| Abstract: | In Norway, one of the best examples for examining cultural narratives of murder is what is known as the Lensmannsmordersaken, i.e., ‘the case of the county police officers murder’. After summarising the key events of this sensational 1926 case, this article will consider its presentation in the Norwegian press, the impact of contemporary debates around the death penalty, the influence of scientific understandings of criminality, and the case's subsequent reimagining in literature and film. This article shows how inter-war criminalistic fantasies reflected a broad variety of fears, notably those related to ethnic otherness and anxieties related to Norway's then recent achievement of full political independence. A literary version of the case from the 1930s—one of Norway's first ‘true-crime’ novels—is also considered, as is a post-war feature film based on the murder that was banned (for privacy reasons) in 1952 and not released again until 2007. |
