Måndagsmöte: Mircea Cărtărescu

Hur man introducerar den som flödar maffigaste språket ngnsin helt sirapsfärgat och fritt i galaxen, d.v.s. Mircea Cărtărescu, det vet jag inte: har ni läst Bokhoran väldigt länge kanske minns ni alla Orbitórutdrag och stadiga kärleksförklaringar staplade dag efter dag. Svallar ännu förälskelsen bokstavshetaste vulkan, yo, kanske t.o.m. än ytterligare efter [se nedan].

Alors, on y va en anglais:

- Is there a genre of literature that you will absolutely not read: if so, which one and why not?

I will absolutely not read bad literature, no matter which genre it will be, from a stupid saga to a stupid haiku.

- What are you reading right now and how do you like it?

Baricco’s ”Novecento“. Nice, but not good enough. Kind of childish, which is at the same time good and not so good. I prefer “Silk” by far. Baricco built his reputation on very few pages. One expects that all that pages be at his best. If I find bad pages even in his best books – the wife’s letter in “Silk”, for exemple – I am tempted to conclude that he is not so good as we were told.

- How does being busy writing a novel or poetry affect the way you read?

While thinking of a new book, everything I read is connected with it. I am an omnivorous reader, I even read logarithm tables and try to read things in languages I never learned. But when I got my mind set on a book, I read like a mad man. Science, history, religion, literary theory, kinky blogs. I read on the people’s lips. I read in the lines of the palm. I read your thoughts too.

- Are there any, as of yet, untranslated Romanian writers you think we should keep our eyes open for?

Yes, hundreds. The problem is that the best of them actually cannot be translated. They live happily under the waves of a fabulous language. If they are taken out of it and moved into another language, they just explode like the strange abyss fish when brought to the surface. (For example Mircea Horia Simionescu, Gabriela Adameşteanu, Simona Popescu, Gheorghe Crăciun, Cristian Popescu, Matei Visniec.)

- Do you read mostly Romanian or translated (or foreign in original language) literature?

Romanian books, original language books, translated books – it makes no difference to me. I do not care which nationality were Dostoyevski, Musil, Joyce, Sadoveanu or Kafka. I do not read literatures, but individual authors, no matter in which language they wrote. I read perfectly in English and French and I understand Italian and Spanish. But as I said, I even try to read books in Swedish sometimes. No matter the language, a book is the all stars show of a mind. It is the only show I’m interested in.

- I have read that you are an avid S/F-reader – which title (or author) is your favorite in this genre, and what do you recommend a S/F-neophyte begins with?

For a S/F neophyte I recommend the greatest S/F novel that has ever been written, the Bible. He or she will find there everything: the mysteries of time, space and consciousness, close encounters of the third kind, flying objects, abductions, artificial insemination and supernatural powers. The universe in a nutshell, your soul at your hand.

- A couple of books that have meant a lot to you, and why.

I found in Kafka’s “Daily notes” the most impressing definitions of the process of writing, in Salinger’s “Franny and Zooey” the most wonderful struggle for the redemption of one’s soul in the whole contemporary literature, and in Pynchon’s “V” the book I have always wished I could have written myself.