Henning Mankell: My responsibilty is to react

Interview with Swedish writer Henning Mankell, whose books have sold in
more than 40 million copies. Here he reflects upon his work,
inspirations and the role of the intellectual in society.

Henning Mankell (b. 1948) is best known for his crime fiction and his character Kurt Wallander, a police inspector living and working in the Swedish town of Ystad. In the interview he states that he regards crime fiction as one of the oldest literary genres in the world. Crime fiction, Mankell argues, has always mirrored the surrounding society. In that sense, the ancient drama of Medea or Shakespeare's Macbeth could be seen in that tradition, too. Furthermore, Mankell speaks about his early years, growing up only with a father, though in a family, in which music and books played an important role.

"The real artist is the child", Mankell says, as a child does not see any limits in life and dares to ask all the important questions. Finally, Mankell reflects upon his continuos engagement in current affairs, whether it concerns matters of illiteracy in his second home Africa or his outspoken critic of the state of Israel in relation to the Palestinians. "As a writer, I am an intellectual", Mankell says. "And as an intellectual, I have to speak."

Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art.

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Supported by Nordea-fonden.

When people ask me what is my main inspiration

I say it is the ancient Greek drama

if you take a play like Medea that's written 2300 years ago

it is about a woman who murders her children because of jalousy in relation to her husband

if that is not a crime story, I don't know what a crime story is

the only difference is that there is no police officer in it

because in Greece at that time there was no police force

but I can assure you if they had had a police force, there would also have a policeman in the play

but this story uses the mirror of crime to look upon contradictions in society

that is what interests me.

Look at McBeth, take McBeth and put Richard Nixon in there:

you have the same story, in a way.

And then I can say that, yes, there are also pure crime fictions that inspire me.

For example Sherlock Holmes.

Because many histories talk about English society,

about hypocrisy, about many things

So, I don't see any differences by writing crime fiction or another novel

I think, I put up my cheek a little and say that crime fiction is one of the oldest literary genre that exists

it's not invented by Edgar Alan Poe, it's much older than that.

All of my ancestors were musicians, they were playing in churches, organ players and

my grandfather was a composer and I think that when I was young I also thought of myself as a musician

but I realised quite quickly that (I was playing the violin) that I would never be as good as I would want to be

so I, in a way, chose another instrument because you have to understand that writing is a sort of instrument you have in your hands

But on the other hand you might say that music is a very essential part of writing