The word "Quisling" has been used as a synonym for "traitor" or "treachery." The original Vidkun Quisling (1887-1945) was a gifted Norwegian army officer who sided with the Nazis on the first day of Norway's entry into the Second World War. Dahl's biography is the first to use a complete range of source material from Nordic, German, Italian and Russian archives, and family archives now in the United States tracing Quisling's career through to the drama of his trial and execution for high treason in 1945.

In the course of the nineteenth century the advent of printed pamphlets, with their news and advertisements, gave every town along Norway's long coast - populated by farmers, fishermen, clergy, businessmen and shopkeepers - a common language and a public arena for news and ideas. In Norway alone, the number of titles grew from a handful to a hundred in the course of the century. From 1900 to 1940 the number of papers swelled to two hundred and seventy - the number that remains today. The press system created a substantial structure, which would prove vital for many of the later media outlets that developed over the twentieth century with the breakthrough of new technologies - cinema industry, radio broadcasting, television and the internet. Newspapers generated the money and power for the development of these media, thus shaping such media and determining, or at least influencing, their perception and reception in Norwegian society. The press in Norway is therefore at the core of the modern media system and its rich history.

In the course of the nineteenth century the advent of printed pamphlets, with their news and advertisements, gave every town along Norway's long coast - populated by farmers, fishermen, clergy, businessmen and shopkeepers - a common language and a public arena for news and ideas. In Norway alone, the number of titles grew from a handful to a hundred in the course of the century. From 1900 to 1940 the number of papers swelled to two hundred and seventy - the number that remains today. The press system created a substantial structure, which would prove vital for many of the later media outlets that developed over the twentieth century with the breakthrough of new technologies - cinema industry, radio broadcasting, television and the internet. Newspapers generated the money and power for the development of these media, thus shaping such media and determining, or at least influencing, their perception and reception in Norwegian society. The press in Norway is therefore at the core of the modern media system and its rich history.

The word 'Quisling' is used all over the world as a synonym for 'traitor' or 'treachery'. The original Vidkun Quisling (1887-1945) was a gifted Norwegian army officer who earned notoriety when he sided with the Nazis on the first day of Norway's entry into the Second World War. Quisling's coup d'etat in Oslo on 9 April 1940 was immediately denounced as an act of arch-treason, and even Churchill spoke of 'the vile race of Quislings'. Hans Fredrik Dahl's 1999 biography makes use of a complete range of source material from Nordic, German, Italian and Russian archives, and of family archives now in the USA. He traces Quisling's ultimately futile career from his earlier internationalist career as a diplomat and businessman to the drama of his trial and execution for high treason in 1945.