Crime Writers

Photo: Louis MONIER/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images (1987)

Författarporträtt

Malet, Léo

French author born as Léon Malet in Montpellier. Having lost his parents when he was four years old, he was raised by his paternal grandparents. He left school at an early age and started to work, among other things, in a bank and in a factory. In his spare time he sold anarchist magazines. When he was sixteen he ran off to Paris where he tried to make a living singing at a cabaret in Montmartre ...

Further reading

Theme article

History of crime fiction

By: Johan Wopenka

Depending upon how one wishes to define the concept ‘crime fiction’, it is possible to trace its history and roots back in time. When Dorothy L. Sayers compiled her comprehensive three-volume anthology Great Short Stories of Detection, Mystery and Horror (1928–34) she started with two stories from the Old Testament, and when Frederic Dannay and Manfred B. Lee (alias Ellery Queen) wrote their fundamental The Detective Short Story : A Bibliography (1942), they listed eight Chinese collections of short stories which are believed to have been written down between 600 A.D. and 1800 A.D., some of them containing stories based on an older, oral tradition.

Further reading

Literary figure

Svend Foyn

Gender: Male

Lawyer and a skilled amateur detective who lives in the Norwegian town of Tønsberg, like his creator Jan Mehlum. Svend Foyn is divorced and has a teenaged daughter, loves music and books and easily becomes sentimental. His appearance is not particularly noticeable, but he is quite tall – more than 190 cm – and struggles to hold his weight under 90 kilos. His best female friend is Hulda – a Saint B...

Further reading