Murder in the fall
The story Mord im Herbst (original title: Handen ) by the Swedish writer Henning Mankell is the eleventh volume in Wallander's twelve-volume series. It was first published in 2004 in the Netherlands and only in 2013 in Sweden. The German translation was also published in 2013.
background
The story, which Mankell wrote under the working title Handelse om Hösten (Eng. Incident in autumn ), first appeared in the Netherlands after Mankell had been asked to contribute a work for a "month of exciting books" organized by the Dutch book trade. It was not until 2012 that the author agreed to the re-publication in Sweden (under the title Handen , dt. Die Hand ) and in the German-speaking area, when the BBC film adaptation with Kenneth Branagh "convinced him of the quality of the 'given away' story."
The German edition is accompanied by a longer afterword by the author, in which Mankell also reflects on the genesis of the character Wallander in general and mentions, among other things, that he was guided by his own when he was born in 1948.
content
The action takes place in 2002: Commissioner Kurt Wallander initially lives in a problematic shared apartment with his daughter and professional colleague Linda. His colleague Martinsson recommends him a property in Löderup, close to the farm where Wallander's father lived. Soon after, Wallander finds a skeleton hand sticking out of the ground in the orchard of this lonely farm. The hand, as it soon turns out, belonged to a woman's corpse that was buried there decades ago; Another skeleton find soon follows, and Wallander's investigations focus on the former residents of the farm, which turns out to be the scene of a family tragedy.
criticism
The Süddeutsche Zeitung compared the film with its original and noted:
“However, some meat was added to the film where the original literally only offers bones. The novella-like brevity and the material asceticism may be due to the occasion and the associated principle of the least effort, but one could also see a stylistic experiment in trying to reduce a crime story to the most necessary elements. "
filming
- An Event in Autumn (2012)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Kristina Maidt-Zinke: A Wallander case submitted later . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , November 27, 2013, p. 14