Stieg Larsson, My Friend

my friend. Obviously I knew that he wanted to help me. He wanted to warn, protect and support me. He was doing that as best he could. I ought to have been grateful, but I could feel that my irritation had increased thanks to his vitriolic sermon.

When I switched on the lamp it suddenly struck me how remarkably light and darkness interact. Before, we had been hidden, but now the only darkness was outside the window. At a stroke anybody could see what was going on inside the office. I had that familiar feeling of vulnerability. How can you explain to somebody who has never experienced it what it’s like, always to be living alongside a powerful but nevertheless indefinable enemy? Somebody who can see you the moment you switch on the light and who follows every step you take. Luckily, most people never have to think about things like that.

I even surprised myself when I slammed the newspaper down on the table. The article’s headline was staring at us: “Choose sides – now!”

“Don’t you understand, Stieg,” I said, “that the Kurds’ spokesmen are worried about being blamed for the murder of Fadime Sahindal? But it’s not the media attention that’s the problem. The problem is the organizations that represent groups from the Middle East and North Africa. Kurdish women need the media attention they are getting. Believe me, I am a man who was born in Kurdistan. It’s not so bloody easy for me to represent Kurdish women.”

“I understand that, Kurdo, I understand that.”

“Most of those contributing to the debate think that honour killings are arranged by the victim’s family. In other words, that the phenomenon is socially acceptable. But if I understand you rightly, you’re saying that murderers who kill women in the Western world are individuals who make their own decisions and act individually. Am I right?”

“No, you’re not. Take 22-year-old Melissa Nordell. She was Swedish and dumped her considerably older boyfriend. He refused to let her go, and in the end attacked her. He raped her and tortured her with a stun gun. Then, to top it all off, he throttled her. When he realized what he had done, he phoned a relative who was a company director or something of the sort. Between them they cleaned up the scene of the murder, wrapped the corpse in chicken wire and dumped it on the island of Ingaro. Do you remember that?”

“Of course I do.”

“The boyfriend was jailed for life and his relative got two years for desecration of a grave. The newspapers called it a crime passionnel.”

“I take your point, Stieg. I understand that the difference between these two murders is purely cosmetic. You don’t need to be Einstein to get that. It’s just that there’s nobody in this country who wants to listen to such arguments right now. Fadime Sahindal’s father murdered her because he couldn’t accept the fact that she insisted on going her own way. Melissa Nordell was murdered by her ex-boyfriend because he couldn’t accept the fact that she was going to leave him. Neither woman was allowed to go her own way. That’s why they were punished.”

“That’s how we must express ourselves in the media. Exactly like that.”

For the first time in our conversation Stieg looked pleased. It was as if we both heaved a sigh of mutual relief. Neither of us had looked at the clock yet. It felt as if night had fallen.

Then Stieg leaned towards me and said, in a voice much more intimate than before, “I’m prepared to do anything at all to get this debate about honour killing on the right track.”

“Then you can start by writing a really good polemical article,” I said.

“O.K. But not in my name. I can’t represent the Kurdish point of view. I was born in Skelleftehamn, you were born in Kurdistan. I can support you. Once the debate is over – and that could take more than a year – I’d be happy to edit a book about honour killings.”

So we had reached a sort of peace, or perhaps rather an armistice. We had a joint assignment, that was how we regarded it. We knew that we wanted to change the way things were, and were willing to do whatever was necessary. It came naturally to us to notice small things which reflected a bigger picture. Such as the fact that women are depicted on Swedish 20- and 50-krona notes, but men are on the 100-, 500- and 1,000-krona ones. Nothing to worry about. Or is it? The Nobel Prize is almost always awarded to a man, Sweden has not yet had a female prime minister, nearly all great inventors and scientists are men, most university professors are men.

Yet at the same time it’s men who rape, kill and assault others. One woman in five is subjected to rape or attempted rape during her lifetime. One woman in five! Half the population of the world comprises women, but they own only a tiny bit of the world’s resources. Women are hardly represented at all in the corridors of power. No woman has been the U.N. Secretary-General. Everybody knows about Mozart, Vivaldi, Bach. Where are the female composers?

Men write history. Men write about their male friends. For thousands of years there has been a power structure biased in favour of men, and it is hard to change that.

For those who wonder why Stieg refused to change the title of his first novel, Man som hatar kvinnor (Men Who Hate Women – it was often changed in translated versions), there you have the answer. Both he and I lived in an environment in which we were constantly reminded of the consequences of this lack of equality, which has always been the norm, and still is. It didn’t matter that we were both men – as far as we were concerned, the system was obviously wrong and we felt obliged to correct it.

But now we sat in silence, as if we had just completed twelve rounds in a boxing ring. I felt unsure whether I would be able to get up from the little stool in my corner when the bell rang. But there was something gnawing away inside me. I agreed with everything Stieg said, even if he sometimes tended to go over the top. The fact is that he could sound like other brilliant speakers holding forth about ideals of equality at conferences, in seminars, at demonstrations, in books and in the media.

I ought to have asked him that evening how well he lived up to his feminist visions in the everyday world. When had he last done the laundry? How many of the household chores did he help his partner with? When had he last done the washing up? Whenever I visited him and Eva for dinner he always helped to lay the table, serve the food and contribute to the washing up. I also know that he liked ironing. But it was always obvious that he wasn’t the one in charge of the household. It was Eva who took care of everything, from paying the bills to buying the food.

Stieg always claimed that he couldn’t cook, although he often promised his friends to serve them roast hare one day. He said that was his signature dish. Unfortunately I was never lucky enough to sample this magnificent meal.

But perhaps it is unfair to make accusations of this kind. Stieg was hardly ever at home, after all. Maybe it is just another regrettable reminder that theory and practice are rarely as close to one another as we would like to think.

There was one thing I couldn’t resist bringing up that evening. It was impossible, given the long discussion we had had.

“Stieg, do you remember a question I asked you some three years ago?”

“Which question do you mean?”

“After all you have said this evening, can you explain why there is only one woman on Expo’s seven-strong editorial board? It would be easy to conclude that there are not enough competent women in Sweden who could cope with a job on Expo.”

He didn’t even try to defend himself.

“I know. It’s my fault. But the fact is I’m always too stressed to do anything about it.”

“It’s only a matter of time before the media catch on.”

He nodded dejectedly.

“I know, I know.”

He suddenly looked depressed. That had not been my intention. I was worried, I really was, and I knew the explanation he gave was true. When would he have had time to sort out the gender balance at Expo? How many hours are there in a day?

As usual, our arguments had come up against a snag. Yet again we had fought a battle in the office, dealt with important questions that needed sorting out, only to find that shortly thereafter we were back to square one.

The basement windows were just as impenetrably black as before. There was still some time to go before dawn. Nothing outside could be seen clearly from where we were sitting. The world was deaf, vague, unclear and