This is a story about a boy who dreams of becoming an outstanding detective. He wants to investigate crimes, like the famous Sherlock Holmes, because the guy loves to read detective novels and watch movies about the adventures of the legendary detectives! But in a small Swedish town where the main character of the work lives, nothing like this happens. Therefore, baby Calle with his friends while away the time, inventing fun games full of mysteries. But once everything changed, and the boy’s talent came in handy.
Creating a detective trilogy
The world famous children's writer A. Lindgren, the creator of such fairy-tale characters as Carlson, Peppy Longstocking and Myo, turned to the detective genre in her trilogy about the little detective. So, in 1946 the first book from the series “The Adventures of Calle Blumqvist” was published. The story and its main character immediately fell in love with readers, and they were looking forward to the continuation of the story. The writer for this work received the first prize in the literary competition.
In 1951, the continuation of the adventures of baby Calle. The completion of the trilogy is published in 1953. Later, Astrid Lindgren said that, creating the story of the adventures of the little detective, she wanted to distract the children's audience from thrillers that advocate violence.
Detective Wunderkind
The protagonist of the work, a boy named Kalle, has many typical skills characteristic of the characters of the detective genre. He loves puzzles and puzzles, pays attention to insignificant details that elude the gaze of other people.
The usual game of finding and studying evidence in the discovery of invented incidents once turns into an investigation of this crime. Throughout the activities described in the three books, Kalle Blumkvist, as well as his loyal friends Anders and Eva-Lotta, help the police in solving crimes. They will have to face not only petty thefts, but also help investigate murders, abductions and robberies.
Most of the stories described in the trilogy obey the general principle of the detective genre. Kalle Blumqvist is a detective whose suspicious personalities, motive, details or evidence missed by the police do not escape the close attention. He is ready to go forward to learn as much as possible about the person or motive for solving the crime. This is not always safe, so it adds intrigue and keeps you energized.
Specific traits
Great features of the trilogy are not only sparkling humor that accompanies the reader throughout the story, but also a colorful description of the scene. Kalle Blumqvist and his friends live in a small town built along the river and surrounded by beautiful nature. A vivid description gives the reader the opportunity to mentally visit the Swedish suburbs. Here you can see small neat red houses with a white border and large windows wide open, decorated with snow-white curtains, an old abandoned castle on a hilltop and flowering chestnut trees. Everything is very peaceful and calm, which is a wonderful contrasting background for the investigation of crimes.
Film adaptation
The small detective Kalle Blumqvist is well acquainted with our viewers thanks to the film “The Adventures of the Kalle Investigator”, filmed in 1976 at the Lithuanian Film Studio by director Arunas Zhebrunas.
Although the film takes place in a big city, the viewer meets his beloved book hero for his usual pastime. As described in the story, he and his friends are in a confrontation with another group of guys. And even if this is only a game, its name is quite historical and serious - “the war of the Scarlet and White Rose”. As befits the rival orders of chivalry, their members speak a secret language, hide treasures from each other, which can be found by solving many puzzles and overcoming a lot of difficulties, including traps, captivity and ingenious traps.
Carefree games come to an end when Einar, the uncle of Eva-Lotta, appears in the city. The attentive Kalle Blumqvist draws attention to the suspicious behavior of a newcomer, and it also turns out that strange strange people are hunting him. At the same time, newspapers are trumpeting the robbery of a banker, the police are investigating, but so far to no avail. All this cannot be a coincidence, and Kale begins an investigation. He is helped by friends, and later by a team of rivals in the game opposition “Scarlet Rose”.
Interesting Facts
Like any other well-known work, the book and screen stories about Calle Blumquist have several interesting facts:
- In the English version of the trilogy of books by Astrid Lindgren, the little detective's name is Bill Bergson.
- In the Soviet film, the age of the protagonist is almost half less than in the book.
- The Soviet Union was the second country after Sweden in the number of adaptations of the works of A. Lindgren, preserving the original text and events. And, of course, the film “The Adventures of Kalle Detective” is a vivid confirmation of this.