Stieg Larsson (born as Karl Stig-Erland Larsson) was a Swedish journalist and writer who passed away in 2004.
As a journalist and editor of the magazine
Expo
, Larsson was active in documenting and exposing Swedish extreme right and racist organisations. When he died at the age of 50, Larsson left three unpublished thrillers and unfinished manuscripts for more. The first three books (
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
,
The Girl Who Played With Fire
and
The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest
) have since been printed as the
Millenium
series. These books are all bestsellers in Sweden and in several other countries, including the United States and Canada.
Witnessed a rape when he was 15, and was helpless to stop it. This event haunted him for the rest of his life. The girl being raped was named Lisbeth, which he later used as the name of the heroine on his Millenium trilogy. Sexual violence against women is also a recurring theme in his work.
Personal quote:
To exact revenge for yourself or your friends is not only a right, it's an absolute duty.
“No, she did not want to go to hospital. Yes, she would like a cup of tea. Only then did she begin to think rationally again.”
“I’m not arguing. I just think that it’s pathetic that creeps always have to have someone else to blame.”
“There is nothing to talk about" she said. "I'm just a freak that's all.”
“You're an entropic chaos factor”
“I don't think I'm the type who falls in love. She was a friend. And we had good sex.”
“Take it all off. I don't intend to fuck somebody in his underwear. And you have to use a condom. I know where I've been, but I don't know where you've been. - Lisbeth Salander”
“Harald seemed to be an invisible but ever-present spirit who affected life in the village by his absence.”
“Bullshit," Salander said again. "Gottfried isn't the only kid who was ever mistreated. That doesn't give him the right to murder women. He made that choice himself. And the same is true of Martin.”
“She had been sharing a house with him for a week, and he had not once flirted with her. He had worked with her, asked her opinion, slapped her on the knuckles figuratively speaking when she was on the wrong track, and acknowledged that she was right when she corrected him. Dammit, he had treated her like a human being.”
“There was a whole army of people who seemed not to have anything better to do than to try to disrupt her life, and , if they were given the opportunity, to correct the way she had chosen to live it.”
“No, I don't believe in God, but I respect the fact that you do. Everyone has to have something to believe in.”
“I spent the first twenty-five years of my life apologizing for people like Harald because we're family. Then I discovered that being related is no guarantee of love and I had a few reasons to defend Harald.”
“Don't get politics mixed up in this. It's all about money and it makes no difference if the Social Democrats or the moderates appoint the ministers”
“An introverted person obviously affected by her past. Lived alone, had no sex life, had difficulty getting close to people. Kept her distance, and when she let loose there was no restraint. She chose a stranger for a lover.”
“It did no good to cry, she had learned that early on. She had also learned that every time she tried to make someone aware of something in her life, the situation just got worse. Consequently it was up to her to solve her problems by herself, using whatever methods she deemed necessary.”
“When other people are grieving, the newspaperman turns efficient.”
“You were difficult enough to catch,” Faste said. Salander gave him a long look, satisfied herself that he was an idiot, and decided that she would not waste too many seconds concerning herself with his existence.”
“That held for a few minutes, until the head of Budget pointed out that SA was not much better than SS.”
“Somehow she managed to survive and dig herself out and—“ “And somehow get back to the farm and swing an axe into Zalachenko’s skull,” Blomkvist finished for him. “She can be a moody bitch.”
“There's always someone willing to believe malicious rumours.”
“Don't call me crazy.I'm a survivor. I do what I have to do to survive.”
“You walk around feeling like a teenager and immortal your whole life, and suddenly there isn't much time left.”
“Don't exaggerate. Just give your natural bitchy selves full rein”
“Repentinamente comprendió que el amor es ese momento en el que el corazón quiere salirse del pecho.”
“No me enfado contigo. Es sólo que me parece patético que los cabrones siempre echen la culpa a los demás.”
“-... Intenta verlo de la siguiente manera: un ser humano es una envoltura de piel que mantiene en su sitio a las células, la sangre y las sustancias químicas. Unos pocos individuos terminan en los libros de historia. Pero la gran mayoría sucumbe y desaparece sin dejar rastro.-Matas mujeres.-Los que matamos por placer, porque yo no soy el único que tiene este pasatiempo, vivimos una vida completa.”
“Había todo un ejército de gente que parecía no tener nada mejor que hacer que pretender gobernar su vida y, si se le diese la oportunidad, corregir la manera en que había elegido vivirla.”
“I have pain in my hip and long walks are a thing of the past but I'm neither morbid nor senile. I'm not obsessed by death, but I'm at an age when I have to accept that my time is about up. You want to close the accounts and take care of unfinished business.”
“The Salander investigation is fake. Bjorck's original doesn't match Blomkvist's version. Classify Top Secret.”
“To rest. Not to wakeup. Forgive me, Mimmi.”
“Then she made up her mind.It was absurd to pretend that he did not exist.It no longer hurt her to see him. She opened the door wide and let him into her life again.”
“Obviously Wennerström himself was by no means poor. She calculated the real assets to be worth between 90 and 100 billion kronor, which was nothing to sneez eat.”
“Hey, you fucking creep, in this shithole! I've got a monopoly on that one.”
“Only a woman who had killed a man in battle was allowed to give up her virginity.”
“Salander in love. What a fucking joke.”
“Plague might be a social incompetent, but he was unquestionably a genius.”
“Isn't it fascinating that Nazis always manage to adopt the word freedom?”
“The job of the financial journalist was to examine the sharks who created interest crises and speculated away the savings of small investors, to scrutinize company boards with the same merciless zeal.”
“I'm aware of what you've done for me, and I'm not ungrateful. I appreciate that you actually showed yourself to be greater than your prejudices and have given me a chance here. But I don't want you for my lover, and you're not my father.”
“He's pulling the load of an ox and walking on eggshells.”
“Martin was dafter than a syphilitic polecat - where do I get these metaphors from?”
“What irritated her most was that they kept brushing off her arguments with patronizing smiles, making her feel like a teenager being quizzed on her homework. Without actually uttering a single inappropriate word, they displayed towards her an attitude that was so antediluvian it was almost comical. You shouldn't worry your pretty head over complex matters, little girl.”
“[Her] greatest fear, which was so huge and so black that it was of phobic proportions, was that people would laugh at her feelings.”
“Salander leaned back against the pillow and followed the conversation with a smile. She wondered why she, who had such difficulty talking about herself with people of flesh and blood, could blithely reveal her most intimate secrets to a bunch of completely unknown freaks on the Internet.”
“She had put on make-up in a colour scheme that indicated she might be colourblind.”
“Take "no" as an encouragement to redouble his efforts, so it was easier to say "yes" right away.”
“It was troubling that one of the few people she trusted was a man she spent so much time avoiding”
“And yet he kept sticking to her life like gum on the sole of her shoe, either on the Net or in real life. On the Net was OK. There he was no more than electrons and words. In real life, standing on her doorstep, he was still fucking attractive. And he knew her secrets just as she knew all of his.”
“I don't know if I want a steady relationship, but I'm terrified of losing you.”
“Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.”