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The Pyramid is a good read
Book Review by Derryll White
‘The Pyramid’ by Henning Mankell (1999)
It is a pleasure to come to Ystad, Sweden, and check this volume out of the public library, the Ystad Bibliotek. The city of Ystad is proud of its author, Henning Mankell. Those citizens I have talked to tell me that the dialogue on democracy in today’s Swedish state is indeed necessary. Swedes are proud of the support infrastructure and welfare state they have built, and freely question the powers of the business class that appears to be eroding the people’s legacy. This is what Mankell focuses on. Ask any resident about the closure of public post offices and be prepared to get an earful of personal tirades.
For me Henning Mankell has been a strong enough writer that his series of Inspector Kurt Wallender stories spurred me to come to Sweden. I wanted to see for myself the milieu and actual geeography from which he crafted his stories. What I have found so far is a quiet town, expensive by Canadian standards. A self-contained one room apartment, if you can locate one, will cost at least Skr 4000 a week (around $620 Canadian). I came quickly to understand why Mankell says over and over that policemen are not paid enough.
But what about the stories in this volume? They serve to fill in the foreground of Kurt Wallender, the time before the character makes his public debut in the novel ‘Faceless Killers.’ Fans of the Kurt Wallender series, or first-time readers, should really read ‘The Pyramid’ first to get a sense of what Inspector Wallender rose from, who Mona was and how the relationship Kurt has with his father was formed. These items continue throughout the series of novels.
Being in Ystad I begin to understand some of the small things that Mankell includes in the stories. The fact that the encyclopedia salesman in ‘Wallander’s First Case’ rode a bicycle never made sense to me, living in Cranbrook. Here in Sweden I see that many, many people ride bikes for everyday transportation.
I appreciate the fact that Mankell sees it as his duty to document the Swedish state. In this volume he asks questions about drug addiction and about why Sweden is changing. He sees personal weakness and avarice as part of the problem, but he also sees something more – a shifting away from fundamental Swedish values.
‘The Pyramid’ is a good read. It catches many of the fundamentals of small town Swedish life. It also reveals the huge angst that Inspector Kurt Wallender harbours – about his life, his family, his uncompromising father and his changing Swedish state. I recommend this volume as an excellent beginning to the Kurt Wallender series. They are all available in translation at Lotus Books in Cranbrook.
