This essay aims to examine two texts, one autobiography and one essay, by Swedish author Olof Lagercrantz, through the means of stylistical analysis and to investigate the worth of stylistics in regards of trying to capture the style of an author. The main questions are: Which are the distinguishing stylistic features of the two texts? and Is it possible to capture the literary style of Olof Lagercrantz through the methods of stylistic analysis? In aid of trying to answer these questions the methods of Per Lagerholm and Peter Cassirer is being applied. The results points to the autobiographical text being economical in language, dramatic, poetic and personal; the essay being intimate, formal, personal and creating participation. The methods of stylistical analysis is criticized for being a insufficient tool in the analysis, but its benefits are also pointed out.

This thesis aims to examine how the renowned swedish writer and critic Olof Lagercrantz wrote about communist China under Mao Zedong's leadership in the years 1970–1971. Lagercrantz served as editor-in-chef and as cultural director on one of Sweden's major daily newspapers, Dagens Nyheter, between 1951 and 1975. He travelled to China in 1970 as one of the first European reporters to get admission after the cultural revolution. This series of articles about China also changed the image of Lagercrantz, afterwards he was referred to as Maoist. The Swedish daily press referred to him as an "operetta Chinese" and "ching-tjopp chinaman" and the myth that he came back from China to the DN-office wearing a Mao suit, is still in circulation. The paper concerns the problem of trying to understand a culture on its own terms. In the survey, I give a picture of how Lagercrantz wrote about China, and explore some of the contexts of the texts produced. It's easy to judge in hindsight, but my ambition has been to try to find some kind of understanding of, or insight into what was communicated. Making a representation of a country and its people involves many issues and problems and in the paper I examine these through a postcolonial perspective inspired by Edward Said's book Orientalism (1978). Furthermore, I will examine the contexts that may have been important for Lagercrantz's work, and what might have influenced the image Lagercrantz gave of China and what authoritative position he occupies in his articles.

Thesis (doctoral)--Åbo akademi, 1990. / Extra t.p. with thesis statement inserted. Summary in English. Includes bibliographical references (p. 474-494) and index.

This thesis analyses the literature debate in the overlooked Swedish magazine Samtid och Framtid 1944–1949. The magazine was first published at the end of World War II on the initiative of publisher Johan Hansson. After an interesting start, the terms of the debate in the magazine were changed after a power struggle on the editorial level. Thus, the magazine never became the influential arena for literary discussions that it first had potential of becoming. With its initial focus on how to construct a new post-war world, the debates in the magazine, however, provide an interesting material for an investigation of attempts to renegotiate the position of literature in society. This is conducted through a perspective that focuses on the debaters’ use of metaphors, but also their specific experiences of the past and their expectations on the future. Central oppositions between aesthetic and committed ideals are highlighted, but also between individualism and collectivism. It is also demonstrated that the debates successively turned more concrete, not least focusing on the very influential Swedish literary generation of the 1940s.