Замразеното време

Trilogie des Todes #1

by Anna Kim, Анна Ким, Жанина Драгостинова (Translator)

Млада жена е отвлечена от селото си по време на Косовската война (1998–1999). След края на военните действия тя не се завръща у дома и е сред онези 30 000 души, обявени за безследно изчезнали. Съпругът ѝ се заема с издирването заедно със сътрудничка на Червения кръст. Между двамата търсещи пламва греховна любов, за която никой не трябва да разбере в патриархалното албанско семейство...

Една книга за смъртта, за травмата от загубата и паметта.

„Удивително как отново и отново от книжния поток се появяват творби, които така директно говорят на читателя, че пораждат потрес. Това са книги, за които Франц Кафка някога казваше, че трябва да бодат, за да те заболи. Несъмнено такъв е и романът на Анна Ким. Колко вълнуващо любовните истории са свързвани с войната в Косово, колко проникновено текстът пита за мястото на мъртвите в живота ни, колко умело представя традицията и ритуала като затвор и в същото време като утешителна опора, колко красиво приближава суеверието и реалистичния разказ.“
Нюрнбергер Нахрихтен

Genres: Fiction, The World, Literature

180 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Anna Kim, born in 1977 in Daejeon, South Korea, has lived in Vienna since 1979, where she studied philosophy and theater studies. Her debut volume Die Bilderspur was published by Droschl in 2004, followed in 2008 by the novel Die frozen time. Afterwards she published invasions of the private in the essay series of the Droschl publishing house and the novel Anatomie einer Nacht (2012). In spring 2013 Kim started the art project »Rohbau der Zukunft_TM« with Anderwald-Grond.

In part for The Frozen Time, Anna Kim received the Heinrich Treichl Prize 2009, the Promotion Prize for Literature of the Republic of Austria (2009) and the Elias Canetti Scholarship (2009) and the European Union Prize for Literature (2012).

Reviews

[Kuszma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ez a regény bizonyos értelemben Nyugat-Európa és az európai periféria viszonyának metaforája. Van ugye az elkényelmesedett Nyugat, aki megengedheti magának a jó szándék luxusát, meg a kivérzett, egyik polgárháborúból a másikba tántorgó periféria (konkretizáljuk: a délszláv borzalmakból alig kikászálódott Koszovó). Előbbi ég a vágytól, hogy segítse utóbbit, hóna alá nyúlna, ám valahogy nem működik a kémia. Hiányzik a megértés kettejük kapcsolatából, talán mert a Nyugat végső soron továbbra is a barbárnak látja a periféria lakóját. Olyan barbárnak, akinek kultúrája imádnivalóan egzotikus, és sorsa együttérzést kelt bennünk - de azért mindent egybevetve mégiscsak barbár. Más, mint mi. Idegen. És hiába rójuk vele Pristina utcáit, hiába lábolunk át vele együtt a tragédiákon, az idegenség falát nem tudjuk áttörni.

Anna Kim Németországban cseperedett koreaiként hivatott arra, hogy erről az idegenségről érvényes megállapításokat tegyen, ám mégis, a végére kicsit számomra leült a szöveg. Talán túl sok lett benne Nora, az elbeszélő, és túl kevés a koszovói Luan. De talán ez is jelzésértékkel bír: hogy ez itt az elmondhatóság határa, az elbeszélő pedig végső soron mindig önmagáról beszél, mert amiről kéne, azt nem mondhatja el más helyett. Mindenesetre a hiányérzet gátat emelt a katarzis elé.

[Nicko D]

Човек никога не разполага с достатъчно време, за да научи как се напуска живота; дали да се отнася към смъртта негостоприемно, с неголяма любезност, или пък умирането хитрува със сигурността, за да може да нанесе неочаквано удара си. В романа си „Замразеното време” корейската писателка Анна Ким описва емоционалните щети, които войната оставя върху нас. Книгата е носител на Награда за литература на Европейския съюз за 2012 година. „Замразеното време” е част от каталога на издателство „Колибри”, в превод на Жанина Драгостинова.

Романът на Анна Ким разказва за търсенето на Фахрие, която изчезва по време на Косовската война през 1998-1999 година. Предполага се, че младата жена е отвлечена от Тигрите на Аркан - паравоенни групи, които работят по поръчка, пленявайки хора, връщайки ги срещу огромни откупи от близките им.

Години по-късно, съпругът на Фахрие – Луан, се заема с издирването й, чудейки се може ли трупът й да бъде намерен сред стотиците жертви, сред осеяните с безброй тела общи гробове. Луан се допитва до международния комитет на Червения кръст и участващите в издирванията на жертви национални дружества, които подготвят специален каталог, в който са събрани подробни данни за жертвите на войната.

В хода на издирването Луан открива останките на Фахрие и „Замразеното време” започва да ни нашепва, че само настоящето е от полза; миналото никога не спира да го има, то е вечно и безполезно. Миналото е условие за настоящето, а всичко преживяно се превръща в минало в момента, в който се преживява.

Кому принадлежи смъртта? Анна Ким заключва, че Факрие няма право дори да задържи смъртта като единствено свое притежание. Умирането не й принадлежи, смъртта принадлежи на почерненото семейство, на близките и приятелите в траур; мъртвецът е нищо друго освен покойник, гробът е неговият дом, а гробището – адрес. Мъртвите също живеят; те продължават да се лашкат в нашите мисли, съществуват, докато споменът за тях тлее в нас.

Анна Ким, родена през 1977 г. в Южна Корея, от съвсем малка живее с родителите си в Западна Германия. Следва философия и театрознание във Виена. След кратък престой в Лондон се установява в австрийската столица. „Замразеното време“ е вторият й роман, за който получава наградата „Хайнрих Трайхл“ на Австрийския Червен кръст, литературната стипендия „Елиас Канети“ и Наградата за литература на ЕС за 2012 г.

[Frank · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wie oft kommt es vor, dass sich ein Roman (?) beinahe ausschließlich mit der Traumatisierung durch eine Vermisstenerfahrung und dann mit dem Sterben bzw. Totsein und den Folgen für die Hinterbliebenen beschäftigt? Anna Kim ringt um Worte und Bilder, die Gefühlszustände einsichtig machen sollen, die wir normalerweise nicht an uns heranlassen, deren Vorhandensein wir verdrängen und auch dann beiseite schieben, wenn wir damit konfrontiert werden. Das ist das unbezweifelbare Verdienst dieses Buches, das an das Grauen des Kosovo- Krieges erinnert und sichtbar macht, wie der Krieg noch viele Jahre später Leben zerstört. Verdienstvoll auch, die Arbeit der Forensiker ins Licht zu holen, die sich damit beschäftigen, den Toten ein Gesicht zurück und den Hinterbliebenen Gewissheit zu geben. Sie machen aus dem anonymen Sterben, dem "Tod im Krieg" die individuellen Mordfälle, als die sie bezeichnet werden müssen, helfen so den Verwandten und der Gerechtigkeit und zweifeln doch selbst am Sinn ihrer Arbeit. Zu viel Leid, das abstumpft und doch nicht stumpf macht. Wenigstens angedeutet wird auch, dass die Gräueltaten nicht nur den Serben zugeschrieben werden können, die nicht die alleinige Verantwortung am Ausbruch des Krieges tragen, in einer Szene sogar als Helfer in der Not und dann auch als Opfer der albanischen Gegenreaktion beschrieben werden. Peter Handke findet hier indirekt eine Verteidigerin, zumal Anna Kim ausdrücklich auf eine Fehldeutung einer Rede von Milosevic hinweist, der prophetisch den Bruder-Krieg voraussagte, ohne ihn akzeptieren zu wollen. Dann kam der Krieg und der wurde von Menschen und auch von Führern so gemacht, wie er abgelaufen ist- daran gibt es nichts zu deuteln und da ist niemand reinzuwaschen. Nur soll man eben die Gewichte der Schuld angemessen und nicht nur einseitig verteilen... Warum nur vier Sterne? Der Text, dem ich die Qualität "Roman" selbst dann absprechen würde, wenn ich das Offene der postmodernen Form in Betracht ziehe, hätte als persönlich gefärbter (fiktiver) "Bericht" besser funktioniert denn als an den Haaren herbei gezogene und zwei Mal (!) fast völlig unmotivierte (im Falle des Forensikers wie des Kosovaren) Beziehungsgeschichte. Selbst wenn ich es opportun fände, dass die Motive und die psychologischen Beweggründe der Erzählerin, sich jeweils nach einem Ersteindruck an den jeweiligen Mann in Liebe zu verlieren, verschwiegen werden, kann ich nur schwer damit umgehen, über die psychologische Motivation eines Mannes fast nichts zu erfahren, der trotz seiner unheilvollen Verstrickung in die Liebes- und Leidensgeschichte seiner nach einer Verhaftung/ Entführung vermissten Frau die neue Beziehung will und sich dann soweit in ihr einrichtet, dass er die neue Geliebte (?) bittet, ihn zur Bestattung der mit ihrer Hilfe identifizierten Vermissten zu seiner Familie zu begleiten. Dieser "Kunstgriff", der nicht gekonnt ist, führt immerhin dazu, Eigenheiten des Umgangs mit Liebe und Tod in einem kosovarischen Familien-Verband (Sippe) darstellen zu können. Das ist interessant, führt aber unter literarischen Gesichtspunkten zu dem Gefühl, hier würden drei Geschichten, die es wert wären, einzeln erzählt zu werden, in eine verpackt, die damit überfrachtet ist und zu viele Brüche aufweist, als dass sie unter künstlerischem Aspekt als "gelungen" bezeichnet werden könnte. Davon ab ist das Thema aber hoch spannend und die Kritik am Künstlerischen mindert nicht Aktualität und Bedeutung der angesprochenen Fragen und die Originalität der Reflexionen, die den Leser zwingen, sich mit der verdrängten Problematik des (indirekten) Leidens am Krieg auseinanderzusetzen. Unter diesem Aspekt ist dem Buch eine breite Leserschaft vor allem in der Generation zu wünschen, die - gewöhnt an Ballerspiele aller Art - heute schon wieder allzu leicht geneigt ist, das dämliche Politiker-Gequatsche von einem notwendig "robusteren Mandat" (das Sprachungeheuer meint schlichtweg KRIEG) u.a. der Bundeswehr kritik- und widerstandslos hinzunehmen. Es ist ja nicht wahr, dass "uns" so etwas wie im Jugoslawien- Krieg nicht passieren könnte. Doch, es kann, und diverse AfD-Politiker bereiten sich und ihre Klientel auch schon darauf vor. Wehret den Anfängen - in diesem Sinne ist Anna Kims Anrufung der Vergangenheit ein Weckruf für die Zukunft. Ich kann daher das Buch zur Lektüre empfehlen!

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

“…being missing mutates into the birthmark on their forehead, into the scar on their cheek, into their predilection for swimming in the rain, strolling along streets after midnight.”




Such are the sorts of details that forensic archeologists and forensic anthropologists look for when trying to find missing persons. It’s not enough to know what the missing person looked like, but how they lived, even their favorite foods, places to eat, and ways they liked to travel are also important. Habits assist in placing the victims, dental records and medical reports come in later to confirm the identity. Such is the difficult work of locating and identifying missing persons in wartime, in this novel, specifically during the Kosovo war. The conflict between Albanians and Serbs was intensely violent, and cases of mass executions and random kidnappings were common.





Frozen Time examines the conflict from the point of view of a researcher with the Red Cross Tracing Network in Vienna whose job consists of interviewing the families of persons still missing long after the conflict ended. She interviews the family, trying to discern details that will set their loved one apart amid the thousands of corpses that are buried throughout the region. Physical details are important, but even their moods and whims create an additional layer of identification. Nora is taught essential skills in interviewing loved ones, yet even her professional demeanor is challenged when hearing the heartbreaking stories of incomprehensible atrocities.




The title comes from Nora’s observations about a man, Luan, who is searching for his wife Fahrie, who had been abducted seven years before and was presumed dead. “Your present and future have been amputated, leaving traces, phantom beings, they complain whenever you forget your grief, even if only for a moment, your life frozen at the moment when you discovered Fahrie had disappeared, no, it’s not your life that’s frozen but your time, frozen time which doesn’t count, you wish it would finally pass, it is passing, but as it’s frozen, it passes infinitely slowly. Or is it less a matter of being frozen, more of experiencing particular minutes, days and months in an endless loop?” Her interviews with him are painful, as he deals with the guilt of not protecting her, guilt for his own survival, and the guilt that he feels when he tries to move on with his life. Yet in order to find her, and differentiate her from all the others, she has to probe, unemotionally and distant, to find clues.




As she interviews him and builds a paper trail of Luan and Fahrie’s life, their shared history, another dimension is revealed as the courtship and marriage rituals unique to the region are explained. Arranged marriages are still common in Albania, and in the case of Fahrie and Luan, they cleverly met in advance to see if they could stand each other, and fell in love on their own, which required them to hide their affection at their marriage because it was assumed they’d never met. Sweet little details like that make Luan’s grief, despite the seven years of solitude, palpable and intense.




The story is told in a documentary style, based on the styles of interviews that are typically done in these cases. This means no dialogue tags, quotation marks, and a few areas of abbreviated text. It feels very real-brisk-and yet despite that, or maybe because of it, the details of the atrocities that are still being unearthed and exposed are shocking and hideous. I remember this time period, my children were little, and it’s hard to imagine such a medieval scope of violence occurring within their lifetime. Even having studied the region in previous nonfiction texts, I was still astonished at what unimaginable horrors have been meted out to innocent victims. The book doesn’t focus on these, but they are there in the background, begging the reader to consider where such violence comes from.




An especially important detail is that the author, Anna Kim, doesn’t get into the politics of the war; she doesn’t push for one side’s guilt over the other, instead, she concentrates on the recovery process. In a situation where, say, one hundred bodies are discovered in a mass grave, it isn’t enough to have a photograph or DNA; knowing if the missing person frequented the area, what they wore (were their ears pierced?), and if they were right or left handed is more useful in the initial stages.




This book was hard to put down: the style of writing and subject matter had me glued to it to see if Fahrie would be found. I marked so many interesting passages of text I couldn’t even begin to sort them out for this review. There was only one thing that drove me nuts: extensive use of italicized words and phrases. I’m not sure if it was on the author or translator or even editor’s end, but very often in the narrative, a few words would be italicized to remind you that they are very important. But the context was clear and concise, if you’d read anything in the book you knew that without needing italics to tell you it was significant. It sounds completely trivial but it put my teeth on edge at times, because it was distracting and unnecessary. It almost came off as childish, which makes no sense given the serious nature of the subject matter. See, I just did it…isn’t that obnoxious? The book was still very much worth it, but it had to be mentioned!

[Erlinda Pysqyli · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not my cup of tea

[Jim Elkins · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a brief but intense book about the search for a woman who was abducted in Kosovo. The narrator is a Red Cross volunteer who helps locate missing people; she ends up following a man to Pristina to see the exhumed body of his wife, missing for seven years.

As the translator, Michael Mitchell, comments, the book's language is a juxtaposition of forensic information, including the Red Cross protocol for gathering information from survivors, and various kinds of poetic prose written in the second person. "Frozen Time" is interesting on that account, and also because it uses some Albanian words (such as hoxha, a Muslim priest, or Prishtine with an umlaut on the "e," which is the Albanian spelling of Pristina).

It is stark and sharply drawn: compelling as an act of witness but not as a novel. The narration is split between efficient, unadorned reportage of forensics and protocols, and the narrator's intermittently poetic but often literal-minded sense of what the bereaved man does and thinks. There is no consistent development of the narrator's own thoughts and feelings, which go in and out of focus for no clear reason. The man whose wife is missing lives in "frozen time," so his feelings presumably hardly change: but in that "hardly" there is a lot of room for elaboration that never takes place. The feeling of being emotionally frozen gives the book its strength but also serves as an excuse to keep the book's tone battened down to a cold surface.

A stronger version of this book could depict the struggle to feel--not only on the man's part, but on the narrator's. The back cover copy says she becomes "personally involved" with the man, but the nature of that involvement is so ferociously excluded--it is pushed out by the narrator's relentless second-parson reporting--that her interest might only be unreflective or even professional curiosity about other people's suffering. The book could also have been stronger if Kim had hinted that the narrator was drawn to suffering, pathology, or hopeless causes. If I had thought any of those things was possible, I would have been more interested in her. As it is she's like a reporter, or, worse, a novelist in search of subject matter.

[Daisy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Somber. Tragic. Real and dark.

(An example of the writer's language, but just an aside which doesn't pertain to the story: ... if you imagine something unheard of -- automobiles with five wheels, hedgehogs on tiptoe, ghosts with sunglasses -- I love that. )

[Natia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't find the words to describe how painful is the BOOK

[Verce Hristovska · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vojna.. Sudbini.. Odlicna kniga vo koja se dava prikaz na nacinot na koj se baraat isceznatite lica vo voeno vreme. Stanuva zbor za Kosovo, i preku sekavanjata, emociite i potragata na Ljuan Aljushi, koj si ja bara soprugata Fahrie Aljushi, nie se srekavame so edno prebolno vreme za site. Razgovorot se vodi vo Viena, i postoi priracnik po koj se vodat rabotite, no sekavanjata poleka, poleka isceznuvaat. Neizvesnosta i neznaenjeto, vecnata potraga da se dobijat odgovori i konecni reshenija se motiv da se prodolzi ponatamu. Vojnata, od lugeto, pravi cudovishta, da se razbereme.. Prashanjeto e kako ke se opstoi? Ima mnogu uzas i bolka vo knigava, no i ljubov

[Nadya Trifonova-Dimova · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF на 60%. Описанието на книгата ме привлече, но нищо в реалното изпълнение не ми хареса. Нито героите, нито начина на писане, нито коя да е част от и без това малкото развитие в сюжета, което се случи.

[Marco Etheridge · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant, dark, tragic, and profound, Anna Kim's "Frozen Time" is a slim volume not to be entered into lightly. A lost soul seeks his wife who is long years missing, a casualty of the brutal Yugoslav War in Kosovo. The narrator is lost as well, another casualty to the brutal separation between the living and the dead. Themes of love, loss, living, dying, and the ephemeral quality of longing and memory mingle throughout this novel. The story is both stark and beautiful; both blazing and dark.

Again, I caution the reader: Do not enter lightly into this novel. It is masterfully written, but also deeply disturbing. The reader who perseveres will be rewarded and quite likely haunted long after last page is read.

[Elise · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this for my Read the World challenge for Austria. While the idea was good and there was some good thoughts but I don't know if it was the execution or the translation that left me puzzled. The story is about a man whose wife was taken seven years ago in Kosovo. He meets a young woman who works with the Red Cross who works to help those who have lost loved ones. In the course of their interview the two begin to have a relationship and she ends up going with him to Kosovo.

The story switches perspective from Luan to Nora without indicating who it is so it took me a couple of sentences and sometimes paragraphs to figure out who it was that was speaking. There was also an offshoot of the story about Nora and a doctor named Sam which took away from the plot but I think was supposed to show Nora's character.

Some of the writing was cyclical, such as "Present absent ones, their presence unbearably lasting, basically the nature of this existence consists of presence despite absence" but I did think Luan's lament of losing someone was poignant and I really liked the story of his mom. It was a fairly short read but complicated.

[Мариана Рангелова · Rating 3 out of 5]

След прочитането на "Аз още броя дните" на Георги Бърдаров темата за войната в Косово ми стана интересна. "Замразеното време" разглежда войната от другата страна - периодът, в който всичко вече ти е взето - надеждата (отдавна изчезнала), желанието за живот, смисъла на всеки нов ден, дори близките ти... Историята е интересна, увличаща дори (прочетох книгата само за два часа), но използването на второ лице направо ми срина удоволствието от четенето. На няколко пъти се чудех защо ли продължавам да се мъча с този стил, но накрая все пак разбрах - защото историята заслужава да бъде прочетена.

[Tanja · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pretresljiva zgodba o iskanju ljubljene osebe, izginule/ugrabljene med vojno na Kosovu. Zgodba da misliti o smrti, sprejemanju le-te ter sprejemanju situacije, da ne vemo kaj natančno se je zgodilo z ljubljeno osebo.

Stil pisanja mi nikakor ni bil všeč, preskoki iz enega dogodka v drugega brez kakšne konkretne časovnice. Ne vem, jaz sem bila rahlo izgubljena in pri meni ni dosegla nekega globljega vtisa.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Best line of the book: Beside you a cassette recorder, recorded is your own voice, words you stole from you bedtime reading at the well lapdogs swinging in sadness on the shoetree are chatting full of sugar candy. You left out some words when you read it, now the book thinks you're grateful for the detraction, grateful for every line by mistake Auntie cooks lightly leafless basilisk.

[KayG · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yugoslavia.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

- Wow. So painful and disturbing. Interesting writing style. Amazing images and beautiful
- Why did this class suck so bad

[წიგნების შესახებ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't find the words to describe how painful is the BOOK