WEBVTT - Read This: Nothing Happens In Ayşegül Savaş’s Book and That’s Great 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:02.719 Hey there, it's Ruby Jones and I'm delighted to share 0:00:02.759 --> 0:00:06.760 another episode of Read This, Schwartz Media's weekly books podcast, 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:10.560 hosted by editor of the Monthly Michael Williams. It features 0:00:10.560 --> 0:00:13.760 conversations with some of the most talented writers from Australia 0:00:13.920 --> 0:00:16.959 and around the world. In this episode, Michael is in 0:00:17.000 --> 0:00:21.240 conversation with Turkish born Paris based writer I Shagl Chavas. 0:00:22.079 --> 0:00:24.200 As usual, I'm joined by Michael to tell me a 0:00:24.200 --> 0:00:26.360 little bit more about the episode. 0:00:28.640 --> 0:00:30.040 Hi Michael, Hi Ruby. 0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:34.880 So Michael, the title of this episode is nothing happens 0:00:34.920 --> 0:00:38.080 in I shouldgle Chavas's book, and that's great, But as 0:00:38.120 --> 0:00:41.400 a reader who loves a good plot, tell me why 0:00:41.520 --> 0:00:43.960 it is a good thing that nothing happens in this book. 0:00:44.280 --> 0:00:48.320 Yes, Look, that title is tending to be slightly cheeky 0:00:48.440 --> 0:00:50.960 or the very least self parodic, because what I know 0:00:51.040 --> 0:00:54.600 about myself is I am an absolute whore for narrative 0:00:54.960 --> 0:00:57.440 and like I love a good plot. I like a 0:00:57.440 --> 0:01:01.000 crime novel or a thriller. I like fick over nonfiction. 0:01:01.200 --> 0:01:03.720 I want a story that drags me along and is 0:01:03.760 --> 0:01:06.440 gripping and page turning, and where that's kind of front 0:01:06.440 --> 0:01:09.640 and center to what's going on. But I'm also a 0:01:09.640 --> 0:01:12.039 bit of an eclectic reader. So occasionally what you want 0:01:12.360 --> 0:01:14.160 is a book that doesn't do that. It doesn't tick 0:01:14.200 --> 0:01:17.959 those boxes. Instead, what it does is give you world 0:01:18.000 --> 0:01:21.520 building and character and beautiful prose on the line where 0:01:22.120 --> 0:01:25.280 part of the point of the exercise is luxuriating in 0:01:25.400 --> 0:01:28.160 the author and their voice rather than turning the page 0:01:28.200 --> 0:01:30.720 to see what happens next. And as far as books 0:01:30.760 --> 0:01:34.280 like that go, The Anthropologist by Aishagl Savage is a 0:01:34.480 --> 0:01:35.399 prime example. 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:38.200 Okay, I think you've definitely got me interested. Tell me 0:01:38.240 --> 0:01:40.000 a bit more about the Anthropologists. 0:01:40.600 --> 0:01:43.720 I need to be very clear, it's hyperbole to say 0:01:43.760 --> 0:01:45.600 that this is a book about nothing. It's a book 0:01:45.600 --> 0:01:49.120 about a relationship a couple called Asia and Manu, and 0:01:49.160 --> 0:01:52.000 they're hunting for a new apartment to buy. The city 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:55.080 therein isn't named. They're both foreigners to that city, so 0:01:55.080 --> 0:01:58.240 they've got a particularly tight kind of unit between the 0:01:58.280 --> 0:02:01.480 two of them. But that's more or less the entire book. 0:02:01.680 --> 0:02:04.240 They go, they see apartments, then they sit in cafes 0:02:04.520 --> 0:02:06.880 and do post mortems about what they liked, what they 0:02:06.880 --> 0:02:10.080 didn't like, the kind of imagined future that they could 0:02:10.120 --> 0:02:13.320 have in an apartment like that, and that's kind of 0:02:13.360 --> 0:02:16.560 the whole thing. There's no conflict, there's no false drama. 0:02:16.919 --> 0:02:19.920 There's just these two people who love each other and 0:02:19.960 --> 0:02:23.760 they're day in miniature, and there's something beautiful about that, 0:02:23.880 --> 0:02:27.080 the immediacy, because it's a reflection not just of a 0:02:27.160 --> 0:02:29.919 book where plot isn't front and center, but it's also 0:02:29.960 --> 0:02:33.120 a reflection of that time in your early twenties where 0:02:33.440 --> 0:02:36.200 you've got adult freedoms but maybe not the full weight 0:02:36.240 --> 0:02:41.960 of adult responsibilities. And so they're luxuriating impossibility and just 0:02:42.200 --> 0:02:44.600 in what's in front of them day by day, and 0:02:44.639 --> 0:02:46.400 there's something kind of delicious. 0:02:45.880 --> 0:02:50.040 About it coming up in just a moment. Nothing happens 0:02:50.040 --> 0:02:59.280 in Asha Gulshavas's book, and that's great. 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:04.160 Tell me a little bit about a moment when it 0:03:04.200 --> 0:03:07.000 became clear to you that Future Selves, which is such 0:03:07.040 --> 0:03:10.600 a wonderful story but is in many ways the genesis 0:03:10.639 --> 0:03:13.960 of this novel. What was the moment when you got 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:17.040 a sense that Future Selves could be expanded outwards or 0:03:17.200 --> 0:03:21.280 could kind of encompass a different, broader set of concerns. 0:03:22.040 --> 0:03:27.760 I wrote Future Selves during the pandemic, and that, you know, 0:03:28.120 --> 0:03:31.480 the way that people's lives were going in so many 0:03:31.560 --> 0:03:36.880 extreme directions, and you could really see disparity when when 0:03:36.960 --> 0:03:39.119 people had to be confined, had to go to work 0:03:39.200 --> 0:03:43.120 or had to stop work, were completely alone, or weren't community, 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:47.080 those extremes became so apparent. And that's when I wrote 0:03:47.120 --> 0:03:52.200 the story about a couple who is looking for an 0:03:52.200 --> 0:03:55.480 apartment to buy and a young boy who has a 0:03:55.520 --> 0:03:59.200 tragic ending. And when the story was published, I was 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:05.040 a little bit by the feedback I got by how 0:04:05.040 --> 0:04:08.800 many people had connected to it, and I thought, oh, like, 0:04:08.880 --> 0:04:11.720 maybe there is something here, and I was quite heartened. 0:04:12.160 --> 0:04:15.400 And I also thought there is something so liberating about 0:04:15.440 --> 0:04:18.520 the framework of looking for an apartment to buy. I 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:21.479 could sort of continue writing this for a really long time, 0:04:22.160 --> 0:04:26.159 the story of the boy and the tragedy that befalls him. 0:04:26.920 --> 0:04:30.159 I thought, you know, it's too finite, it's too soon, 0:04:30.240 --> 0:04:32.720 and that can't really define the novel, or that it 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:35.719 will not lead the story further. So I had to 0:04:35.720 --> 0:04:37.560 get rid of it, and so I was left with 0:04:37.920 --> 0:04:42.320 just this apartment hunt and I started expanding from there. 0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:45.520 And also something else that happened at the same time, 0:04:46.040 --> 0:04:49.640 which was because we weren't going out, and because we 0:04:49.640 --> 0:04:55.080 weren't seeing friends or eating in restaurants, daily life started 0:04:55.120 --> 0:05:01.600 appearing as something very exotic, and it's you know, some 0:05:01.600 --> 0:05:05.240 people ask like, oh, it's so courageous that you wrote 0:05:05.279 --> 0:05:08.920 about daily life, or you know, you can see it 0:05:09.040 --> 0:05:12.159 so crisply, But actually I wasn't. I was removed from it, 0:05:12.240 --> 0:05:15.520 and that's why I was able to write it. And 0:05:15.600 --> 0:05:17.920 I thought, wouldn't it be so fun to write a 0:05:17.920 --> 0:05:22.000 book in which characters are going to cafes and hanging 0:05:22.040 --> 0:05:23.719 out and having drinks. 0:05:24.400 --> 0:05:26.279 That does make a lot of sense, that it's wild 0:05:26.400 --> 0:05:30.400 fantasy that they could experience these basic, mandane things that 0:05:30.440 --> 0:05:32.960 we take for granted and the rest of the time. Yes, 0:05:33.200 --> 0:05:36.880 in us here a manner, you have possibly one of 0:05:36.920 --> 0:05:40.479 the happier couples committed to the literary page in a 0:05:40.560 --> 0:05:42.960 long time. And I want to know, is that kind 0:05:42.960 --> 0:05:45.400 of wish fulfillment as well? Is that just kind of 0:05:46.640 --> 0:05:50.320 Was that a deliberate choice to have them be so harmonious? 0:05:50.720 --> 0:05:56.560 It really was, And this was the number one greatest 0:05:56.720 --> 0:06:00.200 challenge and obstacle for the book. When I knew what 0:06:00.240 --> 0:06:02.240 the structure was and that what the novel was going 0:06:02.279 --> 0:06:05.080 to be, I said, Okay, this is a book about 0:06:05.120 --> 0:06:08.880 a couple who love one another, and that's sort of it. 0:06:10.480 --> 0:06:13.039 And again, you know this, it's within the framework of 0:06:13.120 --> 0:06:15.920 early youth, so they don't have that many reasons for arguments. 0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:18.719 I'm sure Manu and Asia, when they have children or 0:06:18.800 --> 0:06:22.280 when their parents get sick, they will start getting into arguments, 0:06:22.520 --> 0:06:25.200 but it's this time in their life that's totally idyllic. 0:06:26.120 --> 0:06:28.960 And at the same time, for some reason, you are 0:06:29.120 --> 0:06:33.599 not allowed happy couples in literature, even though it's the thing. 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:36.200 I know people who are happy. I know lots of 0:06:36.320 --> 0:06:39.480 young couples who love one another and that's sort of it, 0:06:39.520 --> 0:06:43.760 and they have silly arguments but nothing existential, And I thought, 0:06:43.760 --> 0:06:46.880 why can't that be the basis of the book? And 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:52.560 it kept on becoming a problem with editors who wanted drama, 0:06:53.080 --> 0:06:56.400 who wanted who said like, oh, you know, how nice 0:06:56.440 --> 0:06:59.880 that this is the background, but surely now we need 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:03.040 some big plot development. And they get separated and then 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:05.680 they come back together, and I say, but no, that 0:07:06.640 --> 0:07:10.120 you know, life doesn't always work that way, and people 0:07:10.200 --> 0:07:13.840 can continue peacefully loving one another and seeing these apartments 0:07:13.880 --> 0:07:16.840 and the thing is that they don't have that much 0:07:16.880 --> 0:07:19.280 at stake with the apartments hunt. I think that's why 0:07:19.320 --> 0:07:21.880 they're not arguing. They're like, ah, well, we can still 0:07:21.920 --> 0:07:26.400 continue living in our rented place. And they really are children. 0:07:27.000 --> 0:07:29.320 You say, not that much at stake, But seriously, if 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:31.160 you put in a chapter where they go to Ikea 0:07:31.200 --> 0:07:33.160 to get some furniture, then they'd be broken up by 0:07:33.160 --> 0:07:33.880 the end of the book. 0:07:34.000 --> 0:07:37.520 It's very sty they're not buying furniture. They you know, 0:07:37.520 --> 0:07:40.160 they buy things from the flea market, so it's probably 0:07:40.280 --> 0:07:44.120 very cheap and they don't have to assemble it. And again, 0:07:44.200 --> 0:07:46.400 it doesn't feel like a big commitment when they buy 0:07:46.400 --> 0:07:48.520 it from the free markets, so there are no arguments 0:07:48.760 --> 0:07:49.240 acquire right. 0:07:49.320 --> 0:07:51.840 The introduction of an Alan cab would just main kind 0:07:51.880 --> 0:07:56.360 of conflict avoid I am. I do think there's something 0:07:56.400 --> 0:07:59.040 too in the point you make about how old they are. 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:02.920 You know, part of this period in their life. Part 0:08:02.960 --> 0:08:08.200 of what you're capturing is that period where adult capacity 0:08:08.280 --> 0:08:12.600 has arrived, but adult responsibility is just around the corner. 0:08:12.680 --> 0:08:14.360 That it's a period where you're kind of in a 0:08:14.360 --> 0:08:16.160 bit of a bubble, right, and it's. 0:08:16.320 --> 0:08:23.160 It's such a short period and it's so it's full 0:08:23.200 --> 0:08:28.480 of freedom and joy and hypothetical conversations and getting drunk 0:08:28.760 --> 0:08:32.200 and you know, smoking joints, And I thought, what a 0:08:32.240 --> 0:08:34.720 fun time to try and capture. And I guess I 0:08:34.760 --> 0:08:36.599 was also writing it at a time when I was 0:08:36.640 --> 0:08:40.920 about to cross to the other side of real adult responsibility, 0:08:42.000 --> 0:08:49.079 and that that time of being youthful adults started feeling 0:08:49.120 --> 0:08:50.720 quite exotic to me as well. 0:08:50.840 --> 0:08:57.560 It is funny because the book resists nostalgia about family tradition, 0:08:57.640 --> 0:09:01.800 that resists nostalgia about homelands or about whatever those concepts mean. 0:09:02.160 --> 0:09:06.240 But it is an intensely nostalgic book for the period 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:08.880 that it describes, for the lifestyle that it kind of 0:09:09.400 --> 0:09:12.160 demonstrates as possible. And I think that gives it a 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:16.800 kind of lovely, almost a note of melancholy to my mind. 0:09:16.840 --> 0:09:18.320 But maybe that's what happens when you read it in 0:09:18.320 --> 0:09:21.520 your forty six and this kind of freedom is far 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:24.480 behind you. But it did seem to me to be 0:09:24.520 --> 0:09:27.760 a kind of captule of a particular kind of hope. 0:09:27.880 --> 0:09:30.520 You know. The idea of having a day where you 0:09:30.600 --> 0:09:35.120 wrote together is such a kind of beautiful concept, I think. 0:09:35.640 --> 0:09:38.440 Yes, And it's only in that phase and it sort 0:09:38.440 --> 0:09:43.719 of vanishes forever and perhaps then comes back when you're 0:09:43.800 --> 0:09:49.840 quite old and have abandoned certain worldly responsibilities once again. 0:09:50.320 --> 0:09:54.360 You know, within that space of freedom or hope or possibility, 0:09:54.400 --> 0:09:58.320 there is also this constant anxiety, right And when you're 0:09:58.400 --> 0:10:02.240 in the period of rotting and hanging out, you're also 0:10:02.320 --> 0:10:07.080 asking yourself, Oh, should I be acting a bit more adults? 0:10:07.120 --> 0:10:14.200 Should I be looking into mortgages, or you know, not 0:10:14.320 --> 0:10:16.200 drinking as much and going out for a run in 0:10:16.240 --> 0:10:19.160 the morning, all of these things. And this is some 0:10:19.200 --> 0:10:21.959 of a question I get asked a lot by young 0:10:22.080 --> 0:10:27.280 people during readings, what would you suggest we do in 0:10:27.320 --> 0:10:29.760 this time of our lives, because we also think we 0:10:29.800 --> 0:10:33.720 should be committing and figuring out what to do. And 0:10:32.559 --> 0:10:37.040 I and I tell them just enjoy it, just relax. 0:10:37.120 --> 0:10:39.720 You know, you are going to have responsibility so soon 0:10:39.840 --> 0:10:42.520 you don't even have to decide or like, go take 0:10:42.559 --> 0:10:44.840 that path. I love the rotting. 0:10:45.280 --> 0:10:48.240 Yeah, oh no, The only thing to do is do nothing, 0:10:48.440 --> 0:10:52.160 embrace it, be in it. Then how does that connect 0:10:52.320 --> 0:10:57.080 with us HER's work as a documentary filmmaker. How does 0:10:57.200 --> 0:10:59.960 the person who is the observer, who is the chronic, 0:11:00.320 --> 0:11:05.160 who is the anthropologist, are they ever truly in the moment. 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:09.480 I mean, she feels like she is, but how much 0:11:09.559 --> 0:11:12.760 is there a necessary arms length from the person who's 0:11:12.800 --> 0:11:15.240 studying everything that happens around us. 0:11:15.240 --> 0:11:18.960 He is a pretty anxious person. So as as much 0:11:18.960 --> 0:11:23.480 as she feels nostalgic for that period of rotting and 0:11:23.760 --> 0:11:28.840 nostalgic or very warmly towards this moment of youth, she 0:11:29.040 --> 0:11:32.760 is also very anxious. And she is an observer, and 0:11:32.800 --> 0:11:35.880 she's always going to be distancing herself or taking a 0:11:35.920 --> 0:11:39.840 step back from these moments of pure pleasure and saying, Okay, 0:11:39.840 --> 0:11:42.440 what are we doing here and what does it mean? 0:11:42.920 --> 0:11:45.839 And I think it's with that type of anxiety that 0:11:45.920 --> 0:11:50.640 she embarks on the documentary project because she's very curious 0:11:50.679 --> 0:11:54.360 about how other people live and you know, what are 0:11:55.200 --> 0:11:59.560 things that they do that maybe she and Manu aren't doing? 0:11:59.800 --> 0:12:04.199 An how do people give shape and meaning to their 0:12:04.280 --> 0:12:09.760 daily lives? And I think the documentary sort of mimics 0:12:10.200 --> 0:12:15.800 her quest in life to you know, to give shape, 0:12:15.840 --> 0:12:17.920 to give meaning, to have some sort of a reason 0:12:18.040 --> 0:12:21.920 to account for the hours of rotting or going to 0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:24.360 the park or taking a walk. 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:27.840 You also capture the ways in which in a relationship 0:12:28.440 --> 0:12:32.880 we all become anthropologists, that the thing about the two 0:12:32.920 --> 0:12:35.600 of them is great rehashes of the things that go 0:12:35.679 --> 0:12:37.880 on in their lives. That they not only go and 0:12:37.920 --> 0:12:40.440 look at these apartments, but then they will sit in 0:12:40.440 --> 0:12:44.800 a cafe afterwards endlessly kind of rehearsing the stories that 0:12:44.800 --> 0:12:47.560 they're going to tell about it. That part of what 0:12:47.760 --> 0:12:53.839 makes any partnership, any relationship, really, but a romantic union 0:12:53.880 --> 0:12:58.680 in particular, is that business of post mortems on everyone 0:12:58.760 --> 0:13:00.520 and everything around you all times. 0:13:02.200 --> 0:13:06.040 Yes, and that's their form of intimacy. I think that's 0:13:06.080 --> 0:13:11.000 sort of their own private ritual and culture. Also, I 0:13:11.040 --> 0:13:14.720 think rehashing is especially important for us in Mono because 0:13:14.720 --> 0:13:20.440 there are so few symbolic or invisible structures that are 0:13:20.559 --> 0:13:26.080 keeping them together. No religion, you know, no ceremonies. So 0:13:26.200 --> 0:13:29.280 the rehashing is a ceremony of its own. It's a 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:35.559 way of repeating and therefore making solid the narratives that 0:13:35.600 --> 0:13:36.360 they come up. 0:13:36.280 --> 0:13:41.760 With when we return, I should go. Shares the approach 0:13:41.840 --> 0:13:46.440 behind writing the Anthropologists what she calls a fragmentary style, 0:13:46.960 --> 0:13:49.360 and she explains why she wants to make foreignness the 0:13:49.400 --> 0:14:00.480 status quality in her rite, We'll be right back. You 0:14:01.080 --> 0:14:04.640 show extraordinary deadness in this novel as a kind of miniaturist, 0:14:05.320 --> 0:14:10.360 creating these really small moments that absolutely sing that their 0:14:10.480 --> 0:14:13.080 smallness and their clarity is kind of the point. That 0:14:13.760 --> 0:14:18.680 conflict between characters would overshadow that, and geographical detail would 0:14:18.720 --> 0:14:22.840 overshadow that, and by stripping all of that away, the 0:14:23.040 --> 0:14:26.600 very small seems to be your project here. 0:14:26.920 --> 0:14:32.680 Yes, And the fragmentary approach started because I wanted to 0:14:32.880 --> 0:14:37.080 get away from the short story and rewire my brain, 0:14:37.120 --> 0:14:39.440 so I wasn't thinking in the tone of the story. 0:14:40.920 --> 0:14:45.280 But as I kept breaking it down and giving titles 0:14:45.320 --> 0:14:47.880 to each of the episodes, I thought, oh, well, this 0:14:47.960 --> 0:14:49.680 is actually you know, this is the point of the book. 0:14:50.000 --> 0:14:53.240 It's a point about daily life, and daily life does happen. 0:14:53.640 --> 0:14:58.080 It is about the small. And you know, you can't 0:14:58.120 --> 0:15:01.600 write about daily life in a in an epic structure 0:15:01.920 --> 0:15:05.880 or as a family saga, because it would become a farce. 0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:10.600 You know, if I created a traditional novel arc around 0:15:11.720 --> 0:15:15.280 having coffee and meeting up with friends, it just wouldn't work. 0:15:15.760 --> 0:15:19.560 So the episodic also rescued me because it showed me 0:15:20.080 --> 0:15:23.280 a way to write about daily life and to honor 0:15:23.400 --> 0:15:27.600 daily life, you know, without maybe tiring the reader or 0:15:27.640 --> 0:15:28.760 trying their patients. 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:34.800 I'm interested in the decision not to ground the anthropologists 0:15:34.840 --> 0:15:39.840 in a specific physical place or a specific cultural tradition. 0:15:39.960 --> 0:15:43.600 You know, the city goes Um named, Your characters' backgrounds 0:15:44.160 --> 0:15:49.440 referred to elliptically rather than with any specificity. How important 0:15:49.520 --> 0:15:51.600 was it to you that there was that distance from 0:15:51.600 --> 0:15:54.440 the grounded in that level of the narrative. 0:15:54.760 --> 0:15:58.600 I thought so much about this, and I thought, you know, 0:15:58.840 --> 0:16:02.760 it is an autobiographical book. It's most more autobiographical than 0:16:02.800 --> 0:16:06.760 anything I've written. Why not sort of own up to 0:16:07.640 --> 0:16:10.160 its inspirations. Why not say it's a Turk living in 0:16:10.200 --> 0:16:14.240 Paris and she's married to a Latvian And I would 0:16:14.240 --> 0:16:17.480 try it out and it would be okay. But there 0:16:17.560 --> 0:16:21.720 was something lost which I couldn't quite name, but instinctively 0:16:21.800 --> 0:16:25.040 I knew that that's not what I wanted to do 0:16:25.160 --> 0:16:27.960 in the book. And I think what was lost was 0:16:28.560 --> 0:16:33.760 a universality, This sense of a foreign experience or a 0:16:33.840 --> 0:16:40.080 sense of youthful estrangement that I was trying to get to, 0:16:40.360 --> 0:16:43.320 that exists everywhere. And it's not just you know, expats 0:16:43.360 --> 0:16:46.120 who feel it. It's also people you know who move 0:16:46.200 --> 0:16:48.760 from one city to another in their own countries, or 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:53.360 maybe it's people in their own cities who feel a stranger, 0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:57.240 who feel foreign just because they're a little quirky. And 0:16:57.280 --> 0:17:00.240 I thought the book is more about that than it 0:17:00.400 --> 0:17:06.400 is about the specific life of a Turk living in Paris, 0:17:06.440 --> 0:17:10.200 which is, you know, that comes with a lot of history, 0:17:10.240 --> 0:17:13.800 it comes with a certain you know, it comes with stereotypes, 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:16.800 that comes with different expectations. And I didn't want to 0:17:16.800 --> 0:17:20.280 be writing that, but it's something I do quite often 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:22.920 actually in my stories in my previous book as well, 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:27.280 that I'll try to blur the lines of geographical settings 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:31.240 and people's backgrounds. And I think, again, this might be 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:40.280 my autobiographical instinct, that I don't define myself simply as 0:17:41.720 --> 0:17:44.399 a Turk, or simply as a Turk living in France, 0:17:44.520 --> 0:17:48.480 or simply as a Turk who's also bilingual. There are 0:17:48.560 --> 0:17:52.040 so many aspects to my identity. But I think to 0:17:52.119 --> 0:17:55.480 everyone's identity that it feels restricting to have to pick 0:17:56.920 --> 0:18:03.560 geography and then to to write within the prejudices or 0:18:03.560 --> 0:18:05.199 the expectations of that geography. 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:10.240 I think you write about foreignness and the experience of 0:18:10.280 --> 0:18:13.200 being a foreigner in ways that are different to any 0:18:13.280 --> 0:18:16.280 that I remember reading before. And I would love it 0:18:16.320 --> 0:18:18.960 if you would reflect on what the concept of the 0:18:19.080 --> 0:18:20.399 foreign means to you. 0:18:21.240 --> 0:18:24.879 I have a short story collection coming out in a 0:18:24.880 --> 0:18:28.480 few months and I was doing an interview for it, 0:18:28.520 --> 0:18:31.719 and the interviewer asked me, are there any things that 0:18:31.840 --> 0:18:35.600 surprised you about the themes in this book? And you know, 0:18:35.880 --> 0:18:39.159 it's so interesting that, you know, I write about people 0:18:39.200 --> 0:18:41.240 in foreign places all the time, and then when I 0:18:41.280 --> 0:18:46.200 put the collection together, I thought, oh, everyone is a foreigner. 0:18:46.240 --> 0:18:49.479 How interesting that I gie born using this trope. And 0:18:49.840 --> 0:18:53.480 I almost think that it comes to me. You know, 0:18:53.480 --> 0:18:56.760 if you're a writer who always writes about characters in 0:18:56.800 --> 0:19:00.840 their homeland, it's sort of like the neutral state. No 0:19:00.880 --> 0:19:03.240 one will question you. You know, no one will say, oh, 0:19:03.240 --> 0:19:05.920 you keep writing about Americans. It's just, you know, that's 0:19:05.920 --> 0:19:08.639 sort of the basis. It is the foundation. And I 0:19:08.680 --> 0:19:13.680 think for me, foreignness is almost like a form of belonging, 0:19:14.640 --> 0:19:19.240 and it's probably through that. You know, that's my neutral state, 0:19:19.280 --> 0:19:22.400 and that's where I start from, and you know, obviously 0:19:22.520 --> 0:19:24.800 from my autobiography, because I grew up in so many 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:32.200 different places and I belong to different linguistic traditions and 0:19:32.800 --> 0:19:35.640 possibly in my writing, I'm trying to make foreigness something 0:19:35.800 --> 0:19:39.440 that is the status quo. 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:42.680 I think you do it so effectively. And I'm glad 0:19:42.720 --> 0:19:47.040 you made that point about foreigness as a state of belonging, 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:50.800 because I think that's where for me, the great difference 0:19:50.840 --> 0:19:54.560 in the way you approach it presents itself that instead 0:19:54.560 --> 0:19:58.639 of this idea of alienation of the other, or distancing 0:19:59.359 --> 0:20:03.359 your characters the characters who define themselves by their foreigness, 0:20:03.600 --> 0:20:05.240 rather than in opposition to it. 0:20:05.600 --> 0:20:09.199 Right exactly. And I think you know, when when I 0:20:09.240 --> 0:20:12.720 was growing up and a child in the nineties, we 0:20:12.760 --> 0:20:18.239 there was so much emphasis on understanding cultural differences, you know, 0:20:18.320 --> 0:20:24.159 appreciating cultural differences and noticing the ways different people do things. 0:20:24.680 --> 0:20:28.000 And I think as I lived in different places that 0:20:28.040 --> 0:20:31.800 became actually quite strange to me that we would remark 0:20:31.920 --> 0:20:36.639 on so many sort of regular daily things as like 0:20:37.520 --> 0:20:43.840 something to appreciate and mark differences, rather than find some 0:20:43.880 --> 0:20:50.360 sort of a tribe among people who are comfortable in 0:20:50.400 --> 0:20:53.280 that state of not quite belonging. 0:20:55.160 --> 0:20:58.240 Given that, I mean, it seems interesting to me that 0:20:58.320 --> 0:21:02.119 Asia is so committed to the idea of having a 0:21:02.320 --> 0:21:05.679 native friend in the city that they find themselves that 0:21:05.760 --> 0:21:09.080 the idea of having someone who does have deeper links 0:21:09.080 --> 0:21:11.880 to the place where they are is something that matters 0:21:11.920 --> 0:21:12.240 to her. 0:21:12.720 --> 0:21:16.600 I think for her that is more exotic than you 0:21:16.640 --> 0:21:20.960 know what I was saying about, remarking on differences that 0:21:21.000 --> 0:21:24.639 someone could still be living in their town of birth 0:21:25.760 --> 0:21:29.040 and they know, you know, Waiters by name. That to 0:21:29.080 --> 0:21:32.520 her is very very special, and there is something there 0:21:32.560 --> 0:21:36.000 is something embarrassing about being a foreigner somewhere and not 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:43.760 being integrated to its native culture. And yet that sort 0:21:43.800 --> 0:21:47.840 of is the reality of most of expatriate life. You 0:21:47.920 --> 0:21:51.560 become friends with other foreigners. It's important for her to 0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:57.040 have Lena as this exotic friend, exotic native friend. And 0:21:57.080 --> 0:21:59.879 then you find out that Lena actually also is playing 0:22:00.080 --> 0:22:03.600 on the idea of the native, and that she is 0:22:03.680 --> 0:22:08.560 exoticizing herself in ways that Ussia thinks a native should be. 0:22:08.600 --> 0:22:11.399 And her background is different, that she grew up in 0:22:11.440 --> 0:22:14.800 the suburbs, and she's not this you know, cool and 0:22:15.040 --> 0:22:19.320 chic urbanite as she portrays well. 0:22:19.400 --> 0:22:22.520 I mean, one of the things about foreigness, about living 0:22:22.520 --> 0:22:24.440 in a place that is new to you one way 0:22:24.520 --> 0:22:28.120 or the other, is the capacity for reinvention, and part 0:22:28.160 --> 0:22:32.560 of what's so lovely in The Anthropologists is that, in 0:22:32.600 --> 0:22:37.280 many ways it's a story about the way a relationship, 0:22:37.400 --> 0:22:42.280 a couple, a unit can reinvent themselves towards one another 0:22:42.720 --> 0:22:43.919 rather than distinctly. 0:22:44.920 --> 0:22:48.480 I think also when because they're so free in their 0:22:49.320 --> 0:22:54.199 lack of roots, it's not just that they're reinventing themselves, 0:22:54.200 --> 0:23:00.560 it's also they are deciding on their own culture, siding 0:23:00.720 --> 0:23:04.560 on their ways of life, and they can really say, okay, well, 0:23:04.560 --> 0:23:06.680 what are our traditions going to be, what are our 0:23:06.800 --> 0:23:09.600 rituals going to be? And they can create all of 0:23:09.640 --> 0:23:13.280 that from scratch, and that's quite a joyful experience. That's 0:23:13.400 --> 0:23:17.320 also another way of thinking of foreignness as not a 0:23:17.400 --> 0:23:22.879 state that's constantly lacking or defined by a sort of absence, 0:23:22.920 --> 0:23:26.320 but a state that has a lot of possibility and 0:23:26.359 --> 0:23:30.199 of freedom and creativity to it because of what it 0:23:30.240 --> 0:23:34.680 allows you to recreate or decide on your own. 0:23:37.920 --> 0:23:39.879 Thank you so much for the gift that you've given 0:23:39.960 --> 0:23:42.399 us with not just this book, but all your books, 0:23:42.520 --> 0:23:43.880 and for being on the show. 0:23:43.680 --> 0:23:47.000 Today, Michael, this was such a pleasure. Thank you for 0:23:47.040 --> 0:23:47.439 having me. 0:23:49.080 --> 0:23:53.000 I should go. Savalja's novel The Anthropologists is available at 0:23:53.040 --> 0:23:56.280 all good bookstores now, and do keep an eye out 0:23:56.320 --> 0:23:59.560 for her forthcoming collection of short stories. It's called Long 0:23:59.600 --> 0:24:02.400 Distance and it'll hit the shelves this July. 0:24:20.720 --> 0:24:23.280 Thank you so much for listening to another special episode 0:24:23.359 --> 0:24:25.560 of Read This. We'll have another episode of read This 0:24:25.640 --> 0:24:28.520 to share with you next Sunday. As always, if you 0:24:28.560 --> 0:24:30.760 want to dive further into Read This, you can search 0:24:30.800 --> 0:24:33.560 for it wherever you listen to podcasts. There are more 0:24:33.560 --> 0:24:36.160 than eighty episodes in the archive for you to enjoy. 0:24:36.680 --> 0:24:46.080 See you next week.