{"id":2449,"date":"2012-09-27T06:10:01","date_gmt":"2012-09-27T10:10:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/?p=2449"},"modified":"2012-09-27T13:09:10","modified_gmt":"2012-09-27T17:09:10","slug":"lisbeth-salander-the-underdog-girl-with-the-dragon-tattoo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/2012\/09\/27\/lisbeth-salander-the-underdog-girl-with-the-dragon-tattoo\/","title":{"rendered":"Lisbeth Salander: The Underdog Girl with the Dragon Tattoo"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>By Scott T. Allison and George R. Goethals<\/strong><\/p>\n

One of the most powerful underdog stories in recent fiction is that of Lisbeth Salander, the main character in Stieg Larsson\u2019s best-selling Millennium Series<\/em> trilogy.\u00a0 In several ways, Salander defies the classic hero prototype.\u00a0 She is a female hero in a world dominated by male heroes, and she is described as small, young, and anorexic looking \u2013 hardly the look of a hero.\u00a0 And as with Harry Potter, another slightly built fictional hero, people underestimate Salander and pay the dearest of consequences for their misjudgment.<\/p>\n

The author, Stieg Larsson, was himself an underdog.\u00a0 Larsson worked as a little-known journalist and photographer in Stockholm, Sweden.\u00a0 A political activist, Larsson spent years writing the Millennium Series<\/em> at home at night after work, with no one knowing about his pet project until 2004 when he finally sought a publisher.\u00a0 Tragically, just before the novels were published, Larsson died of a heart attack at the age of 50.\u00a0 He never lived to witness the remarkable success of his trilogy, which has sold more than 70 million copies worldwide and has spawned a highly successful movie franchise.<\/p>\n

The lead character of Lisbeth Salander is Larsson\u2019s crowning achievement as an author.\u00a0 Few fictional characters carry more gripping emotional power. \u00a0\"\"<\/a>As a child, Salander witnesses her father, named Zala, brutalize and cripple her mother.\u00a0 Because Zala is important to Sweden\u2019s central intelligence agency (SAPO), he is shielded from prosecution.\u00a0 One day, after witnessing Zala savagely attack her mother once again, Salander dowses him in gasoline and sets him afire, causing massive lifetime scarring over most of his body.<\/p>\n

To protect Zala, unscrupulous elements within SAPO arrange for Salander to be judged incompetent, institutionalized, and abused by an evil psychiatrist named Teleborian.\u00a0 Upon reaching adulthood, Salander is released from the hospital but is required to report to a guardian of the state, who is a friend of Zala\u2019s.\u00a0 The guardian eventually rapes Salander in a most brutal manner.\u00a0 He is yet another man who has underestimated her.\u00a0 \u00a0Recognizing that police officials will not bring her rapist to justice, she exacts revenge by raping him herself and carving a full-body tattoo on him that reads, \u201cI AM A SADISTIC PIG, A PERVERT, AND A RAPIST\u201d.<\/p>\n

For some fans of the Millennium Series<\/em>, Salander\u2019s violent vengeance on Zala and on her guardian precludes her from attaining the status of hero.\u00a0 For others, Salander\u2019s actions are heroic responses to a society that repeatedly abuses her (and other women) with impunity.\u00a0 We\u2019ll leave it to you to make the call.<\/p>\n

Later in the trilogy there are other formidable men who also make the mistake of harming Salander and then underestimating her ability to inflict far greater harm on them.\u00a0 These individuals include Zala, Teleborian, and others.\u00a0 \"\"<\/a>Salander\u2019s aggression toward men is always in self-defense and arises from the fact that SAPO has doctors and law-enforcement in their back pocket.\u00a0 In the end, Salander finds a way to out-wit SAPO and bring the responsible parties to justice.\u00a0 And this is another key to Salander\u2019s heroism:\u00a0 She is extraordinarily intelligent and uses her cunning and her computer skills to stay one move ahead of her adversaries.<\/p>\n

Lisbeth Salander is the ultimate underdog.\u00a0 Her penchant for prevailing over men who have power over her, and who abuse that power, makes for a riveting story.\u00a0 Although author Stieg Larsson is no longer with us, he has left a rich legacy in his writings of an unforgettable character whom you don\u2019t ever want to cross in Lisbeth Salander.<\/p>\n

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – –<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Scott T. Allison and George R. Goethals One of the most powerful underdog stories in recent fiction is that of Lisbeth Salander, the main character in Stieg Larsson\u2019s best-selling Millennium Series trilogy.\u00a0 In several ways, Salander defies the classic hero prototype.\u00a0 She is a female hero in a world dominated by male heroes, and … Continue reading Lisbeth Salander: The Underdog Girl with the Dragon Tattoo<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1182,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1159],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fictional-heroes"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/phawtM-Dv","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2449\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/heroes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}