N Vinoth Kumar
Published:
04th June 2013
Italian
writer Alessandro Baricco’s novel Seta,
translated into English as Silk, is
like a game of chess — each chapter is a move.
The author’s
style of narration is such that there’s a limited number of characters in this
novel with short chapters.
Baricco,
also a film director and performer, has 10 novels to his credit.
‘Silk’ is a triangular love story which brings the landscape of Italy and Japan together. The protagonist
Herve Joncour, a youth in his thirties, is a former army man and is engaged in
silkworm trade.
When a
disease invades the silkworms and spreads to the whole of Europe, Joncour
travels to Japan
to smuggle in good quality silkworms. There, he meets a Japanese girl.
Every time
he travels to Japan,
he meets the girl and they fall in love without speaking a word. On their last
meeting, the girl gives him a letter which says, ‘Come Again or I will Die’.
The events following this set the plot of the novel.
The story is
set in the backdrop of the 1860s, when electricity was just an imagination and Japan was
considered the “end of the world.”
Throughout
the story the author uses an imagery way of story-telling to correlate the
circumstances. For example, whenever the author tries to describe the Japanese
girl, he puts it in Joncour’s voice. The novel was later adapted into a film
with the eponymous title and today, it has been translated into nearly 37
languages. “Even translations have their own soul,” said the author.
Recently,
the novel was translated in Tamil as ‘Pattu’ by poet Sugumaran and brought out
by Kalachuvadu Pathippagam.
Baricco
arrived in Chennai on Saturday to launch the Tamil translation followed by a
discussion at Amethyst. Baricco spoke to City Express about his way of writing
and his school of story-telling.
“Though the
story is not a real life incident, the details about the silkworm trade
are very true. In the 19th century, Europeans entered Japan in search
of good quality silkworms. Before going to Japan, they went to Africa.” he
said. Speaking about his style of narration, he said, “It is not a technique,
but my way of writing. In this novel in particular, the story unfolds like a
game of chess. Each small piece of story is a move. Every time the story moves
in and around, but never stops. This keeps the reader completely
engaged.”
“Also, I
have used limited number of characters. It is not demanded by the story but I
decided to limit the characters. Moving a story with limited characters is like
geometry,” he added.
When asked
about the popularity of the book and whether it would be his classical work,
Baricco said, “For every writer, one or two books of his/her will become
popular either during lifetime or after death. I am lucky that I have been able
to catch the attention of so many readers through this book, that too in my
lifetime. But it is too early to say if this is my classical work.”
Explaining
the travelogue nature of this novel, he said, “ I like travelling. Before I
began to write this book, I did a lot of ground work like visiting museums to
know about the silkworm trade in early days.”
Talking
about his school of storytelling, Scuola Holden, Baricco said, “I started this
school 20 years ago along with my friends. We were interested in sharing our
experiences with the younger generation. Here we teach cinema, theatre,
television production, journalism and book-writing. Whatever be the course one
chooses, he or she should learn story-telling and it is part of their
curriculum.”
This
October, Barico is to start a new edition of the school internationally in Torino, where Indian students are also welcome.
Clearing
doubts on whether the art of writing could be taught and writers moulded by
teaching, he said, “Each one has several talents. But one must discover a
talent that brings out his voice. That’s what we are doing here. We help the
students discover their voice”.
Courtesy:
The New Indian Express
