| Author | Stieg Larsson |
|---|---|
| Language | Swedish |
| Genre | Crime / Mystery novel |
| Publisher | Norstedts Förlag (Swedish) |
| Published | 2005-2007 |
| Media type | Print (paperback, hardback) |
The Millennium series is a series of bestselling novels originally written in Swedish by the late Stieg Larsson (1954-2004). The primary characters in the series are Lisbeth Salander, a woman in her twenties with a photographic memory and poor social skills, and Mikael Blomkvist, an investigative journalist and editor of a magazine called Millennium. Blomkvist, the character, has a history similar to Larsson, the author. There are three books in the series:
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When Larsson was 15 years old, he witnessed the gang rape of a girl, which led to his lifelong abhorrence of violence and abuse against women. The author never forgave himself for failing to help the girl, which inspired the themes of sexual violence against women in his books.[1][2]
Larsson was also influenced by the murders of three women (Melissa Nordell, Fadime Sahindal, and Catrine Da Costa) in writing the Millennium series. All three women were killed either at the hands of men or as victims of "honour" crimes. To Larsson, there was no difference and the "systematic violence" against women highly affected and inspired him to take action against these crimes through his writing. Eva Gabrielsson, Larsson's longtime partner, wrote that "the trilogy allowed Stieg to denounce everyone he loathed for their cowardice, their irresponsibility, and their opportunism: couch-potato activists, sunny-day warriors, fair-weather skippers who pick and choose their causes; false friends who used him to advance their own careers; unscrupulous company heads and shareholders who wangle themselves huge bonuses... Seen in this light, Stieg couldn't have had any better therapy for what ailed his soul than writing his novels." [3]
Larsson submitted the manuscripts for all three volumes in the series to two Swedish publishers, with Norstedts Förlag accepting the manuscripts for publication. Norstedts commissioned Steve Murray, under the pen-name of Reg Keeland, to undertake the English translation.[4] Larsson tried to get British publishers to accept his book, but was turned down until Christopher Maclehose bought the global English language rights of the book for Quercus, a small London publisher.[5][6] Alfred A. Knopf bought the U.S. rights to the books after Larsson's death in 2004.[7]
By May 2010, 27 million copies have been sold worldwide.[8]
Larsson wrote about three-quarters of a fourth novel before his sudden death in November 2004. His partner, Eva Gabrielsson, is in possession of the notebook computer with the manuscript but does not own the rights to Larsson's work. This is because Larsson, in an attempt to protect Gabrielsson from the people he was investigating in real life (Swedish Neo-Nazis and racists), never married and wrote his will without any witness (thus making it invalid according to Swedish law). Thus, at his death, it is his family that ended with the succession.[9] Outlines or manuscripts for one or two more books may exist.[8][10]
The Swedish film production company Yellow Bird has produced film versions of the Millennium Trilogy, co-produced with The Danish film production company Nordisk Film and television company,[11] which were released in Scandinavia in 2009. In 2010, the films were shown in an extended version of approximately 180 minutes per film as a six-part miniseries (each film divided in two parts of 90 minutes) on Swedish television. This version was released on July 14, 2010 on DVD and Blu-ray Disc in three separate sets and on November 24, 2010 as a Complete Millennium Trilogy box set with an extra disc.
Originally, only the first film was meant for a theatrical release, with the following ones conceived as TV movies, but this was changed in the wake of the tremendous success of the first film. The first film was directed by Niels Arden Oplev and the next two by Daniel Alfredson, while the screenplays of the first two were adapted by Nikolaj Arcel and Rasmus Heisterberg, and the last one by Ulf Rydberg and Jonas Frykberg. All three films feature Michael Nyqvist as Mikael Blomkvist and Noomi Rapace as Lisbeth Salander.
Yellow Bird, Relativity Media, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures, and BBC Films have partnered with Sony Pictures to produce an American adaptation of the first novel. The film is written by Steven Zaillian, directed by David Fincher and produced by Scott Rudin, with Daniel Craig as Mikael Blomkvist and Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander. Along with Dragon Tattoo, Fincher and Zaillian have signed a two picture deal to also adapt The Girl Who Played with Fire, and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest, which will be shot back to back. In January 2012, it was announced that Sony was "moving forward" with the adaptation of The Girl Who Played with Fire, with Zaillian in the early stage of scripting it for a planned release in late 2013.[12][13]
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