Monday 21 April 2014

Teona Dolenjashvili (თეონა დოლენჯაშვილმა)
source: http://radio1.ge/media-view/8748

Teona “is regarded as one of Georgia’s most promising young authors.“ (http://gratzfeld.ch/pages/en/authors/ teonadolendschaschwili.php) Her first work, collection of stories named "River of January" (იანვრის მდინარე), was published in 2003 and her novel "Memfisi" in 2008. She uses very interesting poetic images and symbols and she won various prices for her books.

22 comments:

Zuzka Š. said...

Teona Dolenjashvili sa narodila v roku 1977. Vyštudovala žurnalistiku a filmovú produkciu. Za svoje prvé dielo "Januárová rieka" alebo "River of January", ktorá bola publikovaná v roku 2005, získala o rok neskôr literárnu cenu Saba v kategórii najlepší debut roka. Ide o zbierku krátkych príbehov.
Zdroj: http://www.bookplatform.org/en/activities/878-teona-dolenjashvili.html

Zuzka Š. said...

Teona Dolenjashvili sa preslávila aj románom "Memphis", ktorý uzrel svetlo sveta v roku 2008. V nasledujúcom roku získal cenu Saba v kategórii Najlepší román roku 2009.
Viac o tomto románe sa dočítate na stránke: http://www.bookplatform.org/en/activities/878-teona-dolenjashvili.html, kde nájdete aj ukažku z knihy.

Zuzka Š. said...

Literárna cena Saba bola založená v roku 2003. Koná sa každoročne. Cieľom je uviesť do povedomia verejnosti novovznikajúcu literárnu tvorbu. Cena je udeľovaná vo viacerých kategóriách, ako napríklad najlepší román, najlepší literárny debut, najlepšia básnická zbierka a pod. Víťazi získavajú finančnú odmenu.
Viac na: https://saba.com.ge/html/page/18

Zuzka Š. said...

Memfisi (Memphis)
A dramatic, emotional, thrilling novel. „Memphis“ tells of a world in which objects and things have taken the place of human emotions and relationships. The most important human attribute of all – the heart that can feel, experience pain, grow tired – is being lost; it has become a thing that can be disposed of. This becomes clear to Ana, the young painter who finds herself transported from the house with the carved veranda to the more refined society of Zurich. The novel opens with Ana taking leave of her husband and her daughter Mari in Zurich and travelling to her homeland of Georgia; there she is desperately hoping to track down a heart for her daughter, who suffers from a heart condition, since no suitable organ is available in Switzerland. Her search becomes a delving into her childhood, which saw her mother suddenly disappear without trace. Ana becomes embroiled in a grim tale of organ trading that requires of her, now a mother herself, the ultimate sacrifice.
Dolenjashvili tells about the current crisis of the Western world and the role of her own country in the context of the modern world: is it but a donor, a still healthy transplant for old Europe, or has it some other, more important mission?
http://gratzfeld.ch/pages/en/authors/teonadolendschaschwili/title/memfisi.php

Zuzka Š. said...

Ianvris mdinare (River of January)
Twelve short stories, linked by a common motive: grief for what has been lost, the desire to regain the irretrievable or to forget it, the wish to flee reality, to start a new life, or to find salvation in art. Many of the stories are set in the fictitious town of Paradiso or in an indistinct place from which everyone is attempting to flee. The author uses unusual poetic images and the stories often veer into the fantastic and symbolic: the cat that writes prophecies on the carpet; the mirror in which past events are visible; lost items that reappear in birds’ nests; boots that the protagonist loses as the aeroplane lands in Italy and then finds again in the aircraft in which she leaves the country. Nothing happens by chance; everything has meaning.
http://gratzfeld.ch/pages/en/authors/teonadolendschaschwili/title/ianwrismdinare.php

Zuzka Š. said...

Awards:
Newspaper “Parnasi” (Parnassus) Prize for the Best Short Story “Fidai” (2004)
Literary Award Saba, The Best Debut of the Year, for the collection of short stories “January River” (2006)
Literary Award Saba, The Best Novel of the Year for “Memphis” (2009)
http://translationlab.ge/authors/teona-dolenjashvili/

Zuzka Š. said...

Teona Dolenjashvili is an interesting author. The main motive for women´s work have always been love (lost love, offended love, expectation for love and other love(s) of this sort), sentimentalism, relationships of man and woman, children and family. The thematic and ideological features of Teona´s work are global (completely "non-female") issues: ecological disasters, terrorism, cloning, apocalypse and post-apocalyptic genre, unusual, exotic environment and entourage, the unexpected and dramatic plot developement, the brutal reality etc.
The same applies to one of her latest works Animal Planet, apocalyptic, post apocalyptic and anti-utopia texts.
Teona says: I fulfilled my goal in the story and left the humanity and the female dog with and open finale and an uncertain future......it´s probably necessary to tell everyone that animals are mostly better...".
EGO MAG, Issue 6, June, 2012
http://issuu.com/flitmedia/docs/ego_magazine___6

Zuzka Š. said...

You can download Teona´s book Animal Planet here: http://ondaelastica.com/animal-planet-ebook-download

Kristina Tapakova said...

The short content of Teona´s book Memphis:
In the novel, the events take their start in Georgia of nineties and tell us about a painter girl from Tbilisi, who is trying to escape abroad from the difficulties of her own country, as well as her solitude and lack of love. In Europe, she becomes a famous painter, but can hardly find neither her peacefulness, nor love. She returns to her home country, in order to find a donor for her sick child. Though, she stumbles into an organization, which is profiting on homeless children's organs. She finds herself confronted against the most important decision of her life, and at the same time, she cracks the mystery of her disappeared mother, who was vanished without a single trace, while her daughter was still a child.
In the novel, the author tells about the contemporary crises of the western world, and the role of the own country in the context of modern world: is her country nothing but a donor, a still healthy transplant for old Europe, or does she some other, more important mission?

http://bookplatform.org/en/activities/879-memphis.html

Zuzka Š. said...

You can learn some basic information about Teona and also see some interesting photos from her life at this website:
http://www.guramdolart.ru/page4/page44/index.html

Zuzka Š. said...

At this website, you can find out about other winners who received Literary Award Saba along with Teona in 2009. There are eight categories in which this award is granted.
http://old.tbcbank.ge/en/about/bank_overview/news/?id=1582&p=15

Zuzka Š. said...

Contemporary Georgian Fiction
(Edited and translated by Elizabeth Heighway)
This volume brings together stories from nineteen of the most influential contemporary authors to have emerged from the Republic of Georgia. Spanning fifty years, but with a particular emphasis on post-independence fiction, this collection features a diverse range of styles and voices, offering a window onto a vibrant literary scene that has been largely inaccessible to the English-language reader until now. With stories addressing subjects as diverse as blood feuds, betrayal, sex, drugs, and Sergio Leone, it promises to challenge any existing preconceptions the reader might hold, and make available a rich and varied literary tradition unjustly overshadowed by the other ex-Soviet republics, until now.
It includes work by Mariam Bekauri, Lasha Bugadze, Zaza Burchuladze, Teona Dolenjashvili etc.
http://www.dalkeyarchive.com/product/contemporary-georgian-fiction/

Zuzka Š. said...

Teona was a part of a project called „Situation of women writers in modern society“. Five Lithuanian and five Georgian women prose writers took part in this project: Nijolė Kliukaitė-Kepenienė worked in pair with Maka Ldokonen, Nijolė Raižytė – with Teona Dolenjashvili, Janina Survilaite-Vatkevičius – with Nino Tepnadze, Gintarė Adomaitytė – with Tamta Melashvili, Laura Sintija Černiauskaitė – with Mariam Bekauri. Georgian translator Nana Devidze helped all participants to translate their short stories to each other’s language. Nana has read Lithuanian writers short stories and helped to select the Georgian writers. The project’s manager – writer Birutė Jonuškaitė. This project is funded by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Lithuania.
http://www.rasytojai.lt/archyvas/index.en0c9e.html?sritis=straipsniai&id=1208

Zuzka Š. said...

Eastern European Literature at the Frankfurt Book Fair
The world’s largest book fair—with around 7,500 exhibitors from over 110 countries—was opened to the public in 2011.
In a brochure published by the Georgian Publishers and Booksellers Association you could have found David Dephy (He took part in 2011 PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature, where Laurie Anderson accompanied him on violin as he read from his work. Dephy’s short story Before the End was included in the 2012 edition of Best European Fiction). The brochure contains an excerpt from Dephy’s work—a stark, surreal story told from the point of view of a writer’s chair—as well as excerpts from thirty additional Georgian authors, including Teona Dolenjashvili, Chambua Amiredjibi, who was twice nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature, and Ana Kordzaia-Samadashvili, who has translated Elfriede Jelinek and other important contemporary German-language authors into Georgian.
http://bombmagazine.org/article/6174/eastern-european-literature-at-the-frankfurt-book-fair-a-small-selection

Vanesa Csengodyová said...

Dephy took part in this year’s PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature, where Laurie Anderson accompanied him on violin as he read from his work. Dephy’s short story Before the End will be included in the 2012 edition of Best European Fiction (Dalkey Archive Press, ed. by Aleksander Hemon). The brochure contains an excerpt from Dephy’s work—a stark, surreal story told from the point of view of a writer’s chair—as well as excerpts from thirty additional Georgian authors, including Teona Dolenjashvili, Chambua Amiredjibi, who was twice nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature, and Ana Kordzaia-Samadashvili, who has translated Elfriede Jelinek and other important contemporary German-language authors into Georgian.
http://bombmagazine.org/article/6174/eastern-european-literature-at-the-frankfurt-book-fair-a-small-selection

Zuzka Š. said...

If there is someone interested in Teona and Contemporary Georgian Fiction, on this webpage you can find out that Teona´s story in this volume is called Real beings.
http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/163047204?q=+&versionId=177683439

Zuzka Š. said...

Here is some information about Contemporary Georgian Fiction:
The unknown is a collection of Georgian short stories, titled Contemporary Georgian Fiction, by 19 writers in the post-independence era. The lengths vary, some more succint and powerful than others. Lots of pain, liberation, agony, disappointment, suicide and anger in the stories but gives an insight into places I have never looked before - geographically and metaphorically.
Lots of introspection especially with Tarttelin's Golden Boy, but also in the anthology.
"Mika thinks a person's life is but a slight ripple on the surface of existence. A few faint circles and then - gulp! - eternal invisibility...." (From Real Beings, by Teona Dolenjashvili)
http://vgayathry.blogspot.sk/2013_09_01_archive.html

Zuzka Š. said...

On April 15, 2013 the national collective stand of Georgia opened at London Book Fair – it was the first stand of Georgia at London Book Fair presented by the Ministry of Culture and Monument Protection of Georgia.
The books of about fifteen Georgian publishers are presented at the stand of Georgia organized by “Georgian Publishers and Booksellers Association”, under the support of the Ministry of Culture and Monument Protection of Georgia. “Bakur Sulakauri Publishing House”, “Diogene”, “Karchkhadze Publishing House”, “Siesta”, “Logos Press”, “Palitra L”, “Bakmi” and “Klio” are among the publishing houses.
Guram Odisharia, the Minister of Culture and Monument Protection of Georgia, Marine Mizandari, the Deputy First Minister, Teona Dolenjashvili, the Advisor of the Minister and Medea Metreveli, the head of the Program in Support of Georgian Book and Literature met with British translator Donald Rayfield, British journalist and publisher Peter Nesmith and American-British publisher John O’Bryan in frames of London book fair. At the meeting they spoke about the future interrelationships among British and Georgian authors and publishing houses.
http://www.culture.gov.ge/topicdetals-11.5825.html

Zuzka Š. said...

Here you can see other books written by Teona:
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5227460.Teona_Dolenjashvili

Zuzka Š. said...

Teona´s Real Beings
Real people are living creatures on our side. Tired, frustrated, and sometimes desperate people in love. Or maybe they were the ones we are ... real life and real feelings: love, betrayal, selfishness, fear ... it's what remains in memory and in many cases, the painful memory. The genius blocks the gene, these cells collapse and he helps people escape from an oppressive past once and for all.
Teona Dolenjashvili "real things" heroes in life was this choice. The choice of life and death, love and hate, between repentance and forgotten.
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22085019

Unknown said...

Teona's first literary work was published in 2003. 2005 saw the publication of her volume of stories „Ianvris mdinare“, for which she was awarded the 2006 Saba Prize for the best debut work. Her novel „Memfisi“ was published in 2008; the following year it won the Saba Prize for the best first novel. Teona Dolenjashvili is regarded as one of Georgia’s most promising young authors.

Unknown said...

Teona Dolenjashvili was born in 1977. She graduated from Tbilisi State University – Journalism and Filmmaking department. She started to actively publish her works since 2003. Her first book, the short stories collection "January River", was published in 2005 by Bakur Sulakauri Publishing. In 2006, "January River" has been awarded the literature prize Saba for the Best debut of the year. Her short stories are translated into German, English, Russian, Ukrainian, and Azeri languages and had been published in various literature collections of the above mentioned countries. The novel "Memphis" was published in 2008 by Publishing House Siesta and was awarded Literary prize Saba for the Best Novel of the Year in 2009.