the arts Stieg Larsson’s other calling: crusader against neo-Nazis naomi pfefferman
shared with Larsson, was soft-spoken and straightforward during a phone interview. “What you see in the first Millennium Stieg Larsson, the Swedish author of the book is what a Nazi past does to a famiinternational best-selling “Millennium” ly, and to its family members: the kind of series, died in 2004 at age 50 of a heart structures that are built up, based on attack, before the publication of his who has the power,” she said. crime thrillers made him one of the Blomkvist and Salander discover a most famous writers of the decade. They mysterious list of names the teenager have sold tens of millions of copies wrote in her journal. When they figure worldwide, spawned three Swedish films out that the names refer to Jewish vicand now Hollywood’s “The Girl with the tims, they are on the path of a Nazi seriDragon Tattoo.” al killer. But amid all this “Stieg industry,” as “It was a natural thing for Stieg to the late author’s life partner, Eva make them Jewish,” Gabrielsson said. Gabrielsson, put it, a crucial element “This is a killer who is acting for politoften has been overlooked: just how ical reasons, within the Nazi ideology, much Larsson embedded in his novels a so he is actually committing political fundamental passion of his life — his murders. … The first book shows the crusade against neo-Nazism and violent effects of an ideology on a family and far-right movements, which he viewed its women.” as anathema to Sweden and to all modIn a way, she said, Larsson was comern society. menting on current events: “It took all of “Those who see Stieg solely as an the 1980s and ’90s until the Swedish author of crime fiction have never truly photo | ap/sony/columbia pictures/merrick morton police, prosecutors and politicians known him,” Gabrielsson writes in her Rooney Mara (left) and Yorick van Wageningen in a scene from “The Girl understood that the extreme right wing 2011 memoir, “‘There Are Things I with the Dragon Tattoo” here were not criminals in the ‘normal’ Want You to Know’ About Stieg Larsson sense, but were committing criminal acts and Me.” which includes “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” “The The Millennium trilogy “is an allegory of the individ- Girl Who Played with Fire” and “The Girl Who Kicked the because of a political ideology,” she said. In 1991, Larsson published “Right Wing Extremism” ual’s eternal fight for justice and morality, the values for Hornet’s Nest.” which Stieg Larsson fought until the day he died,” Marie“Tattoo,” still playing in several Bay Area theaters, intro- with Anna-Lena Lodenius, an overview on the subject, Francoise Colombani wrote in the foreword to duces the odd duo of Mikael Blomkvist, a crusading jour- Gabrielsson said. He was already an expert on each group’s Gabrielsson’s book. nalist and co-founder of a magazine called Millennium, political affiliations, the members’ accomplices, milieus An abiding part of Larsson’s mission was researching and Lisbeth Salander, a pierced, punk, antisocial comput- they frequented and how the then-flourishing whiteand exposing Sweden’s Nazi past and, more urgently, the er hacker, who team up to solve a decades-old mystery power music industry financed extremist groups throughout the world. resurgence of violent racist groups in Scandinavia in the involving the disappearance of a teenage girl. Why did Larsson persevere with his work, despite the 1980s and ’90s, during which time Larsson wrote for the Her uncle, industrialist Henrik Vanger, hires Blomkvist anti-racist British magazine Searchlight and, in 1995, co- to find his niece, revealing early on that his family has danger? “I trace it back to something personal,” Gabrielsson founded a Swedish equivalent, Expo. For those efforts, plenty of racist skeletons in the closet. One of them is Larsson and Gabrielsson — an activist in her own right — Henrik’s brother, Richard, “a fanatical nationalist and anti- said. Larsson’s beloved maternal grandfather, Severin, who received death threats and bullets in the mail. Semite … [who] joined the Swedish National Socialist had helped raise Stieg, was an anti-Nazi activist who had “Stieg was absolutely the real deal — he was an expert on Freedom League, one of the first Nazi groups in Sweden.” been imprisoned in a little-known concentration camp in the neo-Nazi movement in Europe, and particularly in Spoiler alert: There’s also a serial killer whose targets turn northern Sweden, set up to appease the Nazis. “The stories of these prisoners until recently have been Scandinavia,” said Marilyn Mayo, co-director of the Anti- out to have been Jewish women. In “The Girl Who Played Defamation League’s Center on Extremism. “We relied on with Fire,” the chief villain is not only a sex-trafficker but wrapped up in a blanket of silence,” Gabrielsson said. “It his information in terms of tracking the movement in also a Jew-hater, who uses as his alias the name of a wasn’t until five or six years ago that a film was made Europe — its growth, activism and various players. And we Swedish Nazi, Karl Axel Bodin — a real historical figure about these camps, and afterward researchers began to often shared information on the overlap between the neo- who traveled to occupied Norway during the war to join explore Sweden’s true past during the second world war. For Stieg, his work was the defense of the man who Nazi movement in Europe and the United States.” the Waffen SS. Nazis and anti-Semites lurk throughout Larsson’s trilogy, Gabrielsson, reached at the Stockholm apartment she brought him up.” l.a. jewish journal
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Beastie Boys to join Rock Hall of Fame The Beastie Boys — the pioneering hiphop group made up of Mike D (Michael Diamond), MCA (Adam Yauch) and Ad-
Rock (Adam Horowitz) — are going to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The group will be among the class of 2012 that includes the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Donovan and Guns N’ Roses.
The Beastie Boys, creators of hits such as “Fight for Your Right (To Party),” “No Sleep ’Til Brooklyn” and “Sabotage,” have released 12 albums that have sold more than 40 million copies worldwide. The ceremony will be held in April at the Hall of Fame in Cleveland. — jta
Chai Five goes klez in Redwood City The Peninsula-based group Chai Five, with vocalist Emily Pelc, will perform a smorgasbord of Jewish music 8:30 p.m. Jan. 21 at Angelica’s Bistro in Redwood City. The performance, presented by Redwood Symphony, will in-clude a mix of modern klezmer, Ladino and Eastern European .
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Je w i s h f o l k songs, and theatre music by both German composer Kurt We i l l a n d Abraham Goldfaden, often called the father of modern Jewish theatre. Tickets are Emily Pelc $20 in advance and $25 at the door. Angelica’s Bistro is located at 863 Main St., Redwood City. For more information call (650 365-3226 or visit www.angelicasbistro.com. ■