied Vienna to Sweden. “Readers will identify with Stephie as she struggles to fit into yet another new situation and meet a host of conflicting expectations.” More information about the prize can be found here

Michael Meigs has been awarded the 32nd annual Translation Prize for 2011 from the American Scandinavian Foundation for his translation of excerpts from The Dean (Dekanen), a novel by Lars Gustafsson. Gustafsson, well-known Swedish poet and novelist, is a long-time resident of Austin, Texas. Translated excerpts of the novel can be read at www.austinlivetheatre.com

Poems and essays by Göran Printz-Påhlson. Open Book Publishers has published the first selection in English of poems and essays by the late Göran Printz-Påhlson, Swedish poet who was a long-time resident of the UK. The volume, edited and translated by Robert Archambeau, is available in both print and digital formats.

Fans of Swedish crime fiction can look forward to Night Rounds by Helene Tursten, translated by Laura Wideburg. Tursten’s second book in English about detective inspector Irene Huss will be published in February by Soho Press.

Tourquai by Tim Davys, the third installment of the Mollisan Town Quartet, is a “sinister sequel” to Amberville and Lanceheim. As in the first two books, Davys weaves an intricate plot in his alternative universe around the larger questions of stuffed-animal nature, exploring issues of fate, loyalty, good and evil. Read more here.

“One-Way” Look at the World. Toronto publisher Book Thug has just released Roger Greenwald’s translation of Picture World, a book-length poem in 24 parts by Danish poet Niels Frank. A sequence of poems with a strong visual basis, Frank’s poetry is “by turns funny and serious, ironic and sincere, droll and sly, conversational and playfully inventive.” The book is available directly from the publisher or from Small Press Distribution

OBIE Award for Jonas Hassem Khemiri. Khemiri’s play Invasion, produced by the Play Company in New York City last spring, received an OBIE Playwriting Award in May. Invasion was translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles.

A Swedish Tiger. Jonas Hassen Khemiri is one of Sweden's leading young writers, and his novel Montecore has now been published by Knopf. The book was translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles. Read more about this “dazzlingly inventive novel” here.

Swedish immigrants tell their stories. A new book by Oregon writer Lars Nordström examines Swedish immigration to the United States in the post-Vietnam War era. Ten immigrants — five women and five men — share their stories of how they came to leave their native country and settle in the Pacific Northwest. Available from the publisher, Swedish Roots in Oregon.

Gösta Berling in the UK. The new translation of The Saga of Gösta Berling by Nobel Prize winner Selma Lagerlöf has now been published in the UK by Penguin Classics.

“Promise” Fulfilled. Leif GW Persson is Sweden's foremost crime researcher and psychological profiler. Since his first book about detective Lars Johansson was published in 1979, he has also been one of Sweden's leading authors of crime fiction. The first of his books to be published in English is his novel about the murder of “the prime minister,” Between Summer's Promise and Winter's End, now available from Pantheon Books. “Engaging Swedish whodunit, the first of a trilogy—reminiscent of the work of Henning Mankell and Stieg Larsson in its toughness, and just as cynical in its politics” (starred Kirkus review). “Unquestionably the best Swedish crime novel I've read so far.” (Boston Globe)

2010 PEN Literary Awards. Rika Lesser was a runner-up for the 2010 PEN Award for Poetry in Translation, in recognition of her translation of Mozart's Third Brain by Göran Sonnevi (Yale University Press). Review the complete list of this year's PEN award winners.

Mollisan Town Quartet, Book Two. Lanceheim, the second installment in the fantasy series by Tim Davys (a pseudonym), is published by HarperCollins. “A fast-paced literary and psychological drama in which the trials and tribulations of a group of stuffed animals illuminate the moral and philosophical dilemmas we all share.” More information is available from the publisher.

American Girl Gothic. Other Press has published The American Girl, a novel by Finnish author Monika Fagerholm (who writes in Swedish), translated by Katarina Tucker. “Crime mystery and gothic saga, social study and chronicle of the late sixties and early seventies, a portrait of the psyche of young girls on the cusp of sexual awakening, The American Girl is a bewitching glimpse of the human capacity for survival and for self-inflicted wounds.”

Rika Lesser reads Göran Sonnevi. Listen to a poetry reading at Boston University last November by Rika Lesser and Rosanna Warren. Ms. Lesser reads from her translation of Swedish poet Göran Sonnevi's Mozart's Third Brain as well as her own work.

The novel Black Banners (Svarta fanor, 1907), one of August Strindberg's most controversial prose works, has been translated by Donald K. Weaver and now published in English for the first time by Peter Lang.

A Faraway Island by Annika Thor, translated by Linda Schenck, received the Mildred L. Batchelder Award for the most outstanding children’s book originally published in a foreign language. Published by Delacorte, the book has also been selected as an ALA (American Library Association) Notable Book.

Lars Nordström has received the "Niskanen Award" from the Scandinavian Heritage Foundation for "Chronicling Our Immigrant History.” Lars is the author, editor and translator of Swedish Oregon (available from Swedish Roots in Oregon).

New translation of The Saga of Gösta Berling Selma Lagerlöf's classic novel, published in 1891, has now been published by Penguin Classics in a new English translation, the first since 1898.

Mozart's Third Brain, poems of Göran Sonnevi translated by Rika Lesser, is now available from Yale University Press.

The Procession of Memories: Selected Poems 1929-1945 by Harry Martinson. These early poems by Nobel Prize-winning poet Harry Martinson (1904-1978), translated by Oregon writer and poet Lars Nordström, have never been published in English before. The book is available from Wordcraft of Oregon.

God's Mercy is the most recent novel by Kerstin Ekman to be translated by Linda Schenck. The translation is published by University of Nebraska Press.

Four poems by Gunnar Harding, translated by Roger Greenwald with an introductory essay by the translator, can be read in the current issue of Salt Magazine.

The Key to IKEA. One of the basic texts of 20th-century Swedish design, Ellen Key's Beauty in the Home (1899), has now been translated into English by Anne-Charlotte Harvey. This essay is included in Modern Swedish Design. Three Founding Texts, published by the Museum of Modern Art, 2008.

Swedish vampires. The recent Swedish film Let the Right One In has been a surprising success in American theatres. The film is based on the 2004 novel of the same name by John Ajvide Lindqvist, translated into English by Ebba Segerberg and now published in the U.S. by St. Martin's Griffin.

Swedish Oregon. Author, editor and translator Lars Nordström has compiled Swedish Oregon, an overview of Swedish immigration to the state which includes first-person accounts, articles and poetry. For anyone interested in the Pacific Northwest or in Swedish immigration history. The book can be ordered directly from the publisher, Swedish Roots in Oregon.

Absinthe: New European Writing is a print journal featuring the best contemporary European writers. The current issue (11) includes a story by Ulf Peter Hallberg, “Heaven's Gate,” translated by Erland Anderson. Absinthe: New European Writing is published biannually in the spring and fall.

New European Poets from Graywolf Press. This “fiercely intelligent” anthology, edited by Kevin Prufer and Wayne Miller, collects the work of 290 poets from all over Europe whose work was first published after 1968. The book's 24 regional editors include Rika Lesser (Sweden and Finland) and Roger Greenwald, who was responsible for Norway, Denmark, and (with Lesser) Sápmi (formerly known to English-speakers as Lappland).

Scandinavian Crime Fiction blog from Gustavus Adolphus College. A project to follow the burgeoning interest in crime fiction from Scandinavia has been started at Gustavus Adolphus, a Minnesota liberal arts college. Frequently updated with a wide range of links.

New Inger Frimansson title. Island of the Naked Women, the third crime novel by Inger Frimansson to be translated by STiNA member Laura Wideburg, will be published in May by Pleasure Boat Studio. The two previous Frimansson titles are Good Night, Darling and The Shadow in the Water.

Welcome to Amberville. The first book by Swedish author Tim Davys has been published by HarperCollins. Strangely enough, all the characters are stuffed animals...

How to order Swedish Books Online. Information collected by Laura Wideburg.

Over the years, many of our members have received awards for their work.