UK Only Article:
standard article
Issue:
Northern lights
Fly Title:
Creativity
Rubric:
One of the world’s blandest regions has become one of its most creative
Main image:
Foraging for fame
Foraging for fame
TWENTY YEARS AGO the Nordic region was a cultural backwater. Even the biggest cities were dead after 8pm. The restaurants offered meatballs or pale versions of Italian or French favourites. The region did come up with a few cultural icons such as Ingmar Bergman and Abba, and managed to produce world-class architects and designers even at the height of post-war brutalism. But the few successes served only to emphasise the general dullness.
The backwater has now turned into an entrepot. Stockholm relishes its reputation as one of the liveliest cities in Europe (and infuriates its neighbours by billing itself as “the capital of Scandinavia”). Scandinavian crime novels have become a genre in their own right. Danish television shows such as “The Killing” and “Borgen” are syndicated across the ...
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