The Man Who Left Too Soon Page 4

  Gabrielsson rehearses the bitter details of the succeeding dispute, and adds that she feels that the current custodians of her partner’s work are not doing it justice. She disputes several changes that have been made to the books, and also disagrees with the perception that Larsson had a workaholic nature – he was, apparently, ‘The most laid-back person, lying on his back, reading or thinking, watching spaghetti westerns.’

  Intriguingly, Gabrielsson records another painful ambiguity relating to the success of her late partner’s novels, leaving aside the financial battles. She is pleased that readers are absorbing Larsson’s passionate response to corruption, barbarism and misogyny (not to mention the craven nature of most of the media – a key theme of the books), and that Larsson’s readers – by their enthusiastic devotion to his work – are ‘voting for Stieg’s ideal’. However, in a telling phrase she says sees the books as ‘whoring him out’ and regards their success in the marketplace as rather like having your children sold (a recurrent theme of Gabrielsson’s discussions of the books is her symbiotic involvement in their creation).

  She is, finally, grateful for the time she had with Larsson, but is convinced that, if they had married, and had their address revealed, he would have been murdered. She discusses the tearfulness that overtakes her at times, but is comforted by the fact that an idea will occur to her that she then simply has ‘to get on with’. Her view of the dispute with the Larsson family is fatalistic, and she is aware that her options are running out. But she has confidence in the fact that – as she puts it – ‘the truth will win out in the end’. And the real revelation of the interview is that what exists of the fabled fourth book on the closely guarded laptop is 200 pages long.

  CHAPTER 3

  DEATH AND DISPUTES

  Larsson knew the great crime novels of the American hard-boiled masters Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, and, consciously or otherwise, shared the American writers’ careless attitude to their own health. And when, after submitting his manuscripts to his editor Eva Gedin at the Swedish publisher Norstedts, he undertook a punishing walk up seven flights of stairs because of a broken lift, his lengthy abuse of his body’s own resources finally took its toll with the heart attack that was to claim his life.

  Larsson’s British publisher, Christopher MacLehose, has long been the doyen of foreign crime fiction in translation. He has had another Swedish talent, Henning Mankell, under his belt, and was the discoverer of a key Scandinavian crime breakthrough, Peter Høeg’s Miss Smilla’s Feeling for Snow. In his understated manner, MacLehose is proud of Larsson’s success. A distinguished and quietly-spoken publisher of the old school, he spoke to me about Larsson with regret for the premature loss of such a remarkable author, and is frank about the fact that Larsson appeared to be oblivious to all warnings about his health. ‘He smoked over 60 cigarettes a day and was a classic workaholic,’ says MacLehose. ‘To say that he didn’t give his body a chance almost understates the case. And like many driven men, he tended not to listen to the counsel of those around him – he was warned again and again that he should look after himself, but all such advice fell on deaf ears.’

  The suggestion that Stieg Larsson did not talk to his brother and father for many years is disputed, but it is certainly true that he never married his partner Eva Gabrielsson – and by the diktats of the Swedish legal system, she, accordingly, did not inherit his estate or literary legacy (which is principally, of course, the three novels of the Millennium Trilogy). The legatees were, in fact, his father Erland and his brother Joakim. The reason why Stieg and Eva did not marry is now (as previously discussed) common knowledge: he considered that his well-known battles with extremist groups put him in some considerable danger, and he felt that he would to some extent shield Eva from some of this danger by avoiding marriage. She has said that Stieg was under the impression that the Swedish special cohabitation act for unmarried couples would cover rights of inheritance – which, in fact, it does not. Had he realised the uproar that would ensue – a bitter dispute in which his legacy, both artistic and financial, would be fought over – it is entirely possible that he might have rethought this strategy to obviate the pain and acrimony that would follow his death; given his character, it is hardly likely that ‘après moi, le deluge’ would have been his philosophy. The situation that has arisen regarding his royalties, with claims and counterclaims, is further complicated by Swedish laws regarding intestate deaths, in which the state takes 50% of the deceased’s earnings before relatives can make a claim.

  There was considerable press coverage, both in Sweden and the UK, in November 2009 when Stieg’s father and brother spoke to Swedish newspapers. They had decided that they would be offering Eva a compensatory sum which would have no corollary conditions for her. Controversially, Joakim told one newspaper that she would be obliged to ring them and say ‘Yes, please’, and Stieg Larsson readers (many of whom have closely followed this un-illuminating saga) might not have been surprised that – after such an approach – Eva’s response was not immediately forthcoming. She gave no public pronouncement on the family’s suggestion, but made it clear that she was unhappy with the concept of discussing such matters via the press.

  Cynics pointed to the offer as being part of an attempt to reclaim one of the most precious jewels in the crown in the Stieg Larsson legacy – the laptop which remained in the possession of Eva Gabrielsson – and which apparently contains what Larsson had written of the fourth, unfinished, novel (which, as mentioned earlier, Gabrielsson has said consists of a few hundred pages). The laptop was, at this point, safely squirreled away in a safe by Eva – and if all this sounds rather like the plot strand in one of the Larsson novels, that is surely only appropriate.

  There had, in fact, already been a variety of attempts to support Eva in the campaign to gain access to the monies which she felt to be her due, having been an integral part of Larsson’s creative process when he was writing the three novels of the Millennium Trilogy, and various campaigns were mounted by such people as the Norwegian publisher Jan Moberg. So incendiary is the situation involving the dispute that there have even been movements to bring about change in Sweden’s inheritance laws.

  At the time of this latest twist in the dispute, the estate had been valued at more than £20 million, and more was accruing all the time – particularly as a successful series of movies have been completed in Sweden, with the possibility of American remakes now confirmed – and the further fact that the paperback of the third book in the trilogy had not (at the time that the offer was made) appeared in the UK. And the inevitability of that paperback matching the phenomenal sale of its predecessors could hardly be gainsaid.

  Ironically, the only will that Stieg Larsson had made was one written under the spell of a youthful enthusiasm: he had left all that he might have to the Communist party (despite his father’s claim ‘Stieg was never a communist’). This will, however, was never officially witnessed, ensuring that the estate became the joint property of his family and the Swedish state. Despite Eva’s claim that, as the late author’s common-law wife she was the natural legatee, under existing Swedish laws her position has no legal justification. She has pointed out that Stieg’s father and brother had negotiated with her for the laptop containing what was written of the fourth novel, but the lawyer had advised her that this was not a proposition that she should entertain. The latest offer of 20 million kronor (nearly £2 million) from Larsson’s father and brother was an attempt at a reconciliation, with Erland and Joakim telling the press that this was evidence of their desire to move on the stalled negotiations.

  Eva, at the time of these developments, was writing her own memoir describing her times with Stieg, and the fact that Eva had said Stieg had effectively cut himself off from his family, suggested that the book would pull no punches. And whatever text had been written of Eva’s memoir, it was very obviously in a state of flux – changing, perhaps, as these bitter divisions continued.

  The Stieg saga has
some time to run, however. In January 2010 there were two heated debates in Sweden, one focusing on whether or not Stieg Larsson had actually written his three Millennium novels. The controversy began when a former colleague from the Swedish news agency TT (Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå) seemed to claim that Larsson was an exemplary researcher but a maladroit writer who could never have produced a readable novel, suggesting that Stieg’s partner Eva Gabrielsson was the actual writer. This claim was immediately rejected by others who knew him. The accusation – like a more acerbic version of the questions of authorship concerning the novels of the late Dick Francis, whose wife Mary was widely believed to be an essential creative part of the franchise – was detonated in the newspaper Dagens Nyheter by the reporter Anders Hellberg, who claimed that Larsson ‘could not write’. Hellberg, however, does not exactly offer up a concrete alternative.

  Anders Hellberg had worked with Larsson at TT in the late Seventies and early Eighties. Reporting on these events was Sofia Curman of the Swedish news daily dn.se (with Oliver Grassmann). Hellberg’s incendiary comments included the following: ‘The language was weak, the word order was often incorrect, sentence constructions were simple and the syntax was sometimes completely mad’ – in other words, Larsson was not the kind of writer who could have produced the Millennium Trilogy.

  Hellberg indirectly supported the view that the novels may have been partly the product of Larsson’s long-term partner Eva Gabrielsson, noting that she was ‘a very good writer’, but Gabrielsson herself was quick to scotch the idea in a statement given to the Swedish daily Expressen.

  Similarly, and unsurprisingly, Larsson’s Swedish publisher, Eva Gedin of Norstedts, also gave short shrift to the assertion. (She was one of the first people I spoke to in my Larsson odyssey, interviewing her for The Times.) ‘To claim that Stieg did not write the Millennium Trilogy is just nonsense.’ Gedin said. ‘I can only comment on Stieg as a crime novelist. When he came to our publishing house he was a very mature writer and his scripts were thoroughly worked through.’

  In a rare concordance between the warring factions in the estate squabble, Larsson’s brother Joakim also criticised the Dagens Nyheter piece, saying that he was ‘angry’ but ‘not surprised’, adding: ‘It’s just another nonsense article about Stieg that I won’t waste my energy on. Nowadays, my brother is a national icon and there are many claiming to have known him who try to live off his reputation.’

  Hellberg has been subsequently deluged with negative responses from passionate Larsson admirers – and Sweden has more than its share of those. The writer Kurdo Baksi, whose book Stieg Larsson, My Friend gives his account of a working relationship with the author at Tidningarnas Telegrambyrå, was quoted in the contentious piece, but had some caveats about the views attributed to him. However, his aspect of the dispute, as repeated in The Local, a Swedish news source, has had a life of its own. Eva Gabrielsson criticised Baksi’s book, which was interpreted as describing Larsson as a ‘mediocre journalist who lacked objectivity’. Kurdo Baksi, it was said, makes the claim that Larsson ‘wrote biased articles and even invented material’.

  Gabrielsson was unsparing in her response when speaking to the Swedish television channel SVT: ‘Kurdo is trying to perform a character assassination of Stieg as a journalist. This is pure slander.’ She noted that Larsson only worked with Baksi for a brief time on a magazine and some political pieces in the 1990s – and that Baksi was not that well acquainted with the late writer.

  Kurdo Baksi’s remarks to SVT that Larsson was a ‘mediocre’ journalist who lacked objectivity in his work at the news agency also produced a stinging response from Larsson’s former boss at TT, Kenneth Ahlborn, who described the assertions as false, and said that they were essentially ‘an attempt to grab the media spotlight’. He continued: ‘I was Stieg’s boss. We worked in the same room every day. If anyone should speak about his relationship to TT it should be me. The assertion that he could make up biased, objectionable articles is so bizarre. We don’t work like that at TT and Stieg was not like that.’

  Against this mounting wave of criticism, Baksi, in his own defence, commented on Hellberg’s piece.

  ‘I have not been quoted correctly,’ he said. ‘First of all, I never said I was a better writer than Stieg. Maybe I was better than him at handling quick, short journalistic texts, but I am absolutely not a better writer. Anders Hellberg has used our conversation to create a perspective that I just can’t accept.’

  However, this defence drew a swift and uncompromising reply from Hellberg, who maintained that there had been no misinterpretation: ‘Sadly,’ he said, ‘I was unable to record the conversation, but I have written down exactly what Kurdo Baksi said. If he doesn’t want to stand by it now, that’s his business.’

  Meanwhile, Baksi commented on Larsson’s alleged journalistic shortcomings: ‘I still say Stieg Larsson wasn’t a brilliant journalist, but he was a brilliant author. He showed it both in his non-fiction books and in his novels.’ When I talked to the writer Dan Lucas (who worked with Larsson in Sweden), he also spoke well of Larsson’s journalistic accomplishments.

  Sofia Curman of dn.se also quoted writer/journalist Anna-Lena Lodenius, author in tandem with Larsson of Extremhögern (‘The Extreme Right’). Lodenius points out that she never acted as an editor on any of Larsson’s journalistic pieces. She noted: ‘It’s possible that the dry style of TT wasn’t his thing. But of course he could write.’ Lodenius remarked that she feared it would be painful for her to read the Millennium books. ‘When I did read the Millennium Trilogy,’ she said, ‘I clearly heard his voice. I recognised his language and I found some of his favourite words in the books, the same words that I always crossed out when we wrote together. Like everyone else he had certain expressions that were characteristic of his writing. There is no doubt that it’s the same Stieg that I used to work with.’

  Kurdo Baksi had a final salvo about the dual authorship dispute that evokes the Shakespeare/Francis Bacon theory: ‘Shakespeare’s works were written nearly 400 years ago, and the discussion as to who the real author was is still there. Many say [sic] it was his wife. But in Stieg’s case, he was the actual writer. His very special style, which is apparent in everything he ever wrote, is clearly there in all of the Millennium books. My only point regarding his style was that it was better suited for novels than for news articles.’

  In the Expressen pieces, Eva Gabrielsson noted that her interaction with her partner in the writing of the Millennium sequence was a matter of ‘proofreading and discussions’.

  CHAPTER 4

  PUBLISHING LARSSON

  ‘He was a difficult man, but brilliant and multifaceted,’ according to his Swedish publisher, Eva Gedin of Norstedts. ‘Many Swedes were aware of his bravery in tackling extremist organisations,’ she told me. ‘He could be infuriating – and he certainly wasn’t afraid of making enemies. But most of his enemies were well chosen; as for his friends and associates, frustration with him might result from the fact that he was clearly asking his body to do more than it could cope with.’

  Gedin speaks with a mixture of admiration and regret regarding the late author. ‘He came to my attention via the recommendation of another journalist, who rang me up and said, “You may know about Stieg as an antifascist journalist – but did you know he is also an amazing novelist? You have to read this book!” And so we discovered The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

  ‘When I read it, I told him – on the spot – that we wanted to sign him to a three-book contract. His response was a quiet one; generally speaking, he was a surprisingly quiet, shy person – except in one area. He was boastful about himself only in respect of his amazing work ethic. You were always told – in great detail – how he’d copy-edited his magazine, fired off myriad letters, written several chapters, and generally crammed a week of activity into 24 hours. One could always forgive him all this, as he wasn’t really self-aggrandising.’

  In a radio interview for PRI’s The World, Eva Gedin gave s
ome interesting responses concerning the life and death of Stieg Larsson. She talked about first encountering the unpublished manuscripts: ‘We were very excited because we needed a new crime writer, and we could see that we had something really good in our hands.’ Remarking on the steadily growing, viral word of mouth on the books, she noted that, ‘You could sort of hear people talking about Stieg’s book almost everywhere we went – when we went to buy groceries, you could hear people saying “Hey, have you read this new writer Stieg Larsson?”’ Acknowledging that the success of the books was in great part due to the groundbreaking character of Lisbeth Salander, Gedin anatomised the success of this innovative creation: ‘She’s a superhero, something you haven’t seen in crime fiction. She’s such an extraordinary person. Smart… and revengeful.’

  Larsson had in fact told Eva Gedin that he had conceived Salander (as mentioned earlier) as a grown-up version of the classic Swedish children’s heroine Pippi Longstocking.

  So was Larsson – to those who knew him – a heroic figure? ‘He was the best kind of hero,’ according to Gedin. ‘He simply got on with the job, and never seemed to be after any kind of personal glory. Perhaps some might call taking on some sinister organisations foolhardy but I – and many others – had only admiration for him. Of course, it was obvious that something had to give in terms of his health. Which is not to say that he was self-destructive. Outwardly, even before the success of Dragon Tattoo, he was a man of influence and importance; he charmed the ex-minister of immigration, Mona Sahlin – a woman many considered to be a possible future prime minister of Sweden. And, of course, he lectured on the tactics of far-Right groups in France, Germany – and at Scotland Yard.’