All guests of the European Literature Days from 2009 to 2014.

[ המלצה מאת Beat Mazenauer ] Turbulent times lead to turbulent lives – and literature, which attempts to capture this turbulence. That is what the Croatian author Edo Popović’s novel, “Kalda”, is all about.

The hero, named in the title, grew up in the working class area of Zagreb where he gets to know the hardships of adolescence, yet without developing any ambitions. Taking drugs all too often satisfies the longing for sex and his father’s absence is covered up by nonchalance. Popović treats Ivan Kalda as an exemplary case to narrate the psychogram of a Croatian youth in a relaxed, indifferent tone. Kalda is therefore predestined to become a neutral observer who perfects the “art of seeing”.

"Kalda" passively resists conventions by simply refusing to grow up. In no way does he want to become like the adults – well-behaved office-workers who are fulfilled by their sense of obligation and plagued by hidden anxieties. However, his refusal also sets a trap for himself. Was his father not exactly the same – someone who simply left? The membrane between nonchalance and despair is brittle. Kalda’s own son has shown him this. He lives with his mother. Kalda has a good relationship with his son because he is only a stranger who visits. But there is nothing more. Kalda’s career as a photographer also brings him into direct contact with the horror and chaos of the Bosnian war, which confronts him with terrible things. “I was totally indifferent to it all”, he says to protect himself, while also observing how overnight the “various monkeys become key players” and also behave as such, and also towards him.

Edo Popović’s novel oscillates between terse nonchalance and the sensitive anxiety of contact and narrates the story of a generation’s collective confusion. Kalda’s judgement on hope is extremely harsh: “A refuge for the weak” – but can life carry on without the weak? He does not prove immune to them – fortunately, as the end of the book shows. Provocative, direct – Popović achieves the apparently indifferent tone that basically always reveals how he is only a mask, a visibly crumbling panzer. Ultimately, it is pointless not to live one’s life as an adult, but it is difficult to set goals for oneself in a rapidly changing society. That is the focus of this virtuoso novel. “We all get our chance”, Kalda reflects, “it’s up to us how we use it.”

[ ציטוט אהוב ] „Ich wurde geboren, das ist alles, was man über den Anfang sagen kann. Auch später gibt es kaum etwas zu sagen, ich meine – kein Mysterium zu entdecken.“

[ מידע על ספרים ] Popović, Edo: Kalda. (original language: Kroatisch) Voland & Quist, Dresden / Leipzig, 2008 (2007).
תורגם מ Kroatisch על ידי Alida Bremer