Skinswaps

by Andrej Blatnik, Tamara Soban (Translator)

The first collection of stories by Slovenian writer Andrej Blatnik to appear in English, Skinswaps represents a new ethos in the literature of post-Communist Eastern Europe. Blatnik's vision of the isolation, self-deception, violence, and emotional deterioration of human experience is powerfully rendered, yet tempered by a light touch and humane sense of irony.

Genres: Short Stories, Contemporary

109 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Andrej Blatnik was born on May 22nd, 1963, in Ljubljana, Slovenia, where he studied Comparative Literature and Sociology of Culture and got his Masters in American Literature and PhD in Communication Studies. He started his artistic career playing bass guitar in a punk band, was a free-lance writer for five years, and now he works as an editor in Cankarjeva publishing house, teaches creative writing and is on the editorial board of the Literatura monthly since 1984. He is currently the president of the jury for the Vilenica prize.

Reviews

[Tormund · Rating 4 out of 5]

Özellikle sırtımdaki Çizikler öyküsüne bayıldım

[belisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

ortalama öyküler
"Isaac" ve "Kyoto" ortalama üstüydü

[Bob Lopez · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mostly not very interesting short short stories. The standouts in this collection were the longer stories "Scratches on the Back" and "Taste of Blood." I could take or leave the rest.

[Viet · Rating 3 out of 5]

from Skinswaps by Andrej Blatnik (translated from the Slovenian by Tamara Soban):

That night I came home late. Rather late, I'd say. The streets seemed narrower than normal. They grew up closer, I thought. If you walk along them, it's like cutting into living flesh. You have to have power, the same power required for a stab with a knife. This is the city. Here one lives with the greediness of turbines. The city pulsates like a thousand-ton heart, filled with blood. Yes, that's why Diana looks at the streets at night. She studies the capillaries of a body that isn't hers. Not yet. In the sidewalk I recognized a harsh emotion which told me not to look at the ground, to avoid the ground.

[Esteban · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most of the stories did not mean anything to me. I really could not put them together on the changing skin concept/motif. Some of them are very disturbing in a good way, others a waste of time I did not like his speculative style, long sentences and postmodern topics, but at least four or five stories really worth the reading.