Nordic Grey – The Origin Story of Nordic Noir

Abstract:

The recent Literature Across Frontiers (2015) report confirmed what many observers had believed for several years: Britain is currently enjoying a golden age of Scandinavian literature in translation and the statistical evidence now exists to show these trends. It is widely accepted that the genre phenomenon of ‘Nordic Noir’ is responsible for much of this success, thanks to the work of writers such as Stieg Larsson, Henning Mankell and Jo Nesbø. 

The rise of Nordic Noir has forced the British literary system to consider where this trend came from and why it arose – Britain has been compelled to re-evaluate its relationship with the peripheral Scandinavian literary system. This determination to establish an origin story for the newly discovered genre of Nordic Noir has involved revisiting past Scandinavian literary transmissions for clues. In this determination to trace the traditions of a peripheral literary system, some have eagerly settled on Peter Høeg’s Miss Smilla’s Feeling For Snow (1993), while others have opted for the Martin Beck decaology (1968-1977) by Swedish crime writing couple, Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö. 

The methods by which these conclusions are reached are far from reliable – the pursuit of single works or writers that act as sources of the narrative being written result in (over)simplification of the subject, analysis that is far from objective and a desire for fast results. As such, the tendency to ascribe the origins of Nordic Noir definitively to Høeg or Sjöwall/Wahlöö is wrong. 

This paper examines the transmission of Scandinavian literature into the English language and its reception in Britain during the twentieth century, in order to provide a better understanding of how the current Nordic Noir wave was enabled.

Ian Giles, PhD Candidate, University of Edinburgh