The wrong track
The wrong track (original title: Villospår ) is the fifth Kurt Wallander novel by the Swedish writer Henning Mankell . In 1995 it was first published in Sweden, in 1999 for the first time in German by Paul Zsolnay Verlag in Vienna and in April 2001 as a paperback by dtv .
content
In the summer of 1994 a young girl burned to death in a rape field in front of Detective Inspector Kurt Wallander. Summoned by a troubled farmer, he wanted to speak to her and revealed himself as a policeman, whereupon the girl poured gasoline over herself and set herself on fire. While Wallander begins his investigation into this incredible suicide, a former justice minister is killed and more murders follow. The perpetrator is a cruel serial killer who an Indian occurs in the mask and all his victims scalped . In addition to the former politician, the dead include a well-known art dealer, a fence and a white-collar criminal. For the investigators, no connection between the murdered is initially recognizable.
Only when Commissioner Wallander takes a closer look at the family of the penultimate victim does he come across the truth, which he refuses to believe until the end: the victim's only fourteen-year-old son killed the people he somehow made for fate blamed his sister and which he offers her as a sacrifice with a scalp. She was completely traumatized after being raped and was admitted to a psychiatric hospital. Only after the case has been resolved does Wallander become aware that he and his daughter Linda are targeted by the murderer and that they only escaped death by accident.
Statement of the novel
The focus of The Wrong Track is particularly on the subjects of forced prostitution and human trafficking . Mankell pays special attention to young girls who are lured to Europe under false promises. Thus, the book also serves as a mouthpiece for Mankell's social criticism, because in the novel the very highest, elitist circles (such as the murdered ex-Justice Minister) are involved in trafficking in women and other criminal machinations.
As is typical for the entire Wallander book series, the reader recognizes the omnipresent latent failure in the end despite the investigation of the crimes. When the case is over, Commissioner Wallander is completely alone and disaffected. He feels a terrible inner emptiness in the face of his realization that one cannot understand today's time and the world. For Wallander, all that remains of the investigation is his pain and anger at human barbarism. Wallander's discomfort is also based on the fact that the perpetrator, who appeared very sympathetic to him at the first encounters, is also a victim or sees himself as the avenger of a victim. It is therefore Swedish society itself that gives birth to such violent criminals. Jan Feddersen also points to this in a contribution to Mankell's Wallander crime novels: "In this respect, his [Mankell] crime novels are impossible to read as otherworldly horror: Behind every cozy door there can be a humiliated person who seeks revenge."
Film adaptations
In 2001 the novel was filmed in Sweden as a TV crime thriller (see The Wrong Track ), the lead role took over, as in earlier Wallander films, Rolf Lassgård , directed by Leif Magnusson. The German version was dubbed by ZDF in 2001 and broadcast as a three-part in December of the same year. The film is Wallander's fifth film adaptation, although the film versions differ from the chronology of the books, and was released on September 16, 2002 as a DVD version including the documentary Die Welten des Henning Mankell .
Another film adaptation of the BBC was first broadcast on November 30, 2008 on BBC One. It is a BBC and ARD production with Kenneth Branagh in the lead role. Kenneth Branagh was involved in the production of this film from the start.
Reviews
- “The elucidation of this case has nothing to do with elucidation in a broader sense - it is full of horror and darkness. Kurt Wallander is right when he sighs: 'So now we have the certainty that we all hoped would be spared us.' ”- Süddeutsche Zeitung
- “Black as a coffin, Mankell staged his Swedish necromancy, in the course of which a finance shark, a retired justice minister and a small fence prove to be unknown figures. Narrative speed and Swedish sleight of hand make The Wrong Track a must. ”- Cosmopolitan
Web links
- Excerpt from the book (PDF)
- Review note on www.perlentaucher.de
- www.wallander-web.de (Kommissar-Wallander-Fan-Homepage) with a summary, interpretation, reviews, reference to film adaptations, radio play adaptations etc.