On the 9th
of October, at Fra Café and Bookstore there was a reading by the Norwegian poet
Audun Mortensen from his new book, Out of
Office Reply, which was recently
translated into Czech. The cellar-like spaces were rapidly filled with
people, chatting loudly, occupying chairs and gradually, it became a matter of
luck to get a spot at a table on which to place your pint. In the over-crowded
room, the sole empty space was around the table which was reserved for the
organizer of the event Ondřej Buddeus (ed.
note: he was mentioned by Louis Armand in the June 2013 MP), the poet and
Kateřina Daňková from DAMU.
In
short, it was an evening in which the arts of translation, creative writing and
recitation mingled. Despite the low magnitude of the recitations and rather
distracting constant migration of people between the bar (for a drink) and exit
door (for a smoke), the event had an atmosphere of its own. The poems,
contemporary in their usages of numbers, pop-star names or repetition of a
single word, were read first in their original language by Mortensen and then in
Czech by Buddeus or Daňková, who took turns.
Right before the reading, a
short interview-like discussion took place between Buddeus and Mortensen. The
words which I found especially thought-provoking and highly relatable to by any
student of literature were the following ones, said by Audun: “I haven’t read
many books. But often I have people asking me ‘Have you read this/that book?‘ I haven’t. And everytime, it’s like
a small trauma.” At that very moment I could not help smirking, for the
question “Have you read this/that book?” is one I am frequently asked and also pose
myself… Maybe this feeling of personal agreement with the author’s idea made me
more attentive than I would be usually in case of modern poetry.
Though the evening had its
minor imperfections, it was definitely a memorable literary event.
- - Anna Hupcejová
