Swedish novelist Stieg Larsson led a life as fascinating as his fiction, according an extract from The Man Who Left Too Soon by Barry Forshaw published in The Times.
The book reveals Larsson had all too much in common with his fictional journalist-come-detective Mikael Blomkvist with a love of pizza and cigarettes that led to his fatal heart attack. But to Swedish Tourism, it’s all part of the show with their Millennium Tour taking in Larsson’s favourite pizzeria.
Despite their noir crime themes, TLS critic Heather O’Donoghue says that Larsson’s Sweden is “an added pleasure for non-Swedish readers is the setting: it’s all Ikea furniture and democratic socialism”.
In this cheeky mash-up Art house film producer Werner Herzog gives a metaphysical look at the Where’s Waldo books: “In searching for Waldo did we really find ourselves?”
Over the weekend, Australia’s political commentators gave their diagnosis for the Rudd Government’s policy go slow on climate change.
In The Australian, Paul Kelly damned Rudd saying the retreat “leaves his credibility in serious doubt and Australia’s policy in untenable suspension”.
Over at New Matilda, Jason Wilson saw some blue sky with Rudd showing “some virtue… by accepting responsibility for things which are essentially not his fault, in the broader interest of ensuring the next election result”.
Meanwhile the Herald Sun, Laurie Oakes gave up on Kevin and called “Abbott to abandon the budgie smugglers or the bike, but it is time he put his head down and produce some serious policy”.
To take the pulse of the ETS, the Deakin Lectures features Emissions Trading: Dead or Alive with energy economist Denny Ellerman and Martin Parkinson, Secretary of Australia’s Department of Climate Change.
Robin Boyd’s The Australian Ugliness discussed by publisher Michael Heyward, architect Karen Burns, writer Gideon Haigh and historian Brenda Niall.
