© Nadezhda Chipeva, Capital
Georgi Gospodinov at the book fair
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We start to lose our memory and we don’t realize it. Our memory is being rewritten by memory merchants, by memory dealers, by populists and politicians. We come from a time when they sold us a bright future and now they cannot try to sell us a bright past”. This is how Georgi Gospodinov described to BNT the reason for writing the novel “Time Asylum”, Booker Prize winner this year.
According to him, against the backdrop of the uncomfortable present and lack of future, the past is sold as a comfort zone. For Gospodinov, however, this return to the past is dangerous because it could lead to the return of past dictatorships.
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“One day I will publish all the speeches written for unreceived awards. It is an exercise in itself not to hate the winners. You have to stand up and congratulate the winner,” this is how the writer answered a question about whether there were many speeches prepared for awards that his books did not receive.
For Gospodinov, winning the Booker is important for Bulgarian literature, because it has shown that a prize of such rank can be won when writing in Bulgarian. “We have great traditions in short stories and poetry. This award should unlock curiosity about Bulgarian literature,” he emphasized.
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2023-12-30 08:03:45
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