Sister Cities Write Back
Eds. Jaime Calder and Sarah Dodson
From Toronto
An interview between David Bezmozgis, a Toronto writer, and Samara
Walbohm and Mika Bareket of Type Books, a new independent bookstore
that opened this spring in downtown Toronto.
The interview was conducted at Type Books. Oct. 27, 2006.
DB: What are your top five bestsellers?
TB: The Emperor’s Children by Claire Messud
Blind Willow by Haruki Murakami
The Ladies of Grace Adieu by Susanna Clarke
I feel I should mention some Canadian books.
DB: You don’t have to.
TB: Well, okay.
The Dangerous Book for Boys edited by Conn Iggulden & Hal
Iggulden
The Sisters Grimm by Michael Buckley and Peter Ferguson
DB: How’s business?
TB: Business is great.
DB: How many sister cities do you think Chicago has?
TB: 5? 4?
DB: No.
TB: What’s the right answer?
DB: 26.
DB: Do you think I’m the right person to represent Toronto writers?
TB: Absolutely.
DB: Are you only saying that because I’m here?
TB: No. Likely you, among others.
DB: If not me, who else?
TB: Michael Redhill. Do you want to know why?
DB: Yes.
TB: He’s very articulate and passionate.
DB: Of hockey, reading, birdwatching and shoe shopping, where do you
think reading ranks for Torontonians?
TB: Hockey is in decline.
DB: You think so?
TB: Yes. But people like reading about hockey.
DB: That’s popular?
TB: Yes. So is reading about birdwatching. People like a picture of
a bird on the cover.
DB: Thank you for your time.
[David Bezmozgis is the author of Natasha and Other Stories. His work
has appeared in American and Canadian publications such as Harper's,
The New Yorker, Salon, The Walrus, and Zoetrope. He lives in
Toronto.]
From Lucerne: Cheese-fondue or Rock-city?
Lucerne, to say the least, may not be the largest city in the world - but it’s a great little town and has far more to offer than a lake, mountains and swiss cheese-fondue. Lucerne enjoys a very active and creative culture-scene; compared with the number of inhabitants, the number of theatres, galleries, clubs is high, and a lot of events and festival in various fields and disciplines (literature, comics, rock-music, classical music and so forth) attract a wide audience from all over the world. Last but not least, calm and peaceful Lucerne is nowadays considered Switzerland’s noisiest “rock city”. This said, I have absolutely nothing against the mountains. I love them. And all the cultural excitement shouldn’t keep you, should you visit our little big town one day, from eating a tasty cheese fondue in one of the kitchy tourist-restaurants in the old town.”
-Chris Glasser
5. Barfood Poetry
From Lucerne
Barfood Poetry is the first and - until now - only monthly spoken-word-event in Switzerland and exists since September 2001. The range of the performed poetry is broad: from Lautpoesie to sound- and slam-poetry, sometimes combined with video, film or dj-music. Most of the important performers of Switzerland, Germany and Austria have performed at Barfood Poetry, sometimes there are guests from England, USA or South Africa. Twice a year there happens the traditional Poetry Slam which connects Lucerne with Chicago, where the “inventor” of Slam, Marc Smith, still hosts the Green Mill Poetry Slam.
Barfood Poetry takes place in the charming Théâtre La Fourmi and always goes along with a dinner before the event.
www.barfoodpoetry.ch
From Hamburg
Siegfried Lenz: The German Lesson
There was widespread consensus among post-war German authors that following
the collapse of the Third Reich they had a moral obligation to help pay off
the enormous debt with which the Germans together with their honoured Führer
had burdened themselves, and at the same time to take preventative action
against any danger of a reoccurrence. The lesson in being German which
Siegfried Lenz teaches his readers in his novel of 1968 is very much part of
this kind of preventative work of enlightenment: the spirit of subordination
and the overzealous devotion to duty displayed by the civil servant Jepsen,
the “most northerly police officer in Germany” during the Nazi era, are
exposed as dangerous secondary virtues.
When Jepsen’s childhood friend Nansen, a painter disliked by the Nazi big-
wigs in Berlin, is told he has been debarred from his profession, he cannot
count on Jepsen turning a blind eye or standing by him in any other way
against the injustice which threatens him, even though he once saved
Jepsen’s life. Jepsen doggedly does ‘his duty’ - with such eagerness that he
doesn’t notice how he is unintentionally becoming personally more and more
identified with his task. He considers the professional debarment perfectly
reasonable: in any case, Nansen only paints morbid stuff, “the green faces,
the Mongol eyes, these deformed bodies … ” The more fanatically he pursues
Nansen (whom Lenz based on the expressionist painter Emil Nolde), the more
Jepsen’s son feels compelled to keep Nansen’s works of art safe - so he is
forced to steal them.
According to the story itself, the novel The German Lesson grew out of an
essay with the terribly clever title “The joys of duty” which Siggi was
lumbered with by his teacher in the juvenile correction centre. After 1945
his father Jens Ole was interned briefly, and then reinstated to his
previous office without a problem.
*Text by Gerhardt Csejka *
*Erschienen bei Hoffmann & Campe, 1968 *
From
“Anyone who tells you a greater symphony exists than the breath in your body is lying.” The Attack, Yasmina Khadra (Random House)
“…if I can offer you one piece of advice in your dealings with the unfairer sex - honesty, honesty, honesty, honesty! Avoid it at all costs! Lie through your teeth at every turn and you’ll get away with it. When you finally get caught, pretend that you’re mad and develop a drinking problem.” Spud, John van der Ruit (Penguin)
From Birmingham
“Writers never feel comfortable having labels attached to them, however accurate they are.” Jonathan Coe.
From Mexico City
translated by Paul Grens
“Leer es un oficio de ociosos y de desocupados” (Juan Domingo Argüelles dixit)
“Reading is a profession of the idle and the unemployed.” –Juan Domingo Argüelles
***
“(…) la inmensa mayoría de los mexicanos son extranjeros indocumentados en la república de los libros” (González, J., Chávez, M. 1996:31)
“…the vast majority of Mexicans are undocumented aliens in the republic of books.” (Gonzalez, J., Chavez, m. 1996:31)
From Prague
Each day I wind my way down the thousand year old cobble stone roads over the unyielding bridges with towering statues of Christ and along the buildings of blue, yellow, pink and cream—all Rococo, Art Nouveau and Gothic—shuffled together seamlessly like a deck of cards, but with a smooth curve that makes you feel just a bit warmer in the six month winter that is Prague. After the domed church with the spire that pokes clear through the clouds and into the ass of god, I see my red sign hanging above the door, jutting out into the street, fluttering back and forth like a child being pushed on a swing. I unlock the door, turn on the lights, brew coffee, check my email and wait for my first “dobry den” of the day.
Anagram Bookshop. It’s hard to say what everyone is reading. It changes all the time from, “Who is a good Czech author to read? Kafka? Kundera? Karl Capek?” to “Do you have the new Mark Z. Danielewski?” But over the years the conversation is the same. English speakers surprised to meet other English speakers, rampant with excitement if they come from the same city. What do they do here?—they all teach English. And they write. And that’s why they are here, why they are really here—to write. So between the literary theory section and the books of photography, between the watchful eyes of Barthes and Walker Evans, these students cum writers cum teachers enlist one another to join writers groups, start a new pop-culture magazine and most often to meet for Plzen at a favorite pub. And some of the time Anagram has the opportunity to support these writers, to distribute their magazines and newsletters, and sometimes even their books.
From Amman
A list of the top five best-selling books in the area:
1. Dhe’b al-Khatea’ah (The Wolf of Iniquity)\Abdullah Radwan, Poetry.
2. The Davenchi Code\Dani Brown, Novel.
3. Amaret Yaccoubyan (The Yaccoubyan Building)\Ala’ al-Alousi, Novel.
4. The Utilization in the novels of Ghalib Halasah\Dr. Mohammed al-Qawasmeh, criticism.
5. An Anthology of Jordanian Modern Verse\Translated by Odeh al-Qudah.
From Athens
According to the Book Section of one of Athens’ leading newspapers,
Kathimerini, among some of the best sellers listed this past Sunday are*:
“What is Equality” by Ronald Dworkin
“The Paper House: A Novel” by Carlos Maria Dominquez
“The White Castle” by Orhan Pamuk
“A Tomb for Boris Davidovich” by Danilo Kis
“Istanbul: Memories and the City” by Orhan Pamuk
“My Name is Red” by Orhan Pamuk
From Osaka, Japan
Kinokuniya Umeda main store
Hardcover:
1) “Yappari abunai IH Choriki - Denjiha no higai wo dai ni no asbestos ni suruna”
(The Dangers of IH (induction heating) Cooking-ware - Electromagnetic Waves Could be the Next Asbestos)
By: Shunsuke Funase
2) “Kagami no hosoku - Jinsei no donna mondai mo kaiketsu suru maho no ruru”
(The Mirror Principle - The Magic Solution to All your Problems in Life)
By: Yoshinori Noda
3) “10 metoru saki no 100 man-en - Me kara uroko no uriage genkai toppaho”
(1,000,000 yen Only 10 Meters Away - Shockingly Effective Ways to Raise Sales)
By: Jun Sunada
4) “Yume ni kakeru - Pachinko gyokai shinjidai he no yokan”
(Building on a Dream - A New Age in the Pachinko Industry)
By: I & M Tamaya School/ Toshio Tamaya
5) “Oyako no aida no torikata - Kodomo no kokoro no sakebi ni kotaeru”
(How to Interact with your Children - Listening to your Children’s Silent Pleas)
By: Teiichi Yamada
From Petach-Tiva, Israel
Based on municipal libraries’ database, the following books are the most popular requested books for 2006:
1. Adults category:
* “100 winters / by Michal Shalev”. It tells about a period of 100 years - beginning in a plantation in Poland, and ends in Tel Aviv, (Israeli Best seller young Author)
* “The Heiress”/ by Ram Oren, writes mostly detective fictions and nearly all his books are bestsellers, some even have been adapted to successful movies.
* “The Kite Runner”/ by Dr. Khaled Hosseini
* “The DaVinci Code”/ By Dan Brown
From Hamburg
In Hamburg there is the “Literaturhaus” (House of Literature), which
organize and present events involving literature.
02.11.2006
schischischo - literatur
entertainment de luxe
05.11.2006
gemischtes doppel
06.11.2006
sta*-club: leonie swann
07.11.2006 „seiteneinsteiger” bei „spaß am lesen”
07.11.2006
alona kimhi
11.11.2006
ein samuel-beckett-abend
14.11.2006
spaß mit büchern: hamburger
märchentage
14.11.2006
morden im norden
15.11.2006 gedankenflieger - philosophieren
mit kindern - AUSVERKAUFT!!!
21.11.2006
ein f.-scott-fitzgerald-abend
22.11.2006
richard powers
23.11.2006 philosophisches café: peter
sloterdijk - AUSVERKAUFT!!!
27.11.2006
förderpreise der kulturbehörde
28.11.2006
in erinnerung an oskar pastior
30.11.2006
irgendwie komisch V: hans zippert
From Amman
An event involving literature:
In a remarkable celebration held under the patronage of H.E. The Mayor of Amman, with the presence of the Jordanian minister of culture, the Spanish writer Paplo Garcia, the Syrian writer Dr. Nidhal al-Saleh and the Jordanian critic Dr. Rifkah Doudean, GAM honored the Jordanian novelist Sameerha Khrais, the winner of Abou al-Quasim al-Shabbi’s Award for her novel “Dafatter al-Toufan” which has been translated into Spanish.
The celebration was run by the Jordanian critic Abdullah Radwan who welcome the guests who came to honor and congratulate the Jordanian novelist for her creative literary achievement by which, as Radwan says, Khrais has exceeded the limits of locality towards universality.
From Birmingham
Birmingham Book Festival 4-13 October 2006
The book launch of Salt and Honey, debut novel of Zambian born, local author, Candi Miller was part of Birmingham’s book festival. The launch kicked off with background African music and complimentary Salt & Honey cocktails. Members of the public were treated to the fascinating story Candi Miller’s thrilling research expedition through the Kalahari, which involved being caught up in one of the largest veld fires ever in that region as well as being charged by a bull elephant. Candi also read from the novel, parts of which are written in Jo/’hoansi and we were given a short lesson in the famous ‘click language’ of The San (Bushmen), and in particular the Jo/’hoansi tribe that Miller visited as part of her research for the novel. An incredible language to listen to but whose sounds are almost impossible to reproduce.