Traditional costume

Photo: Peter Westrup/www.imagebank.sweden.se

Swedes are very proud of the fact that theirs is the most modern country in the world. In fact the public TV broadcasting company SVT made a series of programmes with the same title, in which famous Swedish opinion formers analysed what made Swedes “Swedish”. The jury is still out on this question.

That Sweden punches way above its weight, historically and in modern times, in terms of the impact of its culture around the globe is without doubt. Take Björn Borg’s tennis game: stoical, rock solid, with a single-minded attitude and never-say-die tilt. Perhaps descriptive of Swedes as people. But instead of analysing Swedes perhaps we should just enjoy and celebrate the sheer showbiz of ABBA, the functionality and aesthetic of Swedish design, the peace prize of dynamite inventor Alfred Nobel and the Swedish folklore-inspired works of Astrid Lindgren. And much, much more.

As Ingemar Stenmark, man-of-few-words skiing legend, replied to a sports commentator’s criticism of one of his performances: “Try it yourself”. So why don’t you try Sweden?