The Wire | AWAY AWAY
Away! Away! by Jana Beňová is our last release of 2018. We are super stoked to work with Jana Beňová again (we published a translation of her novel Seeing People Off last year). To celebrate the release of Away! Away! (today!) check out this excerpt (of an excerpt) from the novel that was featured on Word Without Borders:
"In Paris, something devours the time. Maybe it’s the metro cars. Maybe it’s the constant walking around the city. Or that dog that’s always hungry. He growls at cucumbers and the poop of his canine compatriots. He likes to eat paper tissues and cake, which I went all the way to the Jewish Quarter to buy and then left out within his reach. Boom! That’s what happens to a soldier when he’s not on his guard.
In Paris. It’s useless to fixate on pastries.
In Paris, every minute has only a few seconds, something here swallows up the time. Digests it. I guess that’s why people here love extremely fresh baguettes. They prefer to put them under their arm—directly from the oven—with a hint of flame still burning. In Paris.
In Paris, I have two kinds of salt on the table. One with bigger and one with smaller crystals. Luxury.
In Paris, chestnuts don’t lose their shine.
They glow like the dark brown heart on my necklace. It reminds the cuckoos of a chocolate gingerbread cookie. It reminds me of gym equipment—leather, mats, horse. Something I never managed to jump over.
My friend, who’s lived here for years and speaks Slovak with an accent, has two sons. She says that their apartment is a little small for two children. “But the boys are very well-loved.”
In Paris. The windows are as big as the door.
In the dimness of the metro the nightlife is nonstop.
In Paris. In the morning, half asleep, Son traces a circle with his fingers on his chest. For lunch, there’s meat in a spicy sauce. He sweats over the plate like a woman in labor with her firstborn. Very well-loved.
In Bratislava, on the day we came back from Paris. We’re sitting on a bench in the park. Lost. Helpless. Feeling sorry for ourselves. As if someone close to us had died.
Paris in Paris."
Read the whole excerpt on Words Without Borders
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