We really were identical, like two halves of a coffee bean. That’s why once, a long time ago, she entrusted me and no one else to burn the twenty-five letters that her husband had sent to her, and the seventeen that she had never sent out to various men. “Dust falls to the ground, smoke rises to the heavens.” Of course I never destroyed them, because I thought that it would be worth publishing one or two of the letters, because the most popular literature these days is the kind that falls between fact and fiction.
- from , by Giedra Radvilaviciute
Giedra Radvilaviciute is a Lithuanian prose writer and essayist. Born in Panevezys in 1960, she graduated from Vilnius University with a degree in Lithuanian philology in 1983. She made her debut as a writer in 1985 with a book of short stories, but it was in 1999 that she became truly involved in Lithuanian literature by publishing her essays in the cultural press. Five of her essays were published in the collection Siužetą siūlau nušauti (I propose the plot to be shot down) in 2002. In 2004 Radvilaviciute was published the essay collection Suplanuotos akimirkos (Planned moments) alongside other Lithuanian authors. Her second book of essays Šiąnakt miegosiu prie sienos (Tonight I’ll be sleeping by a wall) was published in 2010. However, ‘essay’ to her does not imply a long and scholarly piece, as English-language readers might expect. Like Paulina Pukyté and some other contemporary writers in Lithuania, she writes short, genre-defying pieces that are also anecdotes, vignettes and metafiction (and very funny).
Radvilaviciute’s work has been translated into English, German, Italian, French, Danish, Croatian, Swedish, and other languages.
Featured Reading Group Titles
Vilnius: Baltos lankos
2004, 143 pages.
Šiąnakt miegosiu prie sienos (Tonight I’ll be sleeping by a wall)
Vilnius: Baltos lankos, 2010, 228 pages.
English extracts:
Radvilaviciute The-Allure-of-the-Text (920.75 kB)
’The Allure of the Text’ was published in this English translation by Darius James Ross in Best European Fiction 2010, edited by Aleksandar Hemon (published by Dalkey Archive Press 2010), an auspicious start to what promises to be an annual treasure.
Radvilaviciute-Giedra Obituary (144.62 kB)
‘Obituary’ was translated by Jūra Avižienis and published in the Vilnius Review in Autumn / Winter 2007. Honest and humorous, it’s an excellent introduction to Radvilaviciute’s wit and style.
Suplanuotos akimirkos are featured in the And Other Stories Lithuanian-language Reading Group for Summer 2010.
