Inspector-Wallander.org News Archive

Inspector-Wallander.org
The Site for English-Speaking Fans of Henning Mankell's Detective Series
Featuring Kurt Wallander of Ystad, Sweden,
A small town outside of Malmö in the southern province of Skåne.

News Archive

Summary of Mankell's appearance in New York, Summer 2004

Posted 13 June 2004, updated 21 June 2004

Chris, a member our discussion list, posted his summary of Henning Mankell's talk in New York City. Here is a small snippet:

HM was at a B&N bookstore with the author Michael Onddatje, who introduced Mankell and said he was a fan of the Wallander books (and especially likes the character of Ann-Britt Hoglund). HM gave a short reading of the opening of "Faceless Killers," and they discussed the novels and HM's theatre work in Mozambique. (HM seemed a bit put off by the impulse some people have to write to the Ystad police and go to the town, when they know very well that Wallander and team are fictional.)

During the talk and in response to questions, Mankell spoke about Kurt Wallander (name created from phone book), the writing process, theatre, Africa, AIDS-orphans & the west, and why he started the Wallander novels:

The main point Mankell would like readers to take away from the Wallander novels is the evil of racism. He believes it is such a terrible crime, he needed a police procedural as the vehicle to hold up a mirror to society, and that's what started Wallander's series.
He believes people are not born evil, circumstances create the occasion for their evildoing.

Tim, a reader from Boston, also managed to take photographs of the event in that city:

Continue reading the full summary and see the larger photographs on our page for these events.

Thanks to Chris and Tim for sharing their experiences with the rest of us.