Son of Svea

This novel is a kind of non-epic family non-saga that describes the life of Ragnar Johansson, born of simple, poor parents at the beginning of modern Sweden, when the state was beginning to design the "people's home." Ragnar is a rigid believer in the wisdom of state officials and of rules in general. This makes him a not very pleasant husband and father, and he is perpetually cranky about the slightest violation of what he thinks are proper norms. As he ages, the social welfare state begins to fray just as social norms loosen. His story is both a portrait of stifled conformism and lack of imagination and a history of sorts of the rise and unraveling of the Swedish folkhemmet. returnreturnAs an American, this novel is a bit of a puzzle. I would love to have some of the generous vision of the Swedish experiment in my life. In Ragnar's case, it appears to be stifling and feeds a sense of angry resistance to opening his mind. As a Minnesotan, I recognize some of the small minded conformity and adherence to rules that he embraces, but I found myself arguing with the story throughout that social welfare need not be tied to small-minded stiffness. returnreturnPerhaps, though, that's not what the author is saying; instead, by telling the story of one man and his family, we see their experience of a dramatic century for Swedish culture, from a highly-unequal and largely parochial society to an experiment in planning that produced much happier results than most such experiments, to a contemporary multicultural society that is far more European than parochial, leaving stick-in-the-mud Ragnar's head spinning. returnreturnThe translation of this dryly comic novel by Sarah Death is very good.