Georgian and European contemporary writers gather at Writer’s House in Tbilisi
By Messenger staff
Wednesday, July 10
On July 5, the Writer’s House hosted a Literature Night in Tbilisi. The evening was organized by the British Council in collaboration with the Goethe Institute, Institute Francois, the Georgian Writer’s House, the Ministry of Culture and the Europe House. The event was and funded by the European Union National Institutes for Culture (EUNIC).
Famous Georgian writer Dato Turashvili was the moderator of the evening. The evening was accompanied by Jazz music and Georgian wine.
The event was also attended by the Deputy Minister of Culture and Monument Protection of Georgia, Manana Berikashvili, writers, publishers and other guests.
Literature Night hosted Georgian writers, as well as writers from Great Britain, France, and Germany.
James A. Hopkins (Great Britain) first visited Georgia in 2008, accompanying the group of German painters as a participant of the project “Pirosmani II”. He described impressions from this visit in articles for the magazines Esquire and Berliner Zeitung. He also wrote the Georgian Trilogy – stories for BBC Radio 4, the first of which, Peacock in Sulphur, presents an art depiction of Pirosmani’s life.
In the early 2000s, Ingrid Thobois (France) was teaching English in Afghanistan. She is the author of several novels including The King of Afghanistan Did Not Marry Us; The Anatomical Angel; Solliciano and The Phantom of the Spring.
Gunter Onemus (Germany) used to work as a book distributor, editor and publisher for the Coolins’s Dictionary Board. Today Mr. Onemus is a free-lance author and interpreter. In 1998 he was awarded with the Alfred Kerr Prize for Literature Criticism and the Munich Prize “Tukan” for the novel Tiger on Your Shoulder. In 2014 the Fisher Verlag is going to publish two books by Gunter Onemus– Ava and Guilty.
Aka Morchiladze’s (Giorgi Akhvlediani) work is among the best prosaic works of the post-Soviet Georgian literature. They represent the influence of contemporary literature and the past, which creates modern Georgia. In 90s he used to work as a journalist for the newspaper. Nowadays he lives in London and continues collaboration with Georgian media.
The authors introduced their work. Each piece was followed by the Georgian version.
Literature Night is the first large project carried out by EUNIC in Tbilisi and it serves the aim to introduce the work of the contemporary European literature to the guests and give an opportunity to Georgian writers to present their newest work to readers. As the organizers say, similar evenings help to bring Georgian and European literature closer.
