The Bullerby syndrome – why some Germans have a Swedish obsession

By Xander Brett

Stockholm syndrome is not the only syndrome associated with Sweden. Bullerby syndrome, however, might be more accurately attributed to Germany, it being a label given to the fascination many Germans have with all things Swedish – from the country’s culture and natural landscapes to an idealised vision of Swedish life.

The syndrome takes its name from The Six Bullerby Children, a collection of Astrid Lindgren stories published in the mid-20^th century. They are set in Bullerby, thought to have been inspired by Sevedstorp near the author’s childhood home. Germans fell in love with Lindgren’s depiction of red houses in a rural, uncomplicated paradise – something that, according to Lisa Källström at Södertörn University (who researched the Bullerby syndrome extensively), echoed the pre-existing German concept of Heimat, meaning a sense of belonging. “Sweden was presented as something different from Germany,” she explains, “but many of the values associated with the Swedish idyll weren’t completely foreign to German culture.”

Källström thinks that Germans idealised Sweden not because of a misunderstanding, but as a way of reflecting on their own way of life. “When Germans looked at the imagined Swedish idyll, they were also expressing ideas about childhood, nature, family, community and what a good life should look like,” she says. “In that sense, the German image of Sweden tells us a great deal about German culture.”

A German-registered car parked next to an elk. Photo: Alexander Hall/imagebank.sweden.se

The long-running franchise feeding the syndrome

About half a century after Germans became enamoured with Lindgren’s Bullerby books, a romantic series in a similar mould began airing on German television. Still running more than 20 years later, Inga Lindström (named after the pseudonym of German writer Christiane Sadlo) is a series of happy-ending feature-length episodes set in Swedish surroundings. The characters have Swedish names, and instalments are largely shot in Sweden, but the cast is mostly German, and it is that language they speak. ZDF recently broadcast Inga Lindström: Rezept für die Liebe (Inga Lindström: Recipe for Love) and several episodes are available on its streaming platform.

Inga Lindström is not the only popular German drama shot abroad. Indeed, it is part of ZDF’s Herzkino (Heart Cinema) strand, which also includes stories by Rosamunde Pilcher filmed in England but with dialogue in German. Given its Bullerby connotation, however, Källström thinks that the Swedish setting could give Inga Lindström a special status among similar German television creations. “The films were constructed so that German viewers would recognise a particular idea of Sweden and could associate it with nostalgia and escape from everyday life,” she says.

Inga Lindström may have given Bullerby syndrome momentum, but German fascination with Sweden had not faded in the decades after the Bullerby books arrived. IKEA reached West Germany in the early 1970s, ABBA sold millions of albums, and, in 1976, Silvia Sommerlath (who is half German) married Sweden’s ruling monarch. All the while Schwedenhäuser – red wood houses that resemble (if only vaguely) those in Bullerby – were popping up all over Germany.

Inga Lindström: Rezept für die Liebe (Inga Lindström: Recipe for Love) was recently broadcast on Germany’s ZDF. Photo: ZDF/Sebastian Wiegärtner

An interest not necessarily reciprocated

Of course, if Germans wish to experience the real Sweden, they need only take a trip north. Plenty do, and Germans have recently accounted for the largest number of foreign overnight stays in Sweden. In fact, such is some Germans’ fascination with Swedish wildlife that there are old rumours of visitors stealing elk warning signs to take home as keepsakes. Sellers of souvenir versions, which can be bought legally, have nevertheless reported plenty of German buyers.

Swedes are no strangers to Germany. Judith Mirschberger, director at the Stockholm branch of the Goethe-Institut, an organisation that promotes the study of the German language and culture, says that while German products, cars for instance, seem to enjoy a good reputation in Sweden, she has noticed both fewer Swedes choosing to study German as a foreign language and a decline in knowledge of German literature. “Things have become more international, so people increasingly look beyond neighbouring countries,” she summarises. “Berlin, however, is still considered quite attractive as a tourist destination for Swedes of all ages.”

Mirschberger adds that while the romantic stories that helped generate Bullerby syndrome remain popular in her home country, Nordic noir, although no longer at the height of its popularity, continues to shape the viewing habits of many German crime drama fans. Perhaps Nordic crime can sit comfortably alongside the image of a Swedish utopia. Mirschberger also believes that social media has played a part in sustaining the syndrome, with German influencers sharing positive experiences of travelling to, or living in, Sweden. “We still read Astrid Lindgren’s work to our children and the film adaptations are very popular,” Mirschberger continues. “Lots of people around me grew up learning about Lindgren’s world as children. I’m in my 40s, though, and grew up in western Germany, so there might be differences between generations, as well as between those who grew up in the west and those who grew up in the east.”

A parade during Wismar’s Schwedenfest this year. Photo: Julia Kristin Adler/Highlights Event Management

Harking back to history

Before the Second World War, German was taught in Swedish schools as the main foreign language, the works of Selma Lagerlöf were popular in Germany, and the two nations were bound by close cultural and economic ties (Germany, we should note, is still one of Sweden’s biggest trading partners).

Earlier, during much of the 17th and 18th centuries, the Swedish Empire controlled parts of Germany, including the Hanseatic city of Wismar, which remained under Swedish control until the early 1800s (though it took another 100 years for Sweden to formally renounce its claim).

Today, Wismar is twinned with the Swedish city of Kalmar, and its years of Swedish rule are celebrated every summer through the four-day Schwedenfest, a celebration that reportedly attracted 100,000 visitors in 2026.

One might assume that political and social ideas have always been central to the syndrome. Lisa Källström’s research, however, suggests a more complex picture. She traces the syndrome to nostalgia and the previously mentioned Heimat tradition, showing how Sweden could embody ideas of an emotionally reassuring home. Political and social dimensions are present, but not necessarily as a direct programme behind the phenomenon.

Källström says that even if Germans nowadays do not hold a wildly different view of Sweden, recent events have made a mark, not least Sweden’s relatively relaxed approach to the coronavirus pandemic, which, she says, presented an alternative to the German way of dealing with a crisis, posing questions of trust, freedom and the role of the state.

“Different images of Sweden can exist at the same time,” Källström makes clear. “Sweden can be associated with the older images of Astrid Lindgren and idyllic countryside, but it can also appear in political discussions about migration, integration and security.”

While Judith Mirschberger accepts that Sweden is not all Bullerby, and Germany and Sweden face similar challenges, she thinks that some Germans perceive their country as generally “more complex and exhausting” than Sweden. “It seems that there’s a certain pessimism in German society,” she concludes. “Some Germans might look to Sweden for a simpler way of life. They could be jealous of Swedes spending the summer in a stuga, for example.”

Some Swedes do indeed retreat to a stuga (cottage); others live on a gård (farm). Sörgårdsidyll, however, the concept of a rural idyll, is a topic for another time.