Sven Lindqvist

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Sven Lindqvist in 2005
Sven Lindqvist in 2005

Dr. Sven Lindqvist (born April 28, 1932) is a Swedish author.

Sven Lindqvist was born in Stockholm in 1932. He holds a PhD in History of literature from Stockholm University (his thesis, in 1966, was on Vilhelm Ekelund) and a 1979 honorary doctorate from Uppsala University. In 1960-1961, he worked as cultural attaché at the Swedish embassy in Beijing, China. He was married to Cecilia Lindqvist 1956-86, with two children. Since 1986, he is married to the economist Agneta Stark. He lives in the Södermalm area of central Stockholm.

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[edit] Literary production

Lindqvist has written more than thirty books , which have been translated into 15 languages, including English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Kurdish, Korean, Persian, etc. He occasionally publishes articles in the Swedish press, writing for the cultural supplement of the largest Swedish daily, Dagens Nyheter, since 1950.[1] He is the recipient of several of Sweden's most prestigious literary and journalistic awards.

His work is mostly non-fiction, including (and often transcending) several genres: essays, documentary prose, travel writing and reportages. He is known for his works on developing nations in Africa and the Saharan countries, China, India, Latin America and Australia. His later works, from the late 1980s, tend to focus on the subjects of European imperialism, colonialism, racism, genocide and war, analysing the place of these phenomena in Western thought, social history and ideology.

These topics are not uncontroversial. In 1992, Lindqvist was embroiled in heated public debate, when his book "Exterminate all the Brutes" was attacked for its treatment of the Second World War and the Holocaust. Opponents accused Lindqvist of reducing the extermination of the Jewish people to a question of economical and social forces, thereby disregarding the impact of Nazi ideology and anti-Semitism and what they viewed as the unique historical specificity of the Holocaust. Some of the harshest attacks were launched by Per Ahlmark, who declared Lindqvist to be a "revisionist". This prompted a furious response by Lindqvist, who considered it a defamatory smear -- at no point had he ever called into question the Nazi responsibility for, or the number of dead in, the Holocaust. Regarding the original dispute, Lindqvist retorted that his main argument was correct: the Nazi quest for Lebensraum had at its core been an application of the expansionist and racist principles of imperialism and colonialism, but for the first time applied against fellow Europeans rather than against the distant and dehumanized peoples of the Third World. However, he agreed that the long tradition of anti-Semitism in European and Christian thought had given the anti-Jewish campaign of the Nazis a further ideological dimension, and amended later editions of the book to better reflect this.

While the main thrust of Lindqvist's writing is historical, ideological and political analysis, he has developed his own highly personal style in dealing with an essentially documentary content. His travel experiences will often form the basis of a text, but they are then complemented, embroidered and expanded by the addition of scholarly analysis, quoted sections from other texts, autobiographical flashbacks, or even dream sections. Often, seemingly unrelated subjects and storylines will be juxtaposed and gradually brought together to form a whole -- such as in Bench Press, where a travel across the Sahara desert is intertwined with details from Lindqvist's childhood, his interest in physical training and the history of bodybuilding. It all emerges as an exposé of the cult of strength, masculinity and power, but also of the relation between mind and body, and the need for man to prove himself against nature and fight for his survival.

These methods create a very personal perspective, weaving documentary and literary elements into a complex, joint narrative which will deepen the psychological impact of the -- often horrifying -- historical details he relates. Some works, particularly in his later production, have also experimented with style, continuity and form, sometimes verging into prose poetry. The most intriguing example is perhaps A History of Bombing, which is made up of short chapters dispersed with no obvious chronology throughout the book. The reader is forced to flip back and forth according to directions at the end of each chapter, with the risk of straying into new chronologies; this is a purely technical feature, yet it affects the content by creating unexpected juxtapositions and bringing home the point that the various storylines and textual elements are all part of a larger historical and ideological whole.

His most recent book is, as of yet not translated into English, is Avsikt att Förinta (2008; Intent to Destroy), about the history, psychology and mechanisms of genocide.

[edit] List of titles

[edit] Works in English

  • China in Crisis (Kina inifrån, with Cecilia Lindqvist, 1963)
  • The Myth of Wu Tao-tzu (1967)
  • The shadow: Latin America faces the seventies (Slagskuggan : Latinamerika inför 70-talet, 1969)
  • Land and Power in South America (Jord och makt i Sydamerika, 1973-1974, 2 vol.)
  • Bench Press (Bänkpress, 1988)
  • Desert Divers (Ökendykarna 1990) -
  • "Exterminate All the Brutes" (Utrota varenda jävel, 1992)
  • The Skull Measurer's Mistake: And Other Portraits of Men and Women Who Spoke Out Against Racism (Antirasister: människor och argument i kampen mot rasismen 1750-1900, 1996)
  • A History of Bombing (Nu dog du: bombernas århundrade, 1999)
  • Terra Nullius (2005; Granta, London, 2007)

[edit] Works in Swedish

  • Ett förslag (1955)
  • Handbok (1957)
  • Reklamen är livsfarlig (1957)
  • Hemmaresan (1959)
  • Praktika (1962)
  • Kina inifrån (1963)
  • Asiatisk erfarenhet (1964)
  • Dagbok och diktverk (1966)
  • Myten om Wu Tao-tzu (1967)
  • Slagskuggan (1969)
  • Självklara saker (1970)
  • Jord och makt i Sydamerika (1973)
  • Jordens gryning - Jord och makt i Sydamerika del II (1974)
  • Arbetsbyte (1976)
  • Lägenheter på verkstadsgolvet (1977)
  • Gräv där du står (1978)
  • Hamiltons slutsats (1980)
  • Kina nu (1980) (with Cecilia Lindqvist)
  • Hamiltons slutsats (1980)
  • En älskares dagbok (1981)
  • En gift mans dagbok (1982)
  • En underjordisk stjärnhimmel (1984)
  • Elefantens fot (1985)
  • Bänkpress (1988)
  • Ökendykarna (1990)
  • Av nyfikenhet öppnade jag dörren i muren (1991)
  • Livstidsmänniskan (1992)
  • Utrota varenda jävel (1992)
  • Arbete & kärlek (1995)
  • Antirasister (1995)
  • Nu dog du: Bombernas århundrade (1999)
  • Framtidslandet (2000)
  • Terra nullius - en resa genom ingens land (2005)
  • Fadern, sonen och den heliga motorcykeln (2006)
  • Avsikt att förinta (2008)

[edit] External links