"You already know enough. So do I. It is not knowledge we lack. What is missing is the courage to understand what we know and to draw conclusions." (Sven Lindqvist, Exterminate All the Brutes, 1996).
In these, the very first and also the very last, sentences of Exterminate all the Brutes, Sven Lindqvist summarizes the main objective of his narrative: to evoke in his readers the courage to draw the necessary conclusions of European genocide. It is also made clear that this will not happen simply through knowledge, for that knowledge is already available and familiar to the readers. Something else, an emotional response, is necessary.
This paper explores how Lindqvist moves from cognition to emotion in the narrative, and how he addresses guilt and shame in relation to privileged Europeans.
Borrowing Sara Ahmeds concept of “affective economies of fear”, I will analyse the way Lindqvist constructs a counter-economy of emotion as a means to discuss the economy of fear associated with European genocide, and to instil courage in his readers. I will map out this counter-economy by looking at Lindqvist’s images of guilt, empathy, and anger, as well as their provocations.