The novel ‘Kairos’ may be set in the final years of East Germany but author Jenny Erpenbeck says the fears of the present day are much like those of that period. Erpenbeck and Michael Hoffman, who translated the book to English, jointly won the International Booker Prize that was announced Tuesday.
They spoke with TOI Bookmark about why the book was written decades after East Germany ceased to exist, how it was translated and why contemporary readers may identify with it.
Edited excerpts
Q. Why did you choose Kairos as the title of this book?
Erpenbeck: I studied ancient Greek in school and I liked it very much. Later, when the (Berlin) wall was gone, I enrolled in a seminar about Pinda the ancient Greek poet.
In the works of Pinda, Kairos plays a big role, it’s the idea of a moment that the gods are offering and the humans have to take. It has to do with humans making something out of the chances that are given.
Q. How difficult was it to write this book and is it accurate to say it seems semi-autobiographical in places?
Erpenbeck: I would say every novel in one way is autobiographical. You have to be close to the subject you are dealing with otherwise you wouldn’t do so much work to write a novel.
If you are living in a time, you often don’t have time to reflect upon it, especially when there’s so much change involved. After 30 years, this distance was big enough to be able to have a look at what happened and I put it together with this private story that also tells the story of a relationship that is shifting.
The story also reveals aspects of the shifting power between the two main characters. It also reveals the lying and truth, aspects that are interesting if you look at the political history of the time.
Q. The book feels like you’re offering a commentary on contemporary world politics…
Erpenbeck: We are facing times of fear presently. We fear environmental and political catastrophes. So many people are not feeling secure anymore.
They are afraid to lose the world they have known until now. I think that’s what makes the book interesting for readers today.
Q. Michael, what was the translation process like?
Hoffman: I think my main bent was to not ever let the thing feel too comfortable. That especially meant not giving into a certain sort of pressure from America. So no euphemisms.
When Catarina sees the beggars on her trip West to Cologne, they are beggars. They are not people begging or any other euphemism. I remember I wanted to keep the word jeans out of the novel for the first sort of 200 pages just because in East Germany there were no jeans in the Western sense.
It’s not a society where youth has any power until the very end. It wasn’t like the US or England. I guess it’s perhaps more like India, where the power is with the old and the entrenched and not with young people. I wanted to discourage all the ‘youthy’ elements of language and not allow English and American readers the feeling that they are cozy in a world governed by young people.
Q. Jenny you recreate a moment in time by honing in on details without turning them dull. Tell us more about the writing process?
Erpenbeck: Partly it is memory and also talks with my friends. For instance, I couldn’t remember the names of all the cafes in Berlin that we visited. I had also kept a collection of East German wrapping papers
I also did some research about the time and I also used some passages out of a diary that I had at the time. Like how the smell changed in the East Berlin streets because of the Westerners visiting.
They would have perfume like Chanel Number 5 and all of a sudden I could smell the new world coming into our old world. I was afraid that I would lose the feeling of being home. Writing is a lot about keeping time.
Q. Having been a judge of this award as well as I presume of others, and now a winner of this prize. Did your experience in this space inform your translating abilities?
Hoffman: I don’t know. I mean the idea of a translator who’s good enough to write on behalf of other people, but not for himself or herself, that seems suspicious to me.
I very much like the idea of the writer as a translator and the translator as a writer. As far as judging goes, I think I’m a failed judge. I always come out on the losing end of things but I’m happy to be a successful candidate.
They spoke with TOI Bookmark about why the book was written decades after East Germany ceased to exist, how it was translated and why contemporary readers may identify with it.
Edited excerpts
Q. Why did you choose Kairos as the title of this book?
Erpenbeck: I studied ancient Greek in school and I liked it very much. Later, when the (Berlin) wall was gone, I enrolled in a seminar about Pinda the ancient Greek poet.
In the works of Pinda, Kairos plays a big role, it’s the idea of a moment that the gods are offering and the humans have to take. It has to do with humans making something out of the chances that are given.
Q. How difficult was it to write this book and is it accurate to say it seems semi-autobiographical in places?
Erpenbeck: I would say every novel in one way is autobiographical. You have to be close to the subject you are dealing with otherwise you wouldn’t do so much work to write a novel.
If you are living in a time, you often don’t have time to reflect upon it, especially when there’s so much change involved. After 30 years, this distance was big enough to be able to have a look at what happened and I put it together with this private story that also tells the story of a relationship that is shifting.
The story also reveals aspects of the shifting power between the two main characters. It also reveals the lying and truth, aspects that are interesting if you look at the political history of the time.
Q. The book feels like you’re offering a commentary on contemporary world politics…
Erpenbeck: We are facing times of fear presently. We fear environmental and political catastrophes. So many people are not feeling secure anymore.
They are afraid to lose the world they have known until now. I think that’s what makes the book interesting for readers today.
Q. Michael, what was the translation process like?
Hoffman: I think my main bent was to not ever let the thing feel too comfortable. That especially meant not giving into a certain sort of pressure from America. So no euphemisms.
When Catarina sees the beggars on her trip West to Cologne, they are beggars. They are not people begging or any other euphemism. I remember I wanted to keep the word jeans out of the novel for the first sort of 200 pages just because in East Germany there were no jeans in the Western sense.
It’s not a society where youth has any power until the very end. It wasn’t like the US or England. I guess it’s perhaps more like India, where the power is with the old and the entrenched and not with young people. I wanted to discourage all the ‘youthy’ elements of language and not allow English and American readers the feeling that they are cozy in a world governed by young people.
Q. Jenny you recreate a moment in time by honing in on details without turning them dull. Tell us more about the writing process?
Erpenbeck: Partly it is memory and also talks with my friends. For instance, I couldn’t remember the names of all the cafes in Berlin that we visited. I had also kept a collection of East German wrapping papers
I also did some research about the time and I also used some passages out of a diary that I had at the time. Like how the smell changed in the East Berlin streets because of the Westerners visiting.
They would have perfume like Chanel Number 5 and all of a sudden I could smell the new world coming into our old world. I was afraid that I would lose the feeling of being home. Writing is a lot about keeping time.
Q. Having been a judge of this award as well as I presume of others, and now a winner of this prize. Did your experience in this space inform your translating abilities?
Hoffman: I don’t know. I mean the idea of a translator who’s good enough to write on behalf of other people, but not for himself or herself, that seems suspicious to me.
I very much like the idea of the writer as a translator and the translator as a writer. As far as judging goes, I think I’m a failed judge. I always come out on the losing end of things but I’m happy to be a successful candidate.
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