This was originally published on my old blog BackpackBook (Livro de Mochila), a project that blended literature and travel, sometimes just traveling in my lucid dreams. It ran as âEscritores bem-aventuradosâ on July 25, 2007. Questions by AndrĂŠ Gazola, originally on lendo.org.
I found out today (25/07) is Writer’s Day. Do you know that kind of person? The one who went adventuring into their imagination with words and their possible meanings, a slightly strange type who believes that one day somebody will understand what they meant by “the baggage always comes back bigger”.
Anyway, AndrĂŠ Gazola put together some questions with the aim of giving writers, and people who play at writing, a chance to say what they think about the book world, and also to get to know the habits of its inhabitants. So, in order to get my entry visa to this new world, I’m answering the immigration interview.
On to the first stage:
- Are you here for tourism, study or work?
Tourism, and I want to make that intention very clear, because I’m running away from another world that insists on enslaving me. - How many days do you intend to stay?
I’ll be frank, I want to stay forever. Even if you throw me out I’ll try to come back illegally. In fact I intend to enter without much money.
Visa accepted!
In the second stage the interviewer AndrĂŠ gets more specific, possibly looking for holes in my intentions.
- What book are you reading?
I recently finished Gulliver’s Travels and Moby Dick from the Correndo Mundo collection, and after several hard nights I finally got through One Hundred Years of Solitude. Currently in the backpack: Na Trilha das AmĂŠricas and A Ăltima Viagem do Lobo Cinzento. - Do you remember your first book?
Unfortunately not, but I consider Amyr Klink’s Cem Dias Entre CĂŠu e Mar a landmark, the first of many books that made me dream. - In Brazil, we know reading isn’t a habit for the population in general. How many books do you read per month on average?
Honestly, I don’t believe the quantity is relevant information. Swallowing a story without chewing it has no nutritional value. Either way, I think I read about two books a month. - Do you have a favorite genre?
Travel literature. New and old stories of real or fictional adventurers are always great company for the trip of our lives. - Some writers, as well as being great artists, are seen as “superior beings” by some readers. Do you have writer idols?
I appreciate these artists’ work respectfully, like any work of art, but I’m not much of a fan of idols :p - Do you distinguish writers by genre, poetry, short story, novel, or do you believe a writer is a writer and that’s that?
I don’t distinguish by genre, ethnicity or creed. - Could the internet turn into a threat to reading books?
Not at all. I’d say the internet brings far more benefits than threats, and I’d highlight access to public domain works, digital formats, collaboration and freedom of opinion, and on it goes. If I go deeper into that discussion we won’t finish this interview today.
That said, if the point was reading books in their current format, I think it’s an excellent threat to archaic paper, but never to the book. The day e-paper or digital readers become more affordable we’ll have taken a big step forward. - If you could, how would you end illiteracy in Brazil and how would you build a reading habit?
A real challenge. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, since I find it hard to encourage the habit even in friends and family.
As for illiteracy, I believe it’s slowly losing its enormity. It could be much smaller if not for the fine education of the people running the country, and that is much harder to fight. - JosĂŠ Saramago recently declared he will always be a communist, though he knows the subject is outdated. Should a writer keep their values forever, or can they change their mind?
As whatshisname would say, better to change your mind than to have no mind to change. - A phrase for Writer’s Day:
Proust, on how the real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.
Well, that was a good interview. I swear I told the truth and nothing but the truth. If I get the entry stamp I promise not to commit any illegalities, unless it turns out to be illegal to leave books along the way and bring new friends into this world.
Congratulations to the writers who to this day are considered adventurers for choosing that profession. I’m here because of you.
Congratulations, adventurers.