Hanna Johansson is the author of the novel Body Double, which has been translated from Swedish to English by Kira Josefsson. Johansson has also written the novel Antiquity. She is based in Sweden.
Q: What inspired you to write Body Double, and how did you create your characters Naomi and Laura?
A: I was inspired by thriller films from the late ‘90s, and wanted to write something that would leave the reader with a similar feeling afterwards.
The novel is made up of two parallel narratives where one follows a nameless narrator and one follows Naomi and Laura, who meet by accident and then become entwined in each other’s lives.
I approached the creation of Naomi and Laura very much as something aesthetic and superficial – like, “these people would fit in such a thriller, and this is what should happen to them” – rather than trying to think of them as real people, which I would normally do.
Q: The reviews of the book have compared it to the work of Alfred Hitchcock--what do you think of that comparison?
A: I completely understand it! It is a suspense story with elegant women and doppelgängers, like Vertigo, and it plays a lot with movie clichés and references.
Body Double is the name of a Brian De Palma movie – that I hadn’t seen when I wrote the novel, though – and some readers have mentioned David Lynch, whereas I was more influenced by European movies.
Q: Did you know how the novel would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?
A: I went into writing Body Double knowing absolutely nothing, and made lots of changes and rewrote the manuscript several times.
Q: What do you think the novel says about obsession?
A: Obsession has so much to do with fantasy and fictionalization. When you become obsessed – and regardless if it’s something kind of benign, like having a crush on someone, or more serious, like believing in a conspiracy theory – you begin to spend a lot of time creating scenarios and imagining things. Which really is what makes an obsession so pleasurable, despite everything.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I’m working on two different things, both also stories of obsession, you could say: a love story, and a novel about a hypochondriac.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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