Dragon tattoos, friends and fame
- Source: Global Times
- [09:33 September 03 2010]
- Comments
Kurdo Baksi and Stieg Larsson
By Nick Muzyczka
Hitting Shanghai bookshelves this month is the Chinese translation of the second work in the hugely popular Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson (1954-2004). The Swedish author of The Girl Who Played With Fire has become an international phenomenon and the trilogy has now sold around 44 million copies all over the world.
Larsson has been smashing sales records and topping charts ever since the posthumous release of the first book in the series, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, in 2005.
In 2008, Larsson was the second-bestselling author in the world, only beaten by Afghan-American author Khaled Hosseini.
In July this year, Amazon.com announced that Larsson became the first writer to sell more than 1 million Kindle e-books.
Larsson's trilogy centers on Mikael Blomkvist, a crusading middle-aged journalist (a little like the author himself) who cannot stand corruption or deceit. He is in trouble from the start of the first book after losing a libel suit against a billionaire businessman whom he is sure is corrupt.
Blomkvist takes a job investigating the mysterious disappearance of a young girl from an island home decades before and is later joined in this investigation by Lisbeth Salander, a skinny, androgynous (and decidedly) anti-social computer hacker.
Together they uncover a devastating series of crimes, brutalities and sheer evil hiding under Swedish respectability - and put themselves in real danger at the same time.
The books are notable for their bluntness in dealing with violence toward women (the original title of the first book in Swedish was Men Who Hate Women), sex, the devious and intricate nature of Swedish law and the realities of international crime.
Kurdo Baksi, a long-term friend of Larsson, and author of a biography entitled My Friend Stieg Larsson has recently come to Shanghai to help introduce The Girl Who Played With Fire to audiences here.
Baksi, whom Larsson used to call his "little brother," told the Global Times that he has already visited 22 countries this year on his promotional tour.
The pair met in 1992, just before Larsson founded an anti-racist magazine called "Expo."
"When he had economic problems, I paid all the costs for his magazine, for almost eight years," related Baksi.
"When I knew him he was a poor guy and I was helping him. But now, he has done something unusual, and, as a dead person, he helps me now. It's very interesting. It has never happened in my life before, and won't again."
According to Baksi, Larsson needed a bigger medium than writing articles to express himself.
