Åke Robert Holmberg (31 May 1907 – 9 September 1991) was a Swedish writer and translator, most famous for his nine children's books about detective

Tam Sventon Tam Sventon ( Swedish: ''Ture Sventon'') is a fictional private detective based in Stockholm, the main character in nine well-known Swedish children's books written by Åke Holmberg between 1948 and 1973. He is characterized by eating semlor, ...

(Swedish: ''Ture Sventon'').

Biography

Holmberg studied at

Stockholm University College Stockholm University (SU) () is a public university, public research university in Stockholm, Sweden, founded as a college in 1878, with university status since 1960. With over 33,000 students at four different faculties: law, humanities, social ...

and graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1934. He then worked for several years at the

Nordic Museum The Nordic Museum () is a museum located on Djurgården, an island in central Stockholm, Sweden, dedicated to the cultural history and ethnography of Sweden from the early modern period (in Swedish history, it is said to begin in 1520) to the ...

in Stockholm, and became a full-time author in 1946. Holmberg wrote exclusively youth books, with one exception: the adult novel ''En frukost i Aquileia'' (A breakfast in Aquileia) from 1967. Åke Holmberg was awarded Svenska Dagbladet Literature Prize in 1948 (together with Stina Aronson, Vilgot Sjöman, Ragnar Bengtsson and Bengt V. Wall). In 1961, he became the recipient of the

Nils Holgersson Plaque The Nils Holgersson Plaque is an award given by Swedish Library Association. It was established in 1950, and named for the book ''The Wonderful Adventures of Nils'' by Selma Lagerlöf. It is an annual award given to the author of the best children' ...

, and in 2007 he posthumously received the award Temmelburken at the Gothenburg Book Fair. In addition to his own books, Holmberg also translated more than 20 books, mainly children's and youth books, from Danish, English and German. Åke Holmberg bequeathed all future copyright payments to a foundation, the Åke and Vera Holmberg's scholarship fund.

References

1907 births 1991 deaths Writers from Stockholm Swedish crime fiction writers Recipients of the Astrid Lindgren Prize Stockholm University alumni {{sweden-writer-stub