Originally Posted By: grelber
And the Millennium series continues with David Lagercrantz nailing the deceased Larsson's style.

I may be opening a can of worms with this post, but I think Sophie Gilbert (The Atlantic) provides an interesting take on Lagercrantz’s continuation of the Larsson novels, and in general on the continuation of popular book series or characters by authors other than the original ones: Lisbeth Salander: The Girl Who Survived Her Creator. Gilbert starts her piece by mentioning a 2010 Slate article by Michael Newman, The Girl Who Deserves To Escape Her Author, who is quite vocal in criticizing Larsson’s writing. Newman allows for the effect of translation on his impressions, but suspects that doesn’t explain his issues with the novels: to him it’s most likely Larsson’s writing that sucks. While I (think I) see his point, I have to disagree with it in the aggregate, and posit that—for me at least—translation has to incorporate not just the correct meaning and style, but also the linguistic ’touch and feel’ of the story, warts and all.

Unfortunately, I can’t judge that in this case, having read Larsson only in (English) translation. But in other cases I could, having read the original as well as a translation. Specifically, the English translations of Larsson’s novels remind me—albeit in different ways—of certain stories originally written in German or Dutch, western germanic relatives of the northern germanic Swedish. Most translation readers rarely experience it, but the sound of a story in the original language can carry an important part of its texture. For instance, if you have read Kafka in German, you can’t escape the estranging effect of the language used. Heck, any halfway decent translation conveys that effect. But if anything, hearing it in German hammers that home irrevocally and inimitably. IMO, if that’s lost in translation, an essential part of the story’s ‘soul’ is lost as well. Incorporating such language texture in translation is hard to do, and the difficulty varies by language, but it’s possible, if perhaps only in approximation.

Anyway, regardless of Larsson’s language use being functional or delinquent, I wolfed down his Millennium series and will definitely have a go at Lagercrantz’s novel.


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