Toomas Vint

[Eric]

I'm still translating that book by Toomas Vint that I referred to in previous postings. Getting near the end, now. Toomas Vint has his own website, but only in Estonian. Browsing there, I found an interesting little comment by Vint himself about one of his earlier novels. This novel is called "A Big Boss Fish in the Aquarium" (1985). This brief comment gives an interesting insight into the puritan-utopian nature of Soviet ideology:

A true-life look at the artistic life of the epoch. The life of dreams and that of the real world. The self-realisation of a young artist. A number of avant garde ideas are examined in the book. One interesting character is Leopold who (prophetically) works as a conceptual artist at the end of the 20th century. This is the first time we meet the artist Vennet among the list of characters. [This recurring figure is Vint's alter ego - but Vint the painter, not Vint the writer.] The novel was censored in the struggle against alcoholism, and nearly all the passages dealing with alcohol were removed.

Tõsitruu sisevaade ajastu kunstiellu. Unenägude maailm ja reaalne maailm. Noore kunstniku loominguline eneseteostus. Raamatus esitatakse mitmeid avangardseid ideid. Huvitav tegelane on Leopold, kes tegutseb (prohvetlikult) sajandilõpu kontseptuaalse kunstnikuna. Esimest korda kohtame tegelaskujude seas kunstnik Vennetit. Romaani tsenseeriti
joomarluse vastu võitlemise eesmärgil, võeti välja peaaegu kõik alkoholiga seonduv.

This shows an interesting aspect of Soviet life: being in denial. Although a great number of Soviet citizens drank too much on account of the hopelessness of their daily lives, official Soviet ideology tried to pretend that this safety valve simply did not exist.

So now that Vint is free to tell us this, and will not get sent to Siberia for anti-Soviet activity, we learn a little more about what life was like in the Soviet Union.

[Eric]

Well, I've just sent the corrections to the galley proofs of "An Unending Landscape" to Dalkey today. There were not many corrections this time, all of them quite minor, but those sorts of things that would irritate the translator if he saw them in the printed book. And although some of the recent comments were on the "Estonian Literature" thread, I thought I'd bump this one, because you can then see what other things Vint has written. Apart from a story of his, this is (I believe) the first post-Soviet work of this author-cum-painter to appear in the English language. Both the Estonian Literature thread and this one have reproductions of those of his paintings that he has used as book covers. So it is also nice that the English translation will have a Vint painting on the cover.

Anyway, this all means that this novel will be available later this year (I think, as we're already in May). The cover, which Liam posted earlier, is almost identical to the Estonian original that I have on my desk in front of me as I write.





It's quite definitely a postmodernist novel, for those that like that sort of thing, and the narration of the various parts echoes various other writers and artists (the jargon is: intertextuality). Allusions are to Joseph Beuys, Jacques Lacan, Chekhov, Iris Murdoch (no, not Rupert or James), and several Estonians plus one Green enthusiast, the Finn Pentti Linkola. It is a tragi-comedy, but much weighted on the comedy side of things. It is also adequately philosophical, examining, for instance, the role of Green thinking, a tongue-in-cheek look at police informers, and the role of contemporary art in society. There is also a certain amount of sexual ambiguity.

I am unashamedly plugging the book here, because when you've translated about 250 pages of original text (which have become about 340 pages of English with a larger typeface and more generous spacing) you do want someone to actually read it. But I have been helped along the way by an Estonian lady who meticulously read through the whole manuscript to make sure I hadn't made any stupid mistakes (I had) and helped me with the more complex idioms. So that important revision, plus the work of the editor in the USA, all enhance the book (not forgetting the person who turned Vint's painting into the cover). There is most definitely an element of teamwork in translation, but ultimately the translator himself or herself must be responsible both for the good bits and clever turns of phrase, and the bloomers, omissions, and clumsinesses.

[Stevie B]

Eric, I've already pre-ordered An Unending Landscape from Amazon (for 1/3 off the cover price!). Looks like the book will out in August?

[Eric]

Nice to know that someone's going to buy it, Stevie B. If it's out in August I'll be happy.

[Eric]

Just out of interest, the author's acknowledgements are as follows:

The author of this book would like to thank the authors of other books, but would especially like to credit the following authors who provided direct help: Irma Truupõld, Vladimir Nabokov, Iris Murdoch, Anton Chekhov, Tõnu Õnnepalu, Roland Barthes, Milan Kundera, Tõnis Vint, Virginia Woolf, John Fowles, Anton Tammsaare, Pentti Linkola, Jacques Derrida...

The internationally famous authors are obvious, but the four Estonians and one Finn may not be familiar to most of you. So:

Irma Truupõld (1903-1980) wrote rather romantic Green books for children long before it was trendy to be Green.

Tõnu Õnnepalu (pseudonym Emil Tode; born 1962) wrote and published Estonia's first gay novel "Border State" back in 1993.

Tõnis Vint (born 1941) is Toomas Vint's brother and a well know graphicist.

Anton Tammsaare (civil surname: Hansen; 1878-1940) was the most famous Estonian realist prose author before Jaan Kross, whose epic in five volumes called "Truth & Justice" shows the movement from country life to the city over several decades.

Pentti Linkola (born 1932) is an odd mixture of a Finnish Green theorist, an admirer of Nazi Germany and was also inspired by the so-called RAF or Red Brigades group.

*

Vint also plays around with the name of the German installation artist Joseph Beuys (1921-1986) and the works of the Estonian Mati Unt (1944-2005), three of whose novels have been published in English by Dalkey, plus a novella called "An Empty Beach" which is alluded to intertextually in "An Unending Landscape".

[Liam]

A recent overview of Vint's An Unending Landscape @ The Complete Review. Overall grade: B (on a scale, presumably, of A to F). Eric's name is mentioned a couple of times, so yes, go Eric! My one complaint is that the reviewer gives too much of the plot away, and rather unnecessarily. Always hint at, but don't spell things out.

[Eric]

It's a pretty fair review, all in all. The plot isn't entirely giveawayable as it does recur twice in a Russian dolls sort of way, so except for the subtle twists, the readers knows the skeleton of what is going to happen, the second and third times. Orthofer mentions homosexuality, but the legover aspect of the novel in its recurring parts is more about sexual ambivalence (is it a man, is it a woman, or a transsexual / transvestite?). Vint plays with this and does pull in various intertextual (intersexual?) things from other famous novels. The book grows on you as you notice details that Vint has drawn in, such as mockery of German art guru Joseph Beuys and his installations (Vint himself is an orthodox oil-on-canvas painter as well as being an author), and the way so-called art experts exploit others, not least the sort of slightly simple-minded artistic genius who can churn out artworks that others get most of the money and credit for. Some of the narration is not the protagonist speaking, or could be, as Vint even splits himself into the Writer (main protagonost) and Vennet the painter. In real life Vint is both.

So the novel has to be read twice. Even I discovered things as I translated it. I've not yet sussed whether the book is in the shops or whether reviewers got a copy before publication.