Arnon Grunberg
Words Without Borders

Sydney Writer's Festival

Attending a literary festival means socializing, socializing and more socializing.
During the Sydney Writers’ Festival this last week, I have done more socializing than during the whole year of 2005. Talking to journalists, talking to fellow authors, talking to organizers, talking to sponsors of the festival, talking to publicists, it’s all the same kind of chore. We do with our mouths and tongues what prostitutes do with their bodies: we try to give pleasure, but it’s not at all exclusive, and often the pleasure is not mutual.
During the cocktail party for international authors, seventy-five during this years’s festival, I spoke to a lady who introduced herself as an author and performer. Shortly after that, she made the statement that artists should be “mirrors of their time.” Then she added, “When corporate managers steal, why shouldn’t we be allowed to steal as well?” After the drinks, which meant after having answered the question, “Is this your first time in Sydney?” sixty-five times, I looked the lady up in the program. Her name was Karen Finley, and the program stated that Ms. Finley was “in the centre of the Culture Wars during the 90s.” No wonder that the other side won the Culture Wars of the 90s.
I want to be many things, but when I hear that authors should be mirrors of their times, I draw a line in the sand.
Friday night, I was scheduled to read in the Sydney Theatre, together with Nirpal Singh Dhaliwal, Lynn Freed, Ewan Morrison, Hari Kunzru, and John Banville.
Shortly before the reading, rumors spread that Mr. Singh Dhaliwal had offended Mr. Kunzru by calling him a fraud and a non-talent in some English newspaper or magazine. Apparently, Mr. Kunzru refused to speak to Mr. Singh Dhaliwal, but thank God a fistfight was avoided. Mr. Kunzru shook hands with Mr. Singh Dhaliwal like the late Mr. Rabin shook hands with the late Mr. Arafat on the White House lawn. The disgust was tangible.
After the handshake, Mr. Kunzru disappeared to the other room.
Imagine the waiting room at your neighborhood dentist on a rainy Monday morning and you get the atmosphere in the dressing room at the Sydney Theatre.
Ms. Freed must have been so nervous before the reading that she had put on all the make-up she had brought with her to Sydney.
This is not say that she wasn’t charming and kind.
Mr. Banville paced up and down. I wanted to cry out to God, “If this is high culture, let us be defeated by the Great Culture Wars yet to come.” To be continued.


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