A New Wave of Swedish Comics Creators: Bergting, Skogäng and Andersson

Earlier this summer, I finally got around to reading a few Swedish comics I have had sitting on my shelf for a wee while now. The comics in question were Peter Bergting's The Portent: Duende (albeit in Swedish translation, The Portent: De dödas rike (2007) (see my review, in Swedish). It was originally released as a miniseries by Image Comics and collected in 2006), Kim W. Andersson's Love Hurts (see my review, in Swedish. It was collected in 2009, but much of it, if not all, was previously published in anthology comics, etc), and the two first instalments of Ola Skogäng's series Theos ockulta kuriositeter (Eng. Theo's Occult Curiosities), Mumiens blod (2008, Eng. The Blood of the Mummy (see my review, in Swedish)) and De förlorade sidornas bok (2010, Eng. The Book of the Lost Pages (see my review, in Swedish)).

What these three comics creators have in common is artistic capability and a very nice sense of visual storytelling. In the Swedish comics field, this is something of a rarity. Not that all Swedish comics artists are bad artists or that all Swedish comics writers (who for some reason more often than not are the same as the artists, leaving little room for collaborations between writers and artists that are not all that uncommon on the continent or in the Anglo-Saxon world), but most really good Swedish comics have tended to be within the comedic genres, e.g. satire or parody; and some of that is admittedly really, really good (e.g. Charlie Christensen's Arne Anka (Eng. Arne Duck) and Johan Wanloo's Örn Blammo (Eng. Eagle Blammo (though the inherent pun is lost in translation) and De äventyrliga karlakarlarna (Eng. The Adventurous Manly Men)). On the other hand, there has been, and perhaps still is, an overflow of black and white, autobiographical comics out there, many of which seem to embrace an aesthetic which is quite frankly ugly, and more often than not reminds me of images drawn by people who could not really draw if their lives depended on it.

Bergting, Andersson and Skogäng, to my mind, offer a new visual paradigm in Swedish comics, and also open up genre boundaries that mostly seem to have been closed here. This in spite of the fact that there has been a more or less continuous influx of translated comics both from Europe and the US for as long as I can remember, with Japan as a comparatively fresh, albeit by now well established, competitor as well. As such, it feels almost strange that it has taken this long for this to happen.

So what do these three bring to the table then? My reviews (linked above) wax on this, but as they are (unfortunately, for more than a few of readers) in Swedish, I will provide a few words in English here. Mostly because I think you should all keep an eye out for these comics creators on the international scene.

Bergting, of course, first published his The Portent: Duende in English, so that one is readily available. It is a very nicely drawn high fantasy series with a quest plot. While it could be argued that it is geared towards the US market, it nevertheless shows that Swedish comics creators are capable of creating wondrous realms of fantasy, both in terms of beautiful images and well-told tales. Bergting weaves a potent mythology that draws upon that which has gone before without being too repetitive of the old. The collected edition also includes a nice foreword by comics artist Michael William Kaluta.

Andersson, on the other hand, shows with great precision, in a day and age where (especially on the US comics market) never-ending story arcs seem to be the order of the day, that it is fully possible to tell nice and intriguing comics stories on no more than a couple of pages. Love Hurts is a great anthology concept that allows Andersson to tell short, short romantic horror stories with twists. I had not encountered his work before this collection, but was entirely won over by it. Visually, one can see clear influences from Peter Snejbjerg (of DC Vertigo's Books of Magic fame). In terms of writing, I am guessing that Andersson has been reading old DC classics like The House of Mystery and The House of Secrets (and quite possibly EC's horror comics from before that) as well as watching TV-series like Tales from the Crypt and films like Creepshow. As far as I have understood, his work has been published outside of Sweden, but I am not entirely sure in which languages or where.

Last, but certainly not least, we have Skogäng, whose combination of Hergé's la ligne claire tradition and influences from great American stylists like Mike Mignola is utterly compelling. Mignola is also a good point of reference, because one of the easiest (and most fitting) descriptions of Skogäng's series is that it is a Hellboy in Swedish (and in Sweden; Skogäng captures Stockholm beautifully in his images). Clearly, Skogäng shares Mignola's interest in and fascination for the occult, the mystical, the mythical and the fantastic, and his protagonist Theo (a man who has been trapped in the body of a brown bear since the 1920s or 1930s) does bring Hellboy to mind with his investigations into the occult. This, and the fact that Skogäng could easily, and very successfully, illustrate a Hellboy story for Mignola (of this I have no doubt whatsoever), could easily make one assume that Theos ockulta kuriositeter is simply a copycat series, but such an assumption would be flawed. It is a rather a case of commonalities, where the reader of one may very well appreciate the other. The first 200 pages volume, Mumiens blod, is also being serialised in French in a more traditional album format. The first album, Théo: Le vampire de Stockholm (Le sang de la momie #1), is available from Amazon (UK) for anyone interested (who also happens to read French, naturally).

So, for my own part, I am looking forward to see what these gentlemen will produce in the future. Not to mention what they will influence others to produce.

Fourteen Seminars, Eight Mini Seminars, Four Signed Books and Four Days: The Göteborg Book Fair, Pt 2

So, here comes the second part of my highlights from this year's Book Fair in Göteborg.

Saturday, in terms of interesting and good seminars, seemed to focus on fantasy and imagination in literature, of the need to go beyond the real or the naturalistic and fully make use of human imagination as a writer.

The first seminar of three worth mentioning was "Drakmytologi i modern litteratur" (trans. Dragon Mythology in Modern Literature), a discussion between SF-Bokhandeln's Maths Claesson and children's writer Jo Salmsson which discussed how contemporary fantasy has developed dragon mythology from its more strictly mythological roots (actually raising quite a few questions in the mean time, which I might one day opt to look into much deeper) as well as discussing Salmsson's children's series Drakriddare (trans. Dragon Knights), the first book of which I bought and got signed after the seminar.

The next seminar, which dealt less with the genre of fantasy per se, and more with literary imagination, featured a discussion between moderator Stephen Farran-Lee and writers Carl-Johan Vallgren and Bengt Ohlsson. I have as of yet read neither of these two writers, but they have both caught my eye on more than one occasion and the conversation on stage did not lessen my interest. If anything, I regret only buying Vallgren's latest book and having that signed, and not taking the opportunity to also get Ohlsson's latest book and have that signed too. Ah well, sometimes quick unplanned purchases leads to one saving money in the wrong places... perhaps.

The last of the three seminars mentioned had the somewhat annoying title "Fantasy för fullvuxna" (trans. Fantasy for Grown-ups) and was moderated by critic Lotta Olsson, both of which had me wary from the get go. The title mostly because it presumes that most fantasy isn't for adults, or perhaps even excludes them, and the moderation by Olsson because she proved an appallingly ignorant moderator a few years back in a seminar with Jonathan Stroud. However, the author in question being Russian writer Nick Perumov, whom I've heard a lot of good things about, I decided to give it a go anyway. And in her defense, Lotta Olsson did a much, much better job this time around. Perumov discussed his fantasy series currently published in Sweden as Svärdens väktare (literal trans. from Sw. The Watchers of the Swords) as well as his Ring of Darkness, "sequel" to Tolkien's Lord of the Rings (due to be published in Sweden next year, I believe). The discussion was very interesting, although Perumov's Russian perspective sometimes became a bit forced in that he seemed blind to the fact that if we (i.e. Westerners) can't see or understand everything that's gone down in the old Soviet Union and Russia, then maybe that would also mean that his own perspective makes him miss things on our side as well. The fact that he more or less accuses of Tolkien of an anti-Russian allegory (something which Tolkien no doubt would have argued heavily against, as my understanding is that he vehemently opposed any and all allegorical interpretations of his work, for better or worse) and of therefore not being realistic, while simultaneously claiming that he himself is writing about things as they really are, is more than ironic. I mean, he is after all not writing directly about present day Russia but a fantasy realm, which then means that he himself is using the technique of allegory more blatantly than Tolkien whom he accuses of this. Ah well... I'm still interested in reading his series, which is supposedly really good. I just wish people wouldn't praise anything outside of mainstream post-Tolkienite fantasy as ever so original and unique without first making sure that it is. The description of the fantasy genre as always and ever about black and white good and evil without any nuances of moral grey areas is getting ever so tired by now.


On Sunday the main theme on my schedule was clearly comics (perhaps not a coincidence given that the Book Fair itself had a focus on comics this day... as per usual), although I had an interesting tie-in with Saturday's theme of fantasy that is also worth mentioning.

Starting with the fantasy tie-in, I'd like to briefly mention Anders Björkelid's new Swedish fantasy series, Berättelsen om blodet (trans. The Story of the Blood), and the first book in it, Ondvinter (trans. Evil Winter). I haven't read Björkelid myself yet, but once again it is material I've heard really good things about. And after hearing Björkelid talk about it and read some of it to the audience, I am even more interested and curious.

The main gist of the day, however, was comics. In fact, three seminars dealing with them. The first being entitled "Vart är den tecknade serien på väg?" (trans. Where Are Comics Heading?), with the subtitle "Vad är en grafisk roman?" (trans. What Is a Graphic Novel? – though it should be noted that the term in Swedish is not 100% the equivalent of its English origin). In this seminar, comics publisher Rolf Classon (Kartago) presented a brief overview of comics history and development, both in America and in Sweden. This was followed by a discussion between Swedish comics writers/artists Henrik Bromander, Charlie Christensen and Kim W. Andersson on comics in general and their own comics. I was only familiar with Christensen's work (I'm a huge fan of his Arne Anka), but the real find here for me was Kim W. Andersson. For better or worse, Swedish comics far too often tend to lean purely toward the American Underground and sometimes almost seem stuck in autobiographical narratives in black and white, not rarely with an aesthetic sensibility widely differing from my own (in that it comes off as crude and rather unappealling). Andersson, however, seems to have been raised on mainstream American comics fare (much like myself to a great degree) and with that source of inspiration his artistic style is much more appealing. So, I took the opportunity of buying a copy of his collected short horror stories entitled Love Hurts and got that signed. Once I've read the collection, I'm sure I will be talking more about this comics writer/artist... one way or the other.

The second comics seminar was a discussion between artist and cultural personality Carl Johan deGeer and his friend Jan Lööf, who is famous in Sweden both for his comics work and and his illustrated children's books. He's also rather famous for being somewhat of a recluse, so it was a treat indeed to see the man on stage and in fine form. The fact that I more or less by happenstance managed to pass by a table where he was signing a while later, with a very short line at that time, was also a bonus that lead me to buy volume two of his collected comics work.

The last comics seminar of the day, which I visited, was about humour in comics, about the strip format, and other formats for that matter, and how the format affects what the comics writers/artists are doing. Moderated by Tomas Torn from Serieakademin, this was a discussion between Tony Cronstam (creator of Elvis), Jonas Darnell (creator of Herman Hedning) and Lars Mortimer (creator of Hälge), and was very illuminating on many levels. From practical matters like where the strips (or comics) are published (newspapers, comicbooks, etc) to what audiences they attract and how they are allowed to develop, this was a really interesting seminar to be sure.


And that, as the saying goes, was that... Fourteen seminars, eight mini seminars, four signed books (a few others bought) and four days of running around and having a whole heckuva lot of fun.