Actor, playwright and writer Eriks Wilson’s novel “Me & Mo” has been published / Article / LSM.lv

The first novel of the actor, director, playwright and writer Eriks Wilson about the life of theater “Me & Mo” has started to reach readers.

Although the actor and director Erik Wilson is no stranger to writing – he is the author of several plays and dramas, holding the first novel written in his hands is, of course, a special event in life.

Already studying at the theater faculty, the most uninteresting lectures were shortened by writing rhymes, later the writing nickname continued in the theater, in moments when there was an unfulfilled or lack of satisfaction, but master’s studies at the University of Liepaja were completed much later – at the age of fifty-eight.

The editor Gundega Blumberga, who met during her master’s degree, has encouraged her to focus on the topic of theater life, but the work has not come in one breath, but has taken three years.

“At first it seemed completely hopeless! But Eric is amazingly persistent, and so far he has come to himself. He writes on horseback, I would even say jestri, he has a very rich vocabulary, and I like the topic the most, because in Latvian literature about theater, about theater people, about those who make theater, who is in the theater before the curtain opens and when it closes, and no one has written about the actors and directors as people! ” notes Gundega Blumberga.

Eric Wilson, on the other hand, reveals: “I have been addressing my editors all the time – dear teacher! And then she cursed a little, but it seemed – not angry about it, because I have learned a lot, a lot. I have learned from her, from my eldest son Robert, and from his wife, who also frightened me – go, write! So I owe them a debt of gratitude. ”

And the explanation of the title of the book “Me & Mo” is also appropriate for the content.

‘It is so: Momento mori, iļi momentaļno v more! And that is – remember death, the ancient Roman call not to forget about the inevitability of death. In Leonid Gaiday’s comedy, it was cleverly translated: in a moment at sea! ” explains Wilson.

“Undoubtedly, it is Liepāja and the city theater in the 1990s and later. When independence is brand new, internal freedom occasionally coincides with external and can also be stranded.

Even scientists don’t want to look for prototypes of Eric Wilson’s characters – they change. Then give up by hand and look no further for personal similarities.

It is a collective hero with our own features at a certain stage in life, ”writes Edīte Tišheizere about the novel.

Meanwhile, Ināra Slucka writes about the work: “I read the novel in one breath. It captivated, pulled, pulled … It created a whole bunch of emotions in me.

I admire that it can be written – witty, sensitive, in some places cynical, direct, seeing, brave, silent. And misunderstanding, at times even anger at how everything related to theater is described.

But there is nothing thought about it, grabbed from the blue air, it is all that way… Time passed, and everything washed out in me and gradually calmed down. And what was left was a novel about lost illusions. For a person who had to find another basis, find other values, find an excuse. “

The artist of the book is Katrīna Vasilevska.

The book was published with the support of the State Cultural Capital Fund.

About the author

Actor and playwright Ēriks Wilsons (1956) was born in Magadan, lived in Rīga, Ikšķile and – for the longest time – in Liepāja. He graduated from the Conservatory’s Department of Acting and obtained a master’s degree in writing studies from the University of Liepaja. He has worked as an actor at the Drama and Liepaja Theaters, has also visited the Daile and New Riga Theaters, been a seamstress, courier, event manager, but still creates his own mono performances. He has written plays, lyrics, poems, stories. Member of the Guild of Playwrights and the Writers’ Union.

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