SubStance

SubStance 32.2 (2003) 12-43

Let's Take that From the Beginning Again...

Antoine Volodine
interviewed by Jean-Didier Wagneur

Jean-Didier Wagneur: A recurring scene in your novels is that of the interrogation. An individual is forced to speak, to admit, to justify himself. Our conversation will be more peaceful, I hope, but it places us in an identical situation.

Antoine Volodine: In my early novels, I was referring exclusively to police situations. The exchange took place in prisons, in cellars, in torture chambers. Nevertheless, the form of the responses always had a relationship to literature: under the guise of a response, the interrogated person recounted stories, or, more accurately, imagined them. Sometimes, too, as in Rituel du mépris, he wrote them down, on whatever was available—straw, mildewed paper—in the darkness of a cage. Quickly, though, starting with Lisbonne, dernière marge, the interrogation was carried out on two fronts: that of information and that of literature. For example, in Vue sur l'ossuaire, the truth that the inquisitors seek with such brutality is inexplicably included in a collection of poetic prose. This slim volume becomes the focus of all the questions. Despite their obsession with piercing its secret, the interrogators do not see the evidence: there is no great mystery; the book seals an amorous alliance that is beyond the reach of the ugliness of politics and war. It's true that the frequency of interrogations in my books has been reinforced since I have been invited by researchers and journalists to speak about my texts, to avow my intentions, and to justify myself concerning the literary means that I use. At the risk of appearing disagreeable, I affirm that only my texts contain the answers to the questions you'd like to ask me. The interview is an exercise that I go along with because I am obliged to, but I don't sincerely believe that it is part of the communication between my readers and myself, or, rather, between the voices of my narrators and the friendship of my readers. [End Page 12]

JDW: Your characters have the habit of using cunning, inventing fictions for the police. What assurance do we have that you will tell the truth...

AV: I have always been very close to my characters, as I've often said. Sometimes, to use the words of Lutz Bassmann, I believe, there is not even the thickness of a sheet of paper between them and me. Thus we have the same conception of truth. I suppose that from your point of view, you have the same conception of truth as those who beat them up. Or am I mistaken?

JDW: What does a writer today have to say—or rather, what, as a writer, is he competent to say?

AV: That will become apparent later. At first glance, I think that a writer's expertise is limited to writing his books. The rest, especially as a voice in the city or in society, does not come from his competence as a writer, but simply from his talent—more or less real—as a worldly chatterbox or agitator. Just because a person knows how to create a novelistic text does not mean that he is suddenly more insightful than others about political and ethical problems. More often, it is the opposite. When a writer talks about something other than his books, it's better to treat him as though he were an official politician, and thus not to believe for a moment in the sincerity of his discourse.

JDW: The literary interview, which dates from the nineteenth century, usually begins with some biographical references. The writer has had a past, family origins, an education. But in your case, we know very little—as little as we do about the narrators of your novels. Is this by design, in order to blend into the world of your characters?

AV: Yes, if you will. As you say, the world of my characters is profoundly interesting to me. My non-literary...