General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Empowering or exploitive to women? [View all]BlueMTexpat
(15,365 posts)Did the books need some editing? Yes. Had Larsson lived long enough to work with an editor, I think that there could have been a lot of improvement. I understand that there was generally hesitation to edit the books simply because he had died so suddenly and, with the friction between his long-time live-in lover and his semi-estranged family who inherited his estate because he died intestate, there was literally no one to work with.
The original title of the first book was "Men Who Hate Women" and that theme certainly carries through the series even though there are also some very enlightened male characters as well, so yes, I believe that Lisbeth is empowerment embodied. Her talents are also underestimated by the same men who "hate" women.
I also have all three of the films in Swedish (with English subtitles) and thought that for the most part, they did justice to the series. Obviously, there were situations from the books that were elided or ignored altogether in the films, but the gist was there.
For anyone who is interested, I recommend the following article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/oct/04/stieg-larsson-partner-eva-gabrielsson?INTCMP=SRCH