Sample of literary figures
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Lisa Mattei
Female
In 2005, Leif G.W. Persson wrote about the young detective inspector Lisa Mattei; ten years later, she is a middle-aged operations manager for the Swedish security services. She made a rapid career, but has a bad conscience because she rarely has time to be with her family, her husband Johan and her daughter Ella. She has private means, and is something of a connoisseur when it comes to clothes, for example. But she is also a gifted and skilful police officer.
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Ewert Grens
Male
Middle-aged detective chief inspector in Stockholm, ordinary-looking, with thinning hair and a wrinkled face. He suffers from a severe trauma: his wife Anni suffered severe brain damage in an accident that he caused. Now Ewert Grens visits her every day in the care home. His only consolation is the songs sung by Siw Malmkvist, and he is always listening to them in the novels by Anders Roslund – the early novels were written together with Börge Hellström.
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Guido Brunetti
Male
Commissario (Detective Superintendent) Brunetti in the Italian state police, stationed in Venice, solves murder cases in a number of books by American author Donna Leon, herself resident in the city. Brunetti is married to Paola, daughter in an aristocratic family and a university lecturer, and has a lively family life which includes children and his own as well as his wife’s relatives. He also battles against the Italian bureaucracy which doesn’t exactly facilitate his work.
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William of Baskerville
Male
The British Franciscan monk from Baskerville is the main character in just one novel – on the other hand, it is the classic <i>The Name of the Rose</i> by Umberto Eco. It is not just the name Baskerville which makes one think of Sherlock Holmes: William’s own ‘Watson’, Adso, describes him as tall, thin, strong, supple, with a crooked nose and sharp eyes, and aged around fifty. And who was a brilliant logician as early as the 14th century…